Suppose there is a group of people who cannot be trusted with guns. And they want to come live in your country. Should they be let in? Should we permanently be bringing people into our country who cannot be trusted with guns? If so, will we have to make new laws limiting the freedom to own and carry guns, to deal with the new problems? Should we consider the likely gun crime statistics of the children these people will have, and how that could affect the need for future gun control? Why does it seem that the cities with the most new arrivals from other countries have the highest rates of gun crime? I suspect that the main reason Liberals/progressives are in favor of gun control is that they generally live in these higher population areas. If it wasn't for all the immigration, would we still have so much of a need for all these gun control regulations? Do the rural areas without gun crime have to sacrifice their freedoms because of all the gun problems in the crime-ridden inner cities? If we are increasing the number of people that cannot be trusted to own a gun, what type of society is that going to create for the future?
Look at the three most urban states, NY,NJ,MASS, where there are large immigrant populations. Lowest incidence of gun violence in the country. Now look at where the gun violence does happen.
California, Arizona, and Texas have large immigrant populations. I am sure it also has much to do with where these immigrants are coming from. A state with many immigrants from India is not going to have the same rate of crime as another state with many immigrants from Mexico. Massachusetts does not have a very high immigrant population. 6.21% of their population speaks spanish in their home. The housing prices in the state are also more expensive, meaning a lower low-income population. Something else to consider, only 1.9% of the population is Black, significantly lower than many other states. This probably has a big effect on the statistics. Here are the murder rates (2010) of some of these states, for comparison: New York: 4.5 New Jeresy: 4.2 California: 4.9 Arizona: 6.4 Texas: 5 Now let's look at states that have the most open and free gun laws, but have very low immigrant populations: North Dakota: 1.5 Montana: 2.6 Idaho: 1.3 West Virgininia: 3.3 It's worth noting that West Virginia has a large low-income population, but 93.2% of the state's population is White, higher than any other state. Looking at the statistics for different states, a couple of trends are obvious. The biggest correlation is that states with lower percentages of Blacks and Hispanics have lower murder and gun crime rates, even regardless of the level of gun restrictions in the states. States that have higher immigrant populations are much more likely to be states with restrictive gun control laws. Another correlation is that states with higher rates of poverty have higher rates of crime, including gun crime, even comparing states with similar ethnic demographics. It is important to remember that in statistics, correlation does not imply direct causation. For example, if we merely see a connection between poverty and crime, it does not necessarily tell us that poverty causes crime. It could be that some other third factor is causing both the poverty and crime. Or, as another example, if we see the states with the highest Black populations have much higher rates of crime, it does not necessarily mean that Black people cause crime. It could be that the economy of these states were historically reliant on agriculture, where slaves were brought in to do the labor-intensive work. In these states there are both a higher number of Blacks and Whites that live in poverty. And when comparing these Southern states to other (more prosperous lower-crime) Midwestern states where agriculture has also been an important part of the economy, population density may be an important factor. In other words, just looking at statistical correlation alone, without giving any consideration to other confounding correlations, can be misleading.
Your chart includes all death by firearm including suicide. If you go to that website (http://www.statehealthfacts.org/comparemaptable.jsp?ind=117&cat=2) and look at suicide per 100,000 you find pretty much the same chart as you posted. What you are showing is not a chart of gun "violence" but of suicide by firearm. With few exceptions, a person who is going to commit suicide by firearm is not a threat to me or anyone else. Personally I believe most people (immigrant and otherwise) are good and decent and capable of owning a firearm. But to prove the "innocence" of immigrants, you need to correlate immigrants with violent crime, not immigrants with firearm laws.
I Live there now. Lots of prisoners let out early or given weak sentences. Everyone knows it is just a matter of time until they kill. Yet when they do, the gun nuts blame guns.
Apparently, the cost of "freedom" for law-breakers (whether they be undocumented immigrants or prisoners let out early) is another law-abiding citizen's freedom to own a gun.
