Former President Donald Trump knows how important his words about unauthorized immigrants are.
“Migrant criminals.” “Illegal monster.” “Killers.” “Gang members.” “Poisoning our country.” “Taking your jobs.” “The largest invasion in the history of our country.”
Repetition has been core to Trump’s speech throughout his political career. Research has shown that the more times someone hears a statement, the more it feels true.
The Marshall Project used a combination of computer-aided text analysis and human reporting to process over 350,000 of Trump’s public statements from Factba.se. Reporters found 13 major claims about immigration, some of which the former president has repeated 500 times or more. All of them are false or deeply misleading.
Our analysis showed these are among Trump’s most-repeated and noteworthy claims — follow the links for The Marshall Project’s full fact checks:
Here are five things to know from our in-depth analysis.
Repetition makes false statements seem more true
Even recognizing that a statement is false becomes more difficult when someone repeatedly hears it.
Cognitive scientists call this the “illusory truth effect.” The more someone hears a statement, the more likely they are to believe it. Why is that? Repetition makes information easier to process, making it seem more truthful. A 2021 study found that repeating a piece of information up to nine times continued to make it more believable to subjects, and further repetition did not decrease the effect.
Falsely linking immigration and crime has resulted in real policies, such as Secure Communities, a program that flags immigrants in local law enforcement custody for deportation, and the 287(g) program, which delegates some immigration enforcement tasks to local police agencies. Experts say such policies do not work, and distract from discussion of true causes and solutions.
Trump has made at least 560 statements connecting immigrants to criminality. According to a consistent, overwhelming amount of criminology research, immigrants to the United States — both legal and undocumented — have committed less crime than native-born Americans, going all the way back to the 1870s. Learn more at the full fact check.
Unauthorized immigrants are used to create doubt about election results
Claims about immigration and crime are being used to challenge the legitimacy of the 2020 and potentially the 2024 general election.
For example, Gov. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia accepted the 2020 results but raised concerns about noncitizen voting. In Texas, right-wing group True the Vote has led a campaign to challenge voter registrations, forcing election officials to handle thousands of challenges while ensuring eligible voters aren’t improperly removed.
Groups have also challenged registrations in states like Arizona, California, Georgia, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Their campaign followed Republican-led states pulling out of a trusted system for maintaining accurate voter rolls.
Trump has claimed at least 20 times that Democrats are intentionally encouraging unauthorized immigrants to vote illegally. There is no evidence that Democratic immigration policies have led to any meaningful increase in noncitizen voting, or in any form of demographic advantage for the party. Learn more at the full fact check.
Inflammatory rhetoric normalizes hardline policies
Scholars have noted the impact of scapegoating immigration: Rhetoric by Trump and other politicians encourages more xenophobia and racism in daily conversations and harsher government policies like family separation and mass deportation.
Polls show rising public support for tougher immigration measures. A July Gallup poll found 55% of Americans favor reducing immigration, the highest in two decades. Support for stricter border measures, including halting asylum and expanding walls, has increased, while support for pathways to citizenship has slightly declined.
State-level polls echo these trends. For instance, a recent Arizona poll found 63% of voters support Proposition 314, which would make unauthorized border crossings a state crime.
Trump has claimed at least 675 times that the construction of a wall along the border with Mexico is necessary and effective. The reality of building a border wall is complex, and the barrier has proven to be ineffective, costly to taxpayers, and a driver for more dangerous modes of entry into the country. Historically, many undocumented immigrants overstay their legal visas, something a wall wouldn’t prevent. Learn more at the full fact check.
Harris has a more positive tone despite backing harsh policies
Reporters reviewed and analyzed Vice President Kamala Harris’ public statements on immigration, but data was limited to the time since she became the Democratic nominee. Her statements generally conveyed a more positive tone toward immigrants and asylum seekers compared to Trump.
“Innocent people.” “Children who had fled incredible violence.” “Displaced.” “Dreamers.” “Families.” “Muslim brothers and sisters.” “We’re all immigrants.”
Harris often references her work prosecuting transnational gangs and supports the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA) and a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.
Despite this, Harris has taken what experts call the Democratic party’s toughest immigration stance in a generation, including measures like increased border enforcement and expanding immigrant detention centers, though these fall short of Trump’s extreme proposals. Harris also supported a border security bill that was derailed by Trump, who opposed its potential benefits to Democrats.
Despite the evidence, immigrants are easy to scapegoat
Politicians across parties and nations continue to reap rewards by blaming immigrants for social problems, despite research showing immigrants are not responsible for increases in crime. Alex Piquero, a criminology professor at the University of Miami, points out the “mismatch” between data and political rhetoric, with research repeatedly showing that immigrants commit fewer crimes than native-born Americans.
As Trump emphasized at CPAC in 2020, he remains confident in the political power of anti-immigrant rhetoric: “I could get elected twice over the wall.” That hasn’t happened — yet.
