dr. massey. >> used to that, too. >> i'll let you. i'll let you. i have a question for dr dr. massey. you've studied the border for an awful long time. i and people why they come here and how long they're going to stay. a lot of other related questions. when you hear the arguments such as what we've just heard from mr. montgomery that it's all criminal activity, as you think about the people and why they're coming here, do you think if there was a comprehensive immigration solution that had make it easy for those people to come here legally, wouldn't that diminish the criminal activity? >> yeah, in my view. the people that come here are looking to stay out of trouble. especially if they're documented. they don't want to have legal entanglemen entanglements. if you look at the data around the united states, immigration neighborhoods have lower crime rates than native neighborhoods and immigrants are less prone to crime than american natives. it doesn't mean there are criminal conspiracies and criminal gangs and so on, but on the whole immigrants are not elevating our crime rate at all.

dr. massey. because [ inaudible ] well played -- >> not a chance i inhale. >> and then for -- [ laughter ] >> for mr. montgomery. you said with confidence that, you said that, sb1070 in ars sars not racist and said it emphatically. my question is i'm not sure how you can make that statement with such emphasis given the lack of empirical data on whether it is soar isn't? i haven't found any study in my understanding is that sheriff arpaio is resistant to people coming in and analyzing that point. >> first -- because there's more, what meets the eye of the civil rights division engaged in. election year politics. although there are some very specific incidents that are referenced to witht civil rights division december 15th letter i acknowledged. the individuals involve wd criminally prosecuted. with respect to i believe the 1070 cannen implement pd. it hasn't been because enjoined by federal courts which was the beginning of its path to the u.s. supreme court last week. i can say emphatically beca

dr. massey. so i will sit down and i will turn the podium over to bill montgomery who will lead off this discussion. bill? >> well, thank you very much, todd. appreciate the invitation to be here today, and i want to start off with establishing what my role is as i see it within the context of our immigration system within our country, share with you, then, some initial observations both from this morning and overall, and then my view towards what i think we need to be doing within the context of addressing immigration in the united states towards what i propose is a sane approach, s-a-n-e, to dealing with immigration. first, my role within maricopa county i am the chief law enfornesment officer representing 4 million people's in what is now the nation's fourth most populist county. i lead an office that has over 300 prosecutors, over 40 civil attorneys over 900 folks working there which makes us the fourth such largest prosecution agency in the country. and we are ground zero for illegal immigra

dr. massey. [inaudible] [laughter] >> i will let you. i have a question for dr. massey.you have been studying the board for an awful long time. you ask people why they come you. you asked him how long they're going to stay. a lot of other related questions. when you hear the arguments such as what we just heard from county attorney montgomery, that it's all criminal activity, as you think about the people, why they are coming here, do you think that if there was a comprehensive immigration solution that would make it easier for the people to come here legally, wouldn't that diminish criminal activity? >> yeah, in my view. the people that come here are looking to stay out of trouble, especially if they are documented. they don't want to legal entanglements. if you look at the data around the united states, immigrant neighborhoods have lower crime rates than native neighborhoods. and immigrants are less prone to crime than an american native. that doesn't mean there aren't criminal conspiracies and criminal gangs and so on, but on the whole immigrants are not relegating ou

dr. doug massey from princeton university. >> i don't -- i could have had picture, but i don't. if you wanted to design a dysfunction immigration policy, you couldn't do better than what we've had over the past several decades. undocumented migration, illegal migration, whatever you want to doll is not a global phenomenon. it's a regional phenomenon. 60% of all illegal migrants in the united states are mexican. another 20% central american. big countries like india or china are under 1%. it's a regional phenomenon of this hemisphere. and it's a failure to deal with the regional realities that we face. in 1993 we signed a treaty with mexico and canada to create an integrated north american economy. free movement of goods, capital, free movement of information, but make no provision for the movement of people within this new integrated economy that is already come substantially into existence. in fact, rather than make a place for movement of people within north america, we militarized the border with our second largest trading partner. and in doing so, we made the problem worse.