Crime Stats Aren’t the Best Way to Make People Feel Safe
Declining homicide and assault rates in DC don’t mean residents feel as safe as they want to be. Democrats have to do a better job of acknowledging that.
Perception is everything.
Photographer: Alex Wroblewski/Bloomberg
On an evening in late July, just blocks from the Washington, DC, rowhouse my wife and I share with our two boys, a shootout erupted between two groups of people. Injuries resulted; cars and homes were riddled with bullets and police determined more than 140 shots were fired.
With criminal activity like this still a daily fact of life in the nation’s capital — and with Americans nationwide often uneasy about their families’ public safety — Democrats are playing political Russian roulette by citing encouraging crime statistics to declare President Donald Trump’s takeover of DC’s Metropolitan Police Department wholly unnecessary. The same goes for his flooding of the city streets with National Guard troops and federal law enforcement. A not-insignificant portion of the electorate in crucial 2026 midterm election battlegrounds might conclude that at least Trump is doing something and acting within the law.