“The association [immigrants] between crime and immigration is false, as is the notion of them exploiting social benefits,” stated António Leitão Amaro in response to Chega party members during the parliamentary debate on the Government’s proposal for the State Budget for 2026 (OE2026).
The official argued that it is not “fair to speak of foreign individuals living in Portugal as welfare state parasites or as criminals.”
“Crime has no skin color, nationality, or religion, neither for the victim nor the perpetrator; those making associations refuted by numbers are manipulating and creating a falsehood in Portuguese society,” he stressed.
Leitão Amaro pointed out that “irresponsible immigration” has quadrupled in Portugal, “yet the crime rate and crime statistics have not shown a correlational trend.”
“Immigrants receive Social Insertion Income (RSI) less than their proportion in the Portuguese population, and the same applies to social supports; they contribute multiple times more than they receive today. In the future, they will receive, but the idea of exploitation is false,” he said in response to Chega deputy Ricardo Reis.
