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Letter Submitted to the New York Times: Responding to Paul Krugman’s “Trump’s Made-Up ‘Kamala Crime Wave’,” August 22

Oct 8, 2024 | op-ed

crime statistics Letters that we submitted

Here is a letter that we submitted to the New York Times a couple weeks ago. The letter was not published by the Times.

Background: I have served as the senior advisor for research and statistics in the US Department of Justice’s Office of Justice Programs and the Office of Legal Policy (2020-21). I was also the chief economist for the U.S. Sentencing Commission (1987-88).

Dear Letters Editor:

Paul Krugman claims former President Trump is “completely divorced from reality” when he says crime increased under the Biden-Harris administration (“Trump’s Made-Up ‘Kamala Crime Wave’,” August 22). Apparently, Krugman is unfamiliar with the Bureau of Justice Statistics’ National Crime Victimization Survey, which shows that between 2016 and 2020, violent crime fell by 17% under Trump — and soared by 43% under Biden-Harris between 2020 and 2022 (the last year that final data is available from the either the FBI or the BJS).

While Krugman wants to focus only on crimes reported to police, the FBI crime data has real problems. Fewer than half of all police departments provide complete crime data to the FBI since its reporting system changed in 2021. Even the Michigan crime data he mentions depends on reported crime, and the rate that people report crime to police has dropped over the last few years as arrest rates have plummeted. The BJS data measures total (reported and unreported) crime.

Krugman claims Trump’s concerns about crime arise from racism, but who does Krugman think are the overwhelming victims of violent crime? Poor blacks. High-income people and those who went to graduate school are the least concerned about crime.

Sincerely,

John R. Lott, Jr., Ph.D.
President
Crime Prevention Research Center

Sources:

Krugman (https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/22/opinion/kamala-harris-trump-crime.html)

The Marshall Project (https://www.themarshallproject.org/2022/08/15/see-if-police-in-your-state-reported-crime-data-to-the-fbi)

A Historical Comparison of the Collapse of Law Enforcement in US Cities. The Drop in Arrest Rates over the Last Few Years is Unprecedented.
The Highest Income People and Those Who Went to Graduate School are the Least Concerned About Crime

johnrlott

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