Category: Crime

Donald Trump is wrong that ‘inner-city crime is reaching record levels’

As part of Donald Trump’s declared outreach to black voters, the Republican presidential nominee has painted a dire picture of American “inner cities” rife with crime, and stated only he can make them safe.

(h/t Wall Street Journal)

Reality

PolitiFact gave Trump’s claim a “Pants on Fire,” their worst truth rating, and even the conservative-leaning Wall Street Journal corrected Trump on his disregard for the facts.

While crime has indeed ticked up recently, according to FBI data it remains near historic lows, even in America’s largest cities like Mr. Trump’s hometown of New York City.

And even if crime isn’t hitting record levels, there is growing evidence that there has been a one-year uptick, at least in certain cities. Trump’s supporters have seized on this as evidence that Trump isn’t totally off base in claiming that crime is on the rise.

Even if the recent one-year spike proves durable, the rates of homicides and violent crime in general have fallen so much in the past 25 years that the recent increases will not push them up to “record” levels at any time in the near future.

 

Trump Tweets Police Deaths Up 78%, When Actually Unchanged

Twitter

In a tweet Donald Trump repeated a previously debunked statistic that police officers killed in the line of duty by gunfire is up 78% this year. However the number of officers killed in the line of duty has not changed compared to last year.

Reality

This is a tragic stat which is why Donald Trump should not be dishonest with these figures.

The Officer Down Memorial Page, which tracks officer deaths, reports that as of the time of Trump’s tweet 32 police officers have been killed by gunfire so far this year, while 21 were killed in line of duty by gunfire during the same period last year. That is a 52% increase.

But keep in mind that context is important. Overall the total number of officers killed in the line of duty compared to last year is unchanged, at 69.

Trump repeated a false statistic regarding officer deaths a week prior when he spoke at the Republican National Convention, but said police killed in the line of duty was up 50%, when at the time it was actually down 1%.

Donald Trump wants to claim Blue Lives Matter but he is willing to dishonor police by exaggerating real officer deaths to stoke fears for political gain.

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