President Donald Trump has warned of sending the National Guard to cities like Chicago, New York, Seattle, Baltimore, San Francisco, and Portland, Oregon, to curb what he considers escalating crime rates. However, recent data indicates that violent crime in these areas, and nationwide, has generally decreased over the years.
In the first half of 2025, homicides had notably decreased when compared to the same timeframe in 2024, maintaining a downward trend seen in the U.S. post-pandemic.
Having already taken federal control over policing in Washington, D.C., Trump has criticized these six Democrat-led cities, all located in states that opposed him in 2024. Nonetheless, he has not issued similar threats to major cities in states that tend to support Republican leadership.
John Roman, a specialist in data and the head of the Center on Public Safety & Justice at the University of Chicago, notes that violence has been a longstanding issue in certain urban neighborhoods. Still, he asserts there is no American city where violence constitutes a genuine crisis.
“We’re at a remarkable moment in crime in the United States,” he said.
Public sees things differently
Trump’s comments may partially resonate with public sentiment, as he refers to places like Chicago as “killing fields.” According to a survey by The AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, 81% of Americans view crime in large cities as a “major problem,” but only 32% favor federal oversight of police forces.
Recent events have served as a stark reminder of gun violence in the U.S. In Minneapolis, despite a reduction in homicides and most crimes, a shooter fatally shot two children attending a Catholic school Mass on Wednesday, and injured 17 others just a day after three separate shootings resulted in fatalities elsewhere in the city.
Still, over time, the picture is encouraging, according to numbers from AH Datalytics, which tracks crimes across the country using law enforcement data for its Real-Time Crime Index.
Aggravated assaults — which includes nonfatal shootings — through June were down in Chicago, Portland, Seattle, Baltimore and San Francisco and were virtually unchanged in New York. Reports of rape were up in New York and Chicago during the first half of the year, but down in the other cities, including a 51% drop in San Francisco.
The crime index also showed that property crimes, such as theft, burglary and motor vehicle theft, were mostly down in those six cities in the first six months of 2025. Theft crimes rose from 2020 to 2024 in four of the six cities analyzed by AP.
Cities defend safety strategies
Trump exaggerated and misstated facts about crime in Washington when his administration took over the D.C. police department and flooded the capital with federal agents and the National Guard. He referred to Baltimore, 40 miles (64.3 kilometers) away, as a “hellhole” during a Cabinet meeting and has said he might “send in the ‘troops.’”
“I’m not walking in Baltimore right now,” Trump said.
Yet Baltimore has shown drops in major crime, according to the crime index. Homicides and rapes were down 25% or more in the first half of 2025 compared to the same period in 2024. Homicides were down for three consecutive years through 2024 and were 35% lower when compared to 2018.
“Deploying the National Guard for municipal policing purposes is not sustainable, scalable, constitutional, or respectful,” Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, a Democrat, said on social media site X.
Baltimore has found ways to reduce violence by offering mentorship, social services and job opportunities to young people likely to commit crimes, said Michael Scott, director of the Center for Problem-Oriented Policing at Arizona State University and a former police chief in Florida.
“That approach has resulted in more significant reductions in shootings and homicides than any other strategy I’ve seen in the over 50 years I’ve been in the field,” Scott said.
Tales of different cities
Trump doesn’t seem to disparage big cities in states that favor Republicans. Charlotte, North Carolina, had 105 homicides in 2024 compared to 88 in 2023. The rate of vehicle thefts per 100,000 people more than doubled there from 2020 through 2024. Indianapolis had a homicide rate of 19 per every 100,000 residents in 2024 — more than four times higher than New York’s.
Amy Holt, 48, who recently moved to Charlotte from a gated community in northern Virginia, said someone tried to steal her husband’s car in their new city. She also found bullets on the ground while walking with dogs.
There’s no discussion about sending the National Guard to Charlotte. Holt believes most cities should be trusted to be in charge of public safety, adding that troops in uniforms would be “alarming” and “scary.”
Democratic elected officials in cities targeted by Trump have publicly rejected suggestions that their residents need the National Guard. “Crime is at its lowest point in decades, visitors are coming back, and San Francisco is on the rise,” Mayor Daniel Lurie said.
Experts question just how effective the National Guard would be and where troops would be deployed in cities.
“It’s going to make residents think: Things must be much worse than I realize to have the military in my neighborhood. What’s going on?” Scott said. “It’s more likely to generate undue fear and apprehension than it will lead to perceptions of reassurance and safety.”
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White reported from Detroit and Keller reported from Albuquerque, New Mexico. AP video journalist Erik Verduzco in Charlotte, North Carolina, contributed to this report.
