Staff Reports
The recent presidential debate featured a classic example of Donald Trump’s no-holds-barred approach to discussing crime, particularly regarding those pesky migrants here illegally. While moderating the exchange, David Muir of ABC News jumped in to challenge Trump’s assertion that America’s crime rates were soaring. Apparently, Muir had a few FBI statistics tucked away, conveniently ignoring the reality on the ground and the implications of illegal immigration, which some suspect is contributing to increased crime.
In defending his claim, Trump pointed to a grave new phenomenon he dubbed “migrant crime,” soaring to unprecedented levels. While Muir was busy waving his fact-checking flag and touting a reported 15% decline in violent crime during the first quarter of 2024, one has to wonder who might actually believe such rosy projections. After all, when cities like New York and Los Angeles allegedly falter in reporting their own crime statistics, what’s the point of trusting any national data? Seems like this might be one of those classic cases where if something doesn’t look right, it probably isn’t right.
FACT CHECK: In last night's three-on-one debate the ABC News moderators used misleading crime data from the FBI to 'fact check' @realDonaldTrump. The reality is that Trump (as he usually is) was right – crime is not down – it is up, way up.
Kamala Harris and her willing… pic.twitter.com/z1GcvfP2nK
— @amuse (@amuse) September 11, 2024
Muir’s defense, citing the FBI’s latest data, had the audacity to gloss over a significant issue: even if overall numbers show a decrease, there is no telling what lies behind those curtains. The FBI itself hit the reset button on its Uniform Crime Report system back in 2021, which left major cities muddling through the new procedures and ultimately failing to report proper figures. It’s almost as if they prefer to ignore the gritty, real-life situations happening on their streets. Perhaps it’s too much for the FBI to handle when every urban center has its own unique crime pressures.
Compounding the issue, results from the first quarter of this year carried a caveat that should make anyone think twice before embracing the numbers. The FBI reported that only 13,719 of the 19,268 law enforcement agencies provided data, meaning a staggering quarter of law enforcement didn’t contribute to this supposed downward trend. If urban crime hotbeds are missing from these figures, it’s a little puzzling why anyone would trust the supposed statistics, yet Muir went along with the narrative nonetheless.
Amid these tangled webs of data woes, Zack Smith from the conservative Heritage Foundation offered a dose of reality. He suggested that crime is a hyper-localized phenomenon and best understood at a community level rather than through vague national figures. On top of that, the burdensome reporting requirements imposed by the FBI could easily result in even fewer cities reporting their numbers. So while the powers that be might suggest crime is down, the streets tell a different story altogether, and anyone paying attention knows it.
Not only is the current data incomplete and potentially misleading, but it raises the question: how can America trust crime statistics when the cities with the most significant issues are largely absent from the reports? If the FBI can’t handle the truth, maybe it’s time for a serious overhaul of how crime data is collected and reported, and perhaps look at the wider implications of policies that grant legal status to individuals with questionable backgrounds. Until then, one thing is clear: the debate on crime statistics isn’t going anywhere, especially when the liberal media continues to push an incomplete narrative.
