The Trump administration is expected to release the latest FBI crime data report on Friday. Officials say the report will show that violent crimes have plummeted to record lows.
The officials told CBS News before the report’s release that the violent crime rate for multiple offenses has significantly dropped. The murder rate in 2025, for example, has dropped more than 18% compared to the year before, the outlet reported.
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President Donald Trump traveled to Garden City, New York, on Friday to deliver remarks at the Nassau County police training center. During his speech, Trump emphasized that his approach to crime was behind the lower rates. But criminal justice experts argue the trend isn’t the result of just one person or administration — it stems from several complex factors.
What are the latest crime statistics?
Along with the notable drop in homicide rates, officials speaking to CBS highlighted steep declines across various other crime categories. They said the rate of vehicle thefts and burglaries in 2025 dropped 22.7% and 15.8%, respectively. Robbery fell similarly, down 18.5% in 2025 compared with the previous year.
While not as dramatic, officials said other crimes also fell last year. The rates of aggravated assaults fell by 7.2%, and rapes declined 7.6%.
Independent preliminary crime reports from 2025 suggest similar findings to the FBI’s. In January, the Council on Criminal Justice (CCJ) released its 2025 crime trends report, finding that the national homicide rate was about 4 per 100,000 residents. If the FBI report confirms its estimates, the organization said this would be the lowest rate since at least 1900.
That trend also seems to be continuing. Earlier this month, the Major Cities Chiefs Association released its crime data report of 66 law enforcement agencies nationwide. It found that the total number of homicides dropped by 17.2%, robberies fell 16.6%, and rapes declined 6.2% so far this year.
Why is crime falling?
In a statement before the FBI report’s release, the CCJ said its research found that the fall in crime rates can’t be explained by a single factor. Instead, researchers said multiple forces moving in the same direction, like changes in law enforcement strategy and broader social changes following the COVID-19 pandemic, likely led to the decrease.
The CCJ emphasized that its findings are not evidence that any specific administration’s policies did or did not work. Researchers said they would need to conduct more rigorous studies to find that out.
Criminologists who previously spoke to Straight Arrow about the trends echoed the CCJ’s report. John Roman, a senior fellow at NORC at the University of Chicago, said the falling rates shouldn’t be attributed to any “particular police or other justice system policy or program” at the state or local level.
Roman pointed to some of the same possible factors that the CCJ did, such as the end of the COVID-19 pandemic and a return to normalcy, reduced demand for drugs and substantial federal aid to state and local governments through legislation like the American Rescue Plan Act, signed by former President Joe Biden in March 2021.
Has Trump impacted the crime rate?
After returning to the White House in 2025, Trump took a direct approach to law enforcement. He launched a major immigration crackdown in major cities across the U.S. and oversaw the deployment of National Guard troops to several cities, including Washington, D.C.
He has often pointed to his deployment of National Guard troops and FBI agents in Washington as the reason for the city’s dropping crime rate. But experts Straight Arrow previously spoke to said crime in Washington and other cities where Trump deployed federal forces was already declining.
Wesley Skogan, professor emeritus at Northwestern University, told Straight Arrow last year that there’s no reason for Trump to take credit, even if he’s trying to lower crime.
“Presidents aren’t in office by the time they could enjoy the fruits of their efforts,” Skogan said.
Adam Gelb, the president and CEO of the CCJ, agreed, saying the drop is happening in areas with varying political policies.
“Rates are falling in cities with very different public safety strategies, economic conditions, and political leadership,” Gelb said. “The consistency across the map should make us cautious about handing credit to any one leader, party, policy, or program before the evidence catches up.”
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