Cities' crime figures don't match Trump's claims

The president wants the National Guard in Democratic-run cities despite statistics.

- BY ED WHITE AND CHRISTOPHER L. KELLER

NATIONAL GUARD members with weapons patrol past Solid State Books on Friday in Washington, D.C.

President Trump has threatened to deploy the National Guard to Chicago, New York, Seattle, Baltimore, San Francisco and Portland, Ore., to fight what he says is runaway crime.

Yet data show most violent crime in those places and around the country has declined in recent years.

Homicides through the first six months of 2025 were down significantly compared with the same period in 2024, continuing a post-pandemic trend across the U.S.

Trump, who has already taken federal control of police in Washington, D.C., has maligned the six Democratic-run cities that all are in states that opposed him in 2024. But he hasn't threatened sending in the Guard to any major cities in Republican-leaning states.

John Roman, a data expert who directs the Center on Public Safety & Justice at the University of Chicago, acknowledged violence in some urban neighborhoods has persisted for generations. But he said there's no U.S. city where there "is really a crisis."

"We're at a remarkable moment in crime in the United States," he said.

The public sees things differently

Trump might be tapping somewhat into public perception when he describes cities such as Chicago as a "killing field." The vast majority of Americans, 81%, see crime as a "major problem" in large cities, according to a survey released this week by the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, though there is much less support, 32%, for federal control of police.