The FBI quietly revised its report of lower crime in 2022 — the second full year of the Biden/Harris administration — to show violent crime during that year actually rose 4.5 percent.
On June 11, 2024, President Joe Biden bragged, falsely claiming he and Harris’s policies had lowered crime:
You know, the year before I came to the presidency, the murder rate was the highest increase on record. Last year, we saw the largest decrease of murder in the history of (inaudible). (Applause.) And those rates are continuing to fall faster than ever. Last year, we also saw one of the lowest rates of all violent crime in nearly 50 years. Murder, rape, aggravated assault, robbery all dropped sharply, along with burglary and property crime.
On June 24, 2024, Breitbart News did a “FACT CHECK” on the FBI report showing lower crime for 2022 and noted the report was missing information from thousands of police precincts that did not report crime data.
Other outlets called out the FBI report as well and now, months later, the federal agency has corrected the record.
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On October 16, 2024, Real Clear Investigations noted:
When the FBI originally released the “final” crime data for 2022 in September 2023, it reported that the nation’s violent crime rate fell by 2.1%. This quickly became, and remains, a Democratic Party talking point to counter Donald Trump’s claims of soaring crime.
But the FBI has quietly revised those numbers, releasing new data that shows violent crime increased in 2022 by 4.5%. The new data includes thousands more murders, rapes, robberies, and aggravated assaults.
The updated FBI data for 2022 shows there were 1,699 more murders than originally reported, 7,780 more rapes, over 33,000 more robberies, and over 37,000 more aggravated assaults.
Professor Carl Moody, crime researcher at the College of William & Mary, observed the FBI has not had to correct crime reports to this degree at any other time during the 21st century.
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Moody said, “I have checked the data on total violent crime from 2004 to 2022, there were no revisions from 2004 to 2015, and from 2016 to 2020, there were small changes of less than one percentage point. The huge changes in 2021 and 2022, especially without an explanation, make it difficult to trust the FBI data.”
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio, a member of Gun Owners of America, a Pulsar Night Vision pro-staffer, and the director of global marketing for Lone Star Hunts. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010 and has a Ph.D. in Military History. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly: awrhawkins@breitbart.com.