Trump Falsely Claims That 'Homicides Are Skyrocketing,' an Imaginary Trend He Blames on Kamala Harris
Trump's campaign dismisses recent crime data while glossing over the fact that he was president during the huge homicide spike in 2020.
"Homicides Are Skyrocketing in American Cities Under Kamala Harris," Donald Trump's campaign avers in a statement issued on Monday. Like Trump's assertion that "our crime rate is going up," this claim is completely at odds with reality.
According to FBI data, the homicide rate jumped by more than 27 percent in 2020, when Trump was president; rose slightly in 2021, the first year of the Biden administration; and fell by 7 percent in 2022. Preliminary FBI numbers show bigger drops in 2023 (about 13 percent) and this year (26 percent for the first quarter). So far this year, according to data from 277 cities, homicides are down by about 17 percent.
It obviously is not true, then, that "homicides are skyrocketing in American cities under Kamala Harris." The Trump campaign nevertheless takes issue with "a ridiculous story" in Axios "claiming that violent crime is falling under Kamala Harris," which it describes as "a lie."
Based on data from the Major Cities Chiefs Association, Axios described "an overall 6% decline in violent crime among 69 cities during the first six months of 2024 compared to the same period last year." Axios "also found that the number of homicides in the 69 reported cities fell by more than 17% during the first half of 2024 compared to the [same] period last year."
The Trump campaign does not claim those numbers are wrong, as implied by the "lie" label. Instead it objects to the story's focus: "It may be true that in *some* cities, some categories of violent crime are lower for the first 6 months of 2024 than in 2023—but violent crime is still WAY UP compared to 2019 under President Trump. Axios can cherrypick all the crime data they like, but it won't change what Americans know: our communities are more dangerous under Kamala Harris."
Talk about cherry picking. It is true that the homicide rate, despite recent declines, remained higher in 2023 than it was in 2019. But the Council on Criminal Justice reports, based on data from 39 cities for the first half of this year, that "most violent crimes," including homicide, "are at or below levels seen in 2019." And the biggest spike in homicides, by far, happened in 2020. Remind me: Who was president then?
I am not suggesting that Trump can reasonably be blamed for the huge surge in homicides during the pandemic. Given all the other factors at work, and given that crime control is mainly a state and local function, it would be unrealistic to assume that any president has much influence on the murder rate.
Trump nevertheless wants us to believe that Harris, who as vice president had even less control over such things, is responsible for crime trends since January 2021. If so, Harris can claim credit for the recent dramatic reductions in homicide—a conclusion that Trump avoids only by pretending that they did not happen.
[This post has been updated with crime numbers from the Council on Criminal Justice for the first half of 2024.]
