Some say the FBI is “adjusting” its gun violence statistics back to 2005, perhaps to make the current numbers look better. After the bureau released its latest data for 2022-2023, analysts noticed that some of the earlier data had been revised upward.
Dean Weingarten explained the situation on ammoland.com. he asked rhetorically after reviewing gun violence data. “What happened to the numbers in 2005?'' Why, after 13 years of stability (starting in 2005), did the number of murders per year suddenly increase by more than 1,000?''
There are various explanations for the FBI's actions. Because many police departments do not do complete reporting, law enforcement agencies must “estimate” the number of violent crimes that occur in their area. Defunding the police has left many crimes unreported, further exacerbating the problem. And many departments don't count 911 calls, only report them. To do so, the victim must personally submit a report to the ministry. For crimes less than violent acts, such as murder or the victim being hospitalized, the numbers are essentially worthless.
political issues
Trump was given a “fact check” after he said during a debate with Kamala Harris that crime has increased under the Biden-Harris administration. The fact checkers were wrong because they used incorrect numbers released by the FBI. The department has not revised the numbers.
Initially, the FBI reported that violent crime as a percentage of population decreased by 2.1 percent in 2022 compared to the previous year. Politicians and gun control advocates have blamed gun control measures under the Biden administration for the decline in numbers. The bureau secretly revised its statistics to show that gun violence actually increased by 4.5 percent that year, a gross error of more than 6 percent. This revised version was only discovered by chance.
On October 16, RealClearInvestigations published John Lott's revelations about stealth revisions. This opened the eyes of a public that was already skeptical about the truthfulness and reliability of the FBI. He wrote:
When the FBI first released its 2022 “final” crime data in September 2023, it reported that the national violent crime rate had decreased by 2.1%. It quickly became, and continues to be, a talking point for Democrats against Donald Trump's claims that crime is surging.
However, the FBI quietly revised that number and released new data showing a 4.5% increase in violent crime in 2022. The new data includes thousands more murders, rapes, robberies and aggravated assaults.
The upward revision (and downward revision possible if the numbers are considered from the victim's perspective) is “far-reaching,” Lott said.
The actual changes in crime are far-reaching. The latest data for 2022 shows an increase of 80,029 violent crimes compared to 2021. Additionally, there were 1,699 murders, 7,780 rapes, 33,459 robberies, and 37,091 aggravated assaults.
Lott then asked rhetorically, “Should we believe the FBI's 2023 numbers?”
Of course not.
real number
But what are the real numbers? No one is tracking the true number of victims who are suffering under a Biden-Harris administration that defunds police, releases criminals, and seemingly ignores illegal immigrants who brutalize them. Maybe?
Yes, there is. That is the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), a program of the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS). From BJS:
The BJS National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is the nation's primary source of information on crime victimization.
Each year, data is obtained from a nationally representative sample of approximately 150,000 households and approximately 240,000 people. You will be interviewed about the frequency, characteristics, and impact of crime victimization in the United States.
The NCVS includes both nonfatal personal crimes (i.e., rape or sexual assault, robbery, aggravated and simple assault, personal theft) and property crimes (i.e., robbery/trespassing, motor vehicle theft, and other types of theft). Collect information reported about. And it wasn't reported to the police.
For each victim incident, the NCVS collects information about the offender (e.g., age, race and Hispanic origin, gender, victim-offender relationship), crime characteristics (e.g., time and location of occurrence, weapon use, crime (such as the nature of injuries, economic impact), whether the crime was reported to the police, reasons why the crime was or was not reported, and the victim's experience with the criminal justice system.
What Lott Found
According to researcher and author John Lott,
While the FBI claims serious violent crimes have decreased by 5.8% since President Biden took office, NCVS numbers show the total number of violent crimes has increased by 55.4%. During Biden's term, rapes increased by 42%, robberies by 63% and aggravated assaults by 55%.
The largest increase in the three years since the NCVS was launched was 27% in 2006, so the increase has more than doubled under the Biden administration.
The NCVS increase under the Biden-Harris administration is the largest increase in the past three years and is slightly more than double the previous record.
Americans are concerned
According to a Gallup poll, 92% of Republicans and 58% of Democrats think crime is increasing. Rasmussen found that 61% of those surveyed think thought crimes are increasing, compared to just 13% who think they are not. Another Gallup poll from March found that “crime and violence” was second only to inflation and rising prices among Americans' concerns. But, as Lott pointed out, “the media and politicians used the FBI's inaccurate data to try to convince people they were wrong.”
John Lott was not the only person to blow the whistle on FBI betrayal. David Mustard, a professor at the University of Georgia who has researched crime extensively, called the FBI's opacity “astounding.”
What is surprising about this FBI report is that it does not say that violent crime in 2022 has increased significantly over previous reports, nor does it explain why the new crime rate is so high. This is because they have not even issued a press release regarding the major revision.
This lack of transparency undermines the FBI's credibility.
It also proved that presidential candidate Donald Trump was right about the spike in violent crime under the Harris-Biden administration.
Related articles:
FBI updates crime data, vindicates Trump in debate. Survey data: Violent crime increases by nearly 60% under Biden administration
