By ED WHITE and CHRISTOPHER L. KELLER, Related Press
President Donald Trump has threatened to deploy the Nationwide Guard to Chicago, New York, Seattle, Baltimore, San Francisco and Portland, Oregon, to struggle what he says is runaway crime. But information exhibits most violent crime in these locations and across the nation has declined in recent times.
Homicides by way of the primary six months of 2025 had been down considerably in comparison with the identical interval in 2024, persevering with a post-pandemic development throughout the U.S.
Trump, who has already taken federal management of police in Washington, D.C., has maligned the six Democratic-run cities that every one are in states that opposed him in 2024. However he hasn’t threatened sending within the Guard to any main cities in Republican-leaning states.
John Roman, a knowledge knowledgeable who directs the Heart on Public Security & Justice on the College of Chicago, acknowledged violence in some city neighborhoods has endured for generations. However he stated there’s no U.S. metropolis the place there “is really a crisis.”
“We’re at a remarkable moment in crime in the United States,” he stated.
Public sees issues in another way
Trump may be tapping considerably into public notion when he describes cities similar to Chicago as a “killing field.” The overwhelming majority of People, 81%, see crime as a “major problem” in massive cities, in response to a survey launched this week by The AP-NORC Heart for Public Affairs Analysis, although there’s a lot much less assist, 32%, for federal management of police.
The general public was reminded this week that shootings stay a frequent occasion within the U.S. In Minneapolis, which has seen homicides and most different crime fall, a shooter killed two kids attending a Catholic faculty Mass Wednesday and wounded 17 a day after three individuals died in separate shootings elsewhere within the metropolis.
Nonetheless, over time, the image is encouraging, in response to numbers from AH Datalytics, which tracks crimes throughout the nation utilizing legislation enforcement information for its Actual-Time Crime Index.
Aggravated assaults — which incorporates nonfatal shootings — by way of June had been down in Chicago, Portland, Seattle, Baltimore and San Francisco and had been nearly unchanged in New York. Reviews of rape had been up in New York and Chicago in the course of the first half of the yr, however down within the different cities, together with a 51% drop in San Francisco.
The crime index additionally confirmed that property crimes, similar to theft, housebreaking and motorcar theft, had been largely down in these six cities within the first six months of 2025. Theft crimes rose from 2020 to 2024 in 4 of the six cities analyzed by AP.
Cities defend security methods
Trump exaggerated and misstated information about crime in Washington when his administration took over the D.C. police division and flooded the capital with federal brokers and the Nationwide Guard. He referred to Baltimore, 40 miles (64 kilometers) away, as a “hellhole” throughout a Cupboard assembly and has stated he may “send in the ‘troops.’”
“I’m not walking in Baltimore right now,” Trump stated.
But Baltimore has proven drops in main crime, in response to the crime index. Homicides and rapes had been down 25% or extra within the first half of 2025 in comparison with the identical interval in 2024. Homicides had been down for 3 consecutive years by way of 2024 and had been 35% decrease when in comparison with 2018.
“Deploying the National Guard for municipal policing purposes is not sustainable, scalable, constitutional, or respectful,” Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, a Democrat, stated on social media website X.
Baltimore has discovered methods to scale back violence by providing mentorship, social providers and job alternatives to younger individuals more likely to commit crimes, stated Michael Scott, director of the Heart for Drawback-Oriented Policing at Arizona State College and a former police chief in Florida.
“That approach has resulted in more significant reductions in shootings and homicides than any other strategy I’ve seen in the over 50 years I’ve been in the field,” Scott stated.
Vice President JD Vance advised a Wisconsin crowd on Thursday that governors and mayors ought to ask the Trump administration for assist.
“The president of the United States is not going out there forcing this on anybody,” Vance stated of utilizing the Nationwide Guard, “though we do think that we have the legal right to clean up America’s streets if we want to.”
Nationwide Guard troops patrol the grounds of the Washington Monument with the Capitol seen within the distance as a part of President Donald Trump’s order to impose federal legislation enforcement within the nation’s capital, in Washington, Thursday, Aug. 28, 2025. (AP Picture/J. Scott Applewhite)
Members of the West Virginia Nationwide Guard close to the Washington Monument in Washington, Wednesday, Aug. 27, 2025. (AP Picture/Mariam Zuhaib)
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Nationwide Guard troops patrol the grounds of the Washington Monument with the Capitol seen within the distance as a part of President Donald Trump’s order to impose federal legislation enforcement within the nation’s capital, in Washington, Thursday, Aug. 28, 2025. (AP Picture/J. Scott Applewhite)
Develop
Tales of various cities
Trump doesn’t appear to disparage massive cities in states that favor Republicans. Charlotte, North Carolina, had 105 homicides in 2024 in comparison with 88 in 2023. The speed of car thefts per 100,000 individuals greater than doubled there from 2020 by way of 2024. Indianapolis had a murder charge of 19 per each 100,000 residents in 2024 — greater than 4 occasions greater than New York’s.
Amy Holt, 48, who just lately moved to Charlotte from a gated neighborhood in northern Virginia, stated somebody tried to steal her husband’s automotive of their new metropolis. She additionally discovered bullets on the bottom whereas strolling with canines.
There’s no dialogue about sending the Nationwide Guard to Charlotte. Holt believes most cities needs to be trusted to be in control of public security, including that troops in uniforms could be “alarming” and “scary.”
Democratic elected officers in cities focused by Trump have publicly rejected solutions that their residents want the Nationwide Guard. “Crime is at its lowest point in decades, visitors are coming back, and San Francisco is on the rise,” Mayor Daniel Lurie stated.
Consultants query simply how efficient the Nationwide Guard could be and the place troops could be deployed in cities.
“It’s going to make residents think: Things must be much worse than I realize to have the military in my neighborhood. What’s going on?” Scott stated. “It’s more likely to generate undue fear and apprehension than it will lead to perceptions of reassurance and safety.”
White reported from Detroit and Keller reported from Albuquerque, New Mexico. AP video journalist Erik Verduzco in Charlotte, North Carolina, contributed to this report.
Initially Printed: August 29, 2025 at 11:28 AM EDT
