Is Donald Trump’s claim that 72% of Swiss prisoners are foreigners correct?

Among the 72% of foreigners in Swiss prisons, there are several structural reasons. La matinale

At the recent UN General Assembly, US President Donald Trump cited Switzerland to denounce what he called “the ingratitude of migrants towards their host country”, claiming that 72% of prisoners in Switzerland are foreign nationals. While the figure is accurate, the way Trump used it is simplistic and misleading. Context is essential.

The overrepresentation of foreigners in crime statistics is a universal phenomenon, observed in many countries worldwide. Yet delinquency or crime cannot be explained by nationality alone, isolated from legal, socio-economic and demographic factors.

The judicial system

In Switzerland, several structural reasons help explain why 72% of prisoners are foreign nationals. One factor is that foreign detainees cannot serve their sentences outside prison.

“Foreigners often don’t have a fixed residence in Switzerland and therefore cannot benefit from electronic bracelets or house arrest, nor from community service as an alternative form of punishment,” explains André Kuhn, professor of criminal law at the University of Neuchâtel, speaking to Swiss public broadcaster, RTS. “There is a certain discrimination built into the law itself,” he says.

Pre-trial detention

Foreigners are also overrepresented in pre-trial detention. “They are more often detained before trial than Swiss nationals, because of fears they may flee. So they end up in pre-trial detention,” says Kuhn. People in pre-trial detention are presumed innocent until trial, but in practice they are incarcerated.

On January 31, 2025, according to the Federal Statistical Office, of 6,994 people in detention, 2,211 were in pre-trial detention and 1,199 were in so-called “early execution of sentences and measures” – people not yet judged but who, for various reasons, had requested to start serving their sentence.

Among those in pre-trial detention, 79% were foreign nationals – the highest number since records began in 1988. This further reinforces the statistical overrepresentation of foreigners (legally still presumed innocent) in prisons, while Swiss nationals can usually remain free while awaiting verdicts.

Laws specific to foreigners

Kuhn cites two further explanations. “There are offences that can only be committed by foreigners.” This includes, for example, the 220 people detained under coercive measures according to the Federal Act on Foreign Nationals and Integration – mostly rejected asylum-seekers awaiting deportation.

Foreigners who face expulsion at the end of their sentence are also excluded from conditional release. “Foreign nationals remain in prison longer than Swiss ones,” Kuhn says.

Demographic structure

The higher proportion of foreigners in prison is also linked to demographics. In Switzerland, young men are overrepresented among foreign residents. Globally, men and young people are the most crime-prone categories.

Because of higher birth rates and predominantly male migration, the foreign population contains a larger share of young men – which helps explain their overrepresentation in prisons.

Socio-economic inequalities

Socio-economic inequalities can also make foreigners more vulnerable to certain forms of crime, such as petty theft. Foreign populations are more present in modest or lower-middle social classes – groups that generate about 60% of crime, according to asylum.ch.

Certain offences, such as theft or street-level drug dealing, are also punished more harshly than white-collar or financial crimes. The NGO Public Eye even describes Switzerland as a “paradise for economic crime”.

Education levels

Education is another determinant. While only about half of the Swiss population has a modest level of education (primary, secondary or vocational training), in 2013 this applied to 68% of people in detention.

Finally, racist biases in policing and judicial institutions may aggravate the problem. A federal report published in August criticised the lack of adequate measures against structural racism in justice and law enforcement. A national strategy is expected to be launched in 2026.

What role does nationality really play?

In criminology, explanatory factors interact, reinforce or cancel each other out. In the journal Vivre Ensemble, Kuhn stresses the importance of weighing the respective impact of each variable. Models show that the main predictors of crime are: sex (being male rather than female), age, socio-economic status and education level.

Nationality rarely adds explanatory value. “Nationality generally explains none of the additional variance in crime,” says Kuhn. In rare cases, it may be a fifth factor – behind sex, age, socio-economic status and education – when migration comes from a country at war.

Exposure to violence in a war-torn society can have a “brutalisation” effect, lowering inhibitions and increasing violent behaviour. This can also occur in host countries exposed to police violence, militarised border protection, the death penalty or widespread gun culture, such as in the United States.

That is why, Kuhn concludes, particular care must be taken of war refugees – as exemplified by the outpatient service for victims of torture and war run by the Swiss Red Cross.

Translated from French using DeepL/amva/ts