Republican-controlled states have higher murder rates than Democratic ones: study
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Republican-controlled states have higher murder rates than Democratic ones: study
“We’re seeing murders in our cities, all Democrat-run,” former President Donald Trump asserted at a March 26 rally in Georgia. “People are afraid to go out.”
In February, Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., blamed Democrats for a 2018 law that reduced some federal prison sentences — even though it was signed by Trump after passing a GOP-controlled Congress. “It’s your party who voted in lockstep for the First Step Act that let thousands of violent felons on the street who have now committed innumerable violent crimes,” Cotton said during a speech in the Senate .
Last December, Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, told Fox News viewers , “America’s most beautiful cities are indeed being ruined by liberal policies: There’s a direct line between death and decay and liberal policies.”
Former President Donald Trump speaks at a rally at a rally on March 26 in Commerce, Ga. (Megan Varner/Getty Images)
But a comparison of violent crime rates in jurisdictions controlled by Democrats and Republicans tells a very different story. In fact, a new study from the center-left think tank Third Way shows that states won by Trump in the 2020 election have higher murder rates than those carried by Joe Biden. The highest murder rates, the study found, are often in conservative, rural states.
The study found that murder rates in the 25 states Trump carried in 2020 are 40% higher overall than in the states Biden won. (The report used 2020 data because 2021 data is not yet fully available.) The five states with the highest per capita murder rate — Mississippi, Louisiana, Kentucky, Alabama and Missouri — all lean Republican and voted for Trump.
There are some examples of states Biden won in 2020 that also have high per capita murder rates, including New Mexico and Georgia, which have the seventh- and eighth-highest murder rates, respectively. And there are Trump-supporting states with low murder rates, such as Idaho and Utah. Broadly speaking, the South, and to a lesser extent the Midwest, has more murders per capita than the Northeast, interior West and West Coast, the study found.
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There is a natural incongruence contained in comparing murder rates in cities with murder rates in states. Cities have much more tension , ingrained simmering hostility , and opportunity to organize crime than most small towns. You also see large groups of people interacting in cities that you dont in towns. Cities will always have higher murder rates.
For that reason I found this part of the article particularly interesting.
It also might not be fair to compare average cities of a few hundred thousand people with mega-cities like New York and LA.
While cities in general might have more opportunities for gangs and other crimes compared to rural areas, really big cities also have lots of resources to fight crime. Additionally, they have way more people in a given space and most of them are inevitably (I believe) going to be law-abiding. So just by math, they get a lower murder rate.
The economies of big cities work in their favor. By virtue of scale and diversity, they are probably more stable than those of smaller cities, which may rely on a single factory, for example, to drive the economy. It seems like nothing breeds crime like poverty. But a very large city will consistently have a lot of people who are economically comfortable.
Thus really big cities can have a lower crime rate regardless of who is running them.
But I thought the conservative narrative was that Democrats who run those big cities aren't interested in fighting crime and want to completely defund the police. What you seem to be saying is that their unexpected lower crimes rates are due to their well funded police forces.
So, just by math, you're saying that the lower the population, like small conservative rural towns, are just more likely to have higher murder rates per capita? Is it that when you cram lots of people into close proximity people tend to treat each other better than those who live so spread out? This math you're doing doesn't seem to be as fool proof as you might think, and in fact Tijuana has almost 2 million people and has the highest rate of murders per capita, so the "way more people in a given space" "inevitably" be more law abiding theory doesn't seem to hold up under scrutiny.
It seems to be a comically flawed theory apparently conceived only to come up for an excuse for why Democratically run big cities, counter to many conservatives intuition, have lower crime rates than Republican run States and cities.
But its "scale and diversity" that most conservatives I've talked to hate about big cities. While you're right, a small town economy can be crippled overnight from a single factory closing, and poverty is rampant because of it leading to higher murder and crime rates, you wouldn't know that from talking to most of the conservatives who live there who refuse to move to the big city where more opportunity is and their reason is often because they feel safer in their small towns and think of big cities as dangerous cesspools of minorities, gays, atheists and liberals.
