Violent crime held relatively steady, ticking down a meager 1%, while homicides jumped 4.3% during 2021, according to an estimate from the FBI’s “Crime in the Nation” report.
Overall violent crime nudged down slightly from 1,326,600 in 2020 to 1,313,200 in 2021, while homicides jumped from 22,000 in 2020 to 22,900 in 2021, the report found. The bureau is cautioning that its report, which is historically one of the most extensive in the United States, is premised on scanter data than prior reports due to sagging local participation.
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var _bp = _bp||[]; _bp.push({ "div": "Brid_64919351", "obj": {"id":"27789","width":"16","height":"9","video":"1111031"} }); ","_id":"00000183-a970-d69e-a3a7-b9f1d07d0001","_type":"2f5a8339-a89a-3738-9cd2-3ddf0c8da574"}”>Video EmbedVOTERS ADD VIOLENT CRIME TO TOP CONCERNS AS MURDER AND CAR THEFTS SURGE
“For years, the FBI’s [Uniform Crime Reporting] Program has provided annual snapshots of crime in the nation. This year, users will notice a difference in the data because it was exclusively collected via [the National Incident-Based Reporting System] in 2021,” the bureau explained in a press release.
Local law enforcement participation in the study plummeted to a decades-low. Only 63% of local law enforcement agencies submitted 2021 data for the report and only 52% of all agencies sent full data for the year, the FBI said. That figure represents the lowest rate of participation in the study since the late 1970s.
The sagging participation appears to be the result of the bureau’s reporting requirements that demanded more information from participants, CNN reported.
Violent crime is an umbrella measurement that captures homicide, aggravated assault, rape, and other types of criminal activity that entail physical force.
Fueling much of the apparent slim decrease in violent crimes was a major 8.9% drop in the rate of robberies from 2020 to 2021. In the prior year, violent crime spiked 5%, while murders skyrocketed 29.4% from 2019 to 2021, marking one of the largest single-year increases in the U.S. homicide rates in history.
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Crime has been pegged as one of the top concerns for voters in the midterm elections in polls. For example, a recent Reuters-Ipsos poll found that 30% of voters selected inflation as their top issue, 6% chose abortion, 5% said immigration, and 4% pointed to crime.
Voters surveyed in the poll favored Republicans in dealing with crime, with 39% saying they were the best on the subject, compared to 30%, who pointed to Democrats.
