{"id":38712,"date":"2026-08-11T14:42:58","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T09:42:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=38712"},"modified":"2026-08-11T14:42:58","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T09:42:58","slug":"homicides-fall-17-in-big-u-s-cities-as-the-post-pandemic-crime-decline-continues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=38712","title":{"rendered":"Homicides fall 17% in big U.S. cities as the post-pandemic crime decline continues"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/graphics.axios.com\/hermesv2\/2026-08-10-741-areas-with-the\/fallbacks\/2026-08-10-741-areas-with-the-fallback.png\" \/><\/p>\n<div>Data: <a href=\"https:\/\/majorcitieschiefs.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/MCCA-Violent-Crime-Report-2026-and-2025-Midyear.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">Major Cities Chiefs Association (MCCA)<\/a>; Chart: Russell Contreras\/Axios<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/05\/10\/violent-crime-us-cities-trump\" target=\"_blank\">Violent crime<\/a> kept falling across many of the nation&#8217;s largest cities through June, with homicides down 17.2% from the first half of 2025, according to preliminary data reviewed by Axios.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why it matters: <\/strong>The decline now spans two presidencies \u2014 it began falling under President Biden after the pandemic-era surge, and has kept dropping under President <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/politics-policy\/donald-trump\" target=\"_blank\">Trump<\/a>.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<ul>\n<li>Trump came into office casting America as being overrun by crime at time when the numbers were already declining dramatically. <\/li>\n<li>As that decline has continued during his watch he&#8217;s taken credit for it, often linking it to his deployment of the National Guard in cities such as Washington, D.C., and Memphis, Tenn., to reduced violent crime rates there. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>By the numbers:<\/strong> An Axios analysis of the <a href=\"https:\/\/majorcitieschiefs.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/MCCA-Violent-Crime-Report-2026-and-2025-Midyear.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">Major Cities Chiefs Association&#8217;s (MCCA) survey<\/a> of 66 large U.S. communities found drops in violent crime in the first six months of 2026 compared to the same period last year.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Homicides fell 17.2%.<\/li>\n<li>Robberies dropped 16.6%.<\/li>\n<li>Rapes declined 6.2%.<\/li>\n<li>Aggravated assaults fell 5.7%.<\/li>\n<li>Taken together, the four categories were down about 8.3%, for roughly 14,200 fewer reported violent crimes, according to the Axios review. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Zoom in:<\/strong> The homicide drops are especially striking in several cities that have struggled with high levels of violence.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2025\/11\/26\/national-guard-washington-dc-about\" target=\"_self\">D.C<\/a>. reported 46 homicides, down 43.9% from 82 in the first half of 2025.<\/li>\n<li>Homicides in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2025\/09\/15\/trump-national-guard-memphis-chicago-dc-crime\" target=\"_self\">Memphis<\/a> fell 43.7%, from 119 killings to 67, and 38.3% in Houston, from 154 to 95.<\/li>\n<li>Philadelphia recorded 83 homicides, down 27.2% from 114.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>The intrigue: <\/strong>Aurora, Colo. \u2014 a city <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2024\/10\/11\/trump-operation-aurora-targeting-undocumented-criminals\" target=\"_self\">Trump falsely singled out<\/a> as being overrun by Venezuelan immigrant gangs during the 2024 election \u2014 saw a 58.8% drop in homicides.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Caveat: <\/strong>Some of the biggest percentage drops came in places with relatively few killings to begin with \u2014 which can make the declines look particularly.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Newark fell 64.7% from 17 to six homicides, Raleigh fell 63.6% from 11 to four, for example.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Yes, but:<\/strong> Some cities had relatively small homicide totals that were significantly higher than in the first six months of 2025.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Honolulu jumped 85.7%, from seven homicides to 13.<\/li>\n<li>San Diego jumped 81.3%, from 16 to 29 \u2014 continuing the increase Axios identified in the first quarter.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Zoom out:<\/strong> Another major crime tracker is seeing similar trends in declining violent crime.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A <a href=\"https:\/\/counciloncj.org\/homicide-likely-reaching-a-new-historic-low-as-most-crime-rates-continue-to-decline-at-mid-year\/\" target=\"_blank\">Council on Criminal Justice (CCJ) analysis<\/a> found homicides down 18% among 30 reporting cities in the first half of 2026. The group says the decline began in the second half of 2022.<\/li>\n<li>The finding is notable because crime has fallen across cities with different political leadership, policing strategies, economic conditions and levels of federal involvement, CCJ said.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>What they&#8217;re saying: <\/strong>&#8220;President Trump promised to make America safe again \u2014 and the data proves he is delivering faster and more decisively than any administration in history,&#8221; the White House said in a statement.<\/p>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Data: Major Cities Chiefs Association (MCCA); Chart: Russell Contreras\/Axios Violent crime kept falling across many of the nation&#8217;s largest cities through June, with homicides down 17.2% from the first half of 2025, according to preliminary data reviewed by Axios. Why it matters: The decline now spans two presidencies \u2014 it began falling under President Biden&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":38713,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/graphics.axios.com\/hermesv2\/2026-08-10-741-areas-with-the\/fallbacks\/2026-08-10-741-areas-with-the-fallback.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38712","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38712","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=38712"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38712\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/38713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=38712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=38712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=38712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}