Most people who follow the news probably missed Monday’s announcement from the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS): Felony violent crime plunged 25 percent in 2025. Rape fell 13 percent, robbery dropped 27 percent, and aggravated assault declined 31 percent. Property crime fell 19 percent. Except for rape, these represent the largest one-year declines since the government began collecting these data 53 years ago.
That marks a dramatic reversal from the Biden administration, when felony violent crime soared by a record 59 percent and property crime rose 8 percent between 2021 and 2024.
Murders also plummeted. The U.S. recorded approximately 4.1 murders per 100,000 people in 2025, a record low, down from 5.1 in 2024. The murder rate has continued to fall. If the additional 18.4 percent decline shown in preliminary FBI data for the first seven months of 2026 holds for the full year, the murder rate would drop to approximately 3.36 per 100,000.
You might expect these unprecedented declines in violent and property crime and record low crime rates to dominate the news. Instead, most major media outlets ignored Monday’s announcement. While the New York Post and CBS covered the new data, the Associated Press, Reuters, CNN, NBC News, ABC News, the New York Times, and the Washington Post apparently didn’t consider the historic reductions newsworthy.
That lack of coverage is particularly surprising because new October polls show that voters still care about crime. A Pew Research Center poll found that 52 percent of registered voters consider violent crime a “very important” issue, while an AP-NORC survey found that 45 percent of adults identify immigration and crime as top issues.
The reasons behind these record crime reductions aren’t difficult to understand. FBI arrests soared 184 percent in 2025 compared with 2024, U.S. attorneys across the country stepped up criminal prosecutions, and the Trump administration federalized law enforcement in Washington, D.C., and Memphis. In D.C., the Biden administration’s U.S. attorney charged only about 33 percent of those arrested. Under Trump, that rate jumped to 96 percent.
Nor is it a coincidence that crime had record percent increases during the Biden administration as record numbers of illegal immigrants entered the country and is now plummeting as the Trump administration seals the border and deports illegal immigrants. The Department of Homeland Security says approximately 70 percent of illegal immigrants deported under the Trump administration had criminal convictions or pending criminal charges.
Even illegal immigrants who have committed crimes but haven’t been caught have an incentive to avoid deportation. By stopping their criminal activity, they can stay off the police radar and reduce their risk of being deported.
At the end of 2025, New York incarcerated 7,113 illegal immigrants, representing 14 percent of the state’s inmate population — at least 3.4 times their share of the state’s population.
But Democrats are promising to reverse these policies. Some Democrats, including New York congressional candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier, advocate abolishing prisons. Others, from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to Pete Buttigieg to Sen. Bernie Sanders, want to cut the prison population in half.
In Congress, 61 House Democrats voted against a resolution condemning calls to “defund the police.” Another 57 House Democrats support completely rescinding the ICE funding provided in last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill. House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries has promised that if Democrats regain control of Congress, they will work to bring back illegal immigrants whom the Trump administration has already deported. Meanwhile, just 15 House Democrats were willing to sign a letter declaring, “We want safety, not lawlessness.”
Americans who thought the last two years’ government shutdowns were long — the 43-day shutdown in 2025 and the 76-day partial shutdown earlier this year — may face an even longer confrontation. Democrats’ push to defund ICE will almost certainly trigger a Trump veto, setting up a massive train wreck between two sides firmly entrenched in their positions.
Democrats claim to champion the poor and minorities, yet those are precisely the people who suffer most from crime. Criminals overwhelmingly victimize people in their own communities, often striking close to where they live. And the damage extends far beyond the immediate victims. Who loses their jobs when crime forces neighborhood stores to close? Who loses access to affordable shopping? Who owns homes whose property values are depressed because of the crime?
The divide between Democrats and Republicans over crime could hardly be sharper, and the elections next week will determine if these record drops in crime will continue. Republicans emphasize arrests, prosecutions, incarceration, and deportations, while Democrats increasingly advocate reducing incarceration and limiting traditional law enforcement and immigration enforcement.
