- [reporter] Violent crime in the United States
is on the rise.
- [newscaster] Major crimes had gone up nearly 60%.
- [news anchor] Major cities saw a 33% jump in homicides.
- If you've turned on the news in the past year,
you've likely seen reporting
on the nationwide increase in violent crime.
Is this the '80s and '90s all over again?
Is it merely a political talking point?
Neither? Let's take a look.
[people chattering] [calm music]
So the short answer is sort of.
According to FBI data,
some violent crime rates rose significantly
from 2019 to 2020, most notably the murder rate,
which rose by almost 30%.
The rates of other crimes,
like robbery and property crime, decreased.
Though the rates of murders, as well as assaults, rose,
they remained below the high point seen in the early 1990s.
By 2021, the 2020 spike in violent crime
had already leveled off a bit.
But even in the places where violent crime increased,
why and how rates rose is more complex
than some of the theories currently being thrown around.
Many Republican and even some Democratic politicians
and pundits have claimed
that progressive district attorneys have contributed
to the rise in crime over the past few years.
- [news anchor] Shootings and thefts are also up
in places like New York, LA, San Francisco.
- [Lester Holt] Whose fault is that?
- [Eric Adams] It's a combination.
Our criminal justice system, the laws that we have passed,
and the failure to prosecute those who are committing crimes,
and judges who are not utilizing the power that they have.
- This argument places blame on prosecutors
who have sent defendants to treatment programs
instead of prison or recommended against cash bail
for those in pretrial detention.
- There's no evidence to support the claim
that progressive prosecutors have somehow contributed
to the rise in violent crime in their jurisdiction
or around the country,
and we now have really good evidence showing that.
- This is Ames Grawert, senior counsel
in the Justice Program at the Brennan Center for Justice.
He co-authored a report delving into the rise
in violent crime over the past few years
and the reasons behind this trend.
One example of the evidence Grawert is referring to
that debunks the progressive prosecutor myth can be found
in a 2021 paper published with the Law & Economics Center
at George Mason University.
The report looked at data from 35 jurisdictions
with so-called progressive prosecutors
and found that there were 'no significant effects'
of these reforms on local crime rates.
A common conservative talking point, however,
is that crime is mainly spiking in liberal cities.
- [Dave Rubin] Look where it's not safe.
Look where murder is skyrocketing.
Look at Chicago.
Look at Portland.
- [Dan Bongino] Nine out of 10 cities where the spike's happening
are led by overwhelmingly liberal politicians.
- In reality, the data shows that the crime rates
in blue cities aren't any higher
than crime rates in red cities.
In fact, in some red regions, it's the opposite:
- Rates of violence—rates of gun violence, especially—
are much higher in the South than the Northeast.
They're much higher in so-called red states.
- According to an analysis of data
by the centrist think tank Third Way,
eight of the 10 states with the highest murder rates
in the U.S. are red.
And another look at the numbers by crime analyst Jeff Asher
shows that murder rates rising in 2020 didn't correlate
with the party affiliation of a city's mayor.
Moreover, Grawert says the incline in murder rates
wasn't unique to cities.
- The murder rate rose around the country—
in red and blue states, in red and blue cities,
in suburbs, rural areas, major cities—everywhere.
- Despite this evidence, conservatives have continued
to peddle another false narrative.
And that leads us to myth three:
- [reporter] After a year of scrutiny
over controversial police use-of-force incidents,
some cities are starting to limit what officers can do.
- [Rep. Jim Jordan] In the wake of radical left-wing efforts
to defund the police, it's no surprise
that violent crime is on the rise in America.
- After 2015, there was a narrative that emerged
around the so-called Ferguson effect.
- [Wolf Blitzer] Comey is suggesting that increased scrutiny
of police tactics in the wake of the Ferguson unrest
and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement
has police holding back.
- The best research on that is grounded in 2015
and shows no reason to believe
that the so-called Ferguson effect existed.
There's no reason to think it happened in 2020, either.
- The takeaway?
- Trying to fit the increase in violence in 2020
into a simple political narrative like this
just simply doesn't square with the evidence.
- We know what isn't causing crime to increase.
So what is?
The answer is complex, but available data points
to a few possible factors.
One factor is guns.
- [reporter] America is on a gun-buying spree.
- [anchor] Gun and ammo sales surged during the pandemic.
- [newscaster] Shelves at local gun stores are emptying
as handgun sales skyrocket.
- In 2020, gun sales went through the roof,
reaching an all-time high—
and this record correlated with another:
Roughly 77% of murders were committed with a firearm
in 2020, the highest ever reported to the FBI
going back to 1960.
Additionally, the number of guns used in a crime
within six months of being purchased rose
from 13% between 2015 and 2019 to 23% in 2020.
- All that adds up to a very strong picture
that gun violence is sort of behind the increase in murders
and potentially also behind the increase in assault.
- Another key factor potentially contributing
to the uptick in violence is the COVID-19 pandemic.
People who were already disadvantaged—
those struggling with poverty, unemployment, health issues,
and a range of other socioeconomic problems—
were most impacted by the pandemic.
Moreover, there was a breakdown in community—
people weren't able to come together
and create a sense of safety with each other.
And the pause on communing also impacted programs
specifically designed to prevent violence.
- We know, for example,
that summer youth employment programs
are a very powerful way
of reducing violence in neighborhoods.
Those programs simply couldn't be run.
You can't do it over Zoom,
and you can't do it during a respiratory virus pandemic.
These are factors that might have affected communities
of all types, not just the cities,
but also in, in rural areas and in suburbs, as well.
- So we know that guns and socioeconomic insecurity
contributed to the rise in violent crime.
The question now is, what are solutions that work
to reduce crime?
- There's strong evidence that investing in our communities
can help build a long-term vision of public safety.
- Community investment can look like many things—
and we've seen what works.
For instance, in Oakland, CA,
homicides and non-fatal shootings were nearly cut in half
as of 2019 since the city began
a community violence intervention program in 2012.
- I think the best time to make these investments
in our communities was, in fact, a quarter century ago.
But the second-best time to make those investments is today.
[calm music]