A debate between NewsNation anchor Leland Vittert and correspondent Geraldo Rivera become heated on Monday as Rivera accused Republicans of constructing a “boogeyman” from unlawful immigrants.

The interview changed into nerve-racking straight out of the gate after Vittert opened by way of asking, “Do we finally agree that unlawful aliens who commit crimes will have to then be deported?”

“Yes, I don’t have any problem with the deportation of felony aliens,” responded Rivera. “I think that the issue with saying it that method is that you ignore the fact and the info, 140 years of information that unlawful aliens so-referred to as, undocumented immigrants commit fewer crimes than prison residents.”

Vittert interrupted, “I’m gonna cease you right there. I’m gonna stop you proper there. No, no, no, no! As a result of we did a complete phase on this and the so-known as knowledge on Friday. It comes again to 1 learn about out of Texas about illegal immigrants who commit homicide.”

“That’s not authentic,” Rivera insisted.

“It is proper!” Vittert replied. “We don’t have 140 years of data about this, it’s simply not authentic.”

Rivera argued, “Yes we do. Stanford University, I’ve read the learn about myself. We absolutely do, and why are you questioning my recitation of the info? I’m completely confident that unlawful immigrants, in keeping with the info, together with the Policing Institute, commit fewer crimes proportionally than electorate do.”

He persisted, “The very fact of the subject is that unlawful immigrants have grow to be the boogeyman of the current generation! We can’t subscribe to that hysteria.”

Vittert went on to ask Rivera why President Joe Biden had now not yet addressed the murder of twenty-two-yr-old Laken Riley, who was once allegedly killed by way of an illegal immigrant from Venezuela.

“We both recognize that if Laken Riley had been slightly Black woman killed by means of a couple of White guys, Kamala Harris would have been on the funeral and Joe Biden would were giving statements about it,” said Vittert. “Why isn’t he talking about this?”

Rivera answered via comparing the political reaction to Riley’s homicide to the 2018 murder of 20-year-old Mollie Tibbetts, and argued that it used to be offensive to use such incidents for political purposes.

“Mollie Tibbetts’ father stated it was despicable and heartless to use her title in a political manner. I believe that it’s despicable and heartless in this case also,” Rivera declared, to which Vittert pointed out that Riley’s mom had known as her daughter’s homicide “an avoidable tragedy” and had used the hashtag “#SayHerName.”

The interview turned into much more heated after Rivera in comparison the response to migrant crime to scaremongering about ethnic teams up to now.

“now We have to work collectively to search out solutions somewhat than attempt to politicize a specific crime, or try to politicize an issue, scare people in the way in which they scared them in regards to the Irish, scared them in regards to the Italians, and they scared them about the Chinese language,” said Rivera.

“No, no, no! This is very totally different,” Vittert shot back. “This isn’t scaring a couple of crew of individuals coming right here for a greater life. That is speaking about unvetted entrance into america illegally. Those are two very various things.”

Watch above via NewsNation.

The post ‘No, No, No!’: Geraldo Rivera and Leland Vittert Get Heated in Debate Over Migrant Crime first regarded on Mediaite.