Yet many white conservative Christians have been claiming higher crime rates among poor black neighborhoods are just a symptom of their culture, not their poverty and lack of opportunity.
y big cities can have a lower crime rate regardless of who is running them
Except urban areas are more violent than rural.
It seems like nothing breeds crime like poverty.
Many of the poorest American counties have less crime than average. But they are rural counties.
I’m not here to tell you what the conservative narrative is.
And I didn’t say anything about anybody’s crime rate being unexpected. Don’t know where you got that.
Could be. For some. I believe a core facet of my thesis was that many factors can impact the crime rate - not just a well-funded police force. Even a well-funded police force can be useless for a variety of reasons.
Nope. Didn’t say that. My theory is that perhaps there is something like a bell curve where once a town gets big enough to have a chronic crime problem, maybe more people doesn’t mean more crime.
I didn’t say any of it was foolproof. I used words like “may,” “I believe,” and “probably.” All I did was give my sense of things. Take it or leave it. I don’t care.
I don’t know why you think I care what the conservatives you talk to might think. I’m not responsible for what other people say.
Again: Who cares?
Well, that’s possible, too. I think it would be foolish to just dismiss culture as a factor in larger population trends, whether it’s crime rates, birth rates, or college graduations.
True. Perhaps it’s less of an issue when everybody is in the same boat. Also, it’s got to somewhat harder to hide in a small town.
I'm actually seeing a lot more reported murders from the rural parts of my state
We seem to have more too. Just a day or so ago a young man shot and killed his step father.
The top ten cities with the highest murder rates are;
1. St. Louis, Missouri
2. Baltimore, Maryland
3. Birmingham, Alabama
4. Detroit, Michigan
5. Dayton, Ohio
6. Baton Rouge, Louisiana
7. New Orleans, Louisiana
8. Kansas City, Missouri
9. Memphis, Tennessee
10. Cleveland, Ohio
What’s the takeaway, is there a pattern? State government, city government, city demographics? What is the point of this article. Are Trump voters the majority of these killers, of those killed?
“…is there a pattern?”
Demographics aside, but addressing the obvious with little hope of any meaningful change, we have a gun issue.
Plain and simple while being simultaneously multi-faceted and complex. We can barely negotiate the simple things, so let us talk around the complex rather that acknowledge the truth and continue to blindly accept the carnage as collateral damage.
we have a gun issue
Yes, like drugs, we want both and can’t control either.
“Yes, like drugs, we want both and can’t control either.”
Indeed. The common denominator?
Protecting the ‘legal’ distribution of both as they cross the imaginary, ignored, but ultimately profitable bridge between user and abuser.
I don't consider any of those large cities. Not on the scale of say New York, Los Angeles, or Chicago. I do think that you will find more conservatives in those cities than the ones I listed
Do you think that most of the shooters in Baltimore are conservative?
I really don't know.
But you think that: “ I do think that you will find more conservatives in those cities than the ones I listed”.
What’s your point?
“Do you think that most of the shooters in Baltimore are conservative?”
Do you think the families and survivors of ‘the shooters’ give a fuck whether they were ‘conservative’ or otherwise?
Time to address the issues, rather than the continuation of lamely labeling as an excuse for ignoring the truth.
It's just my opinion
Your opinion is that many/most shooters in these medium size cities are conservatives?
“Your opinion is that many/most shooters in these medium size cities are conservatives?”
See 4.3.6…
…comment?
Do you think the families and survivors of ‘the shooters’ give a fuck whether they were ‘conservative’ or otherwise?
No, but that’s not the topic or point of the seeded article. Did you read it?
Time to address the issues, rather than the continuation of lamely labeling as an excuse for ignoring the truth.
Go for it.
I’ve replied to you 4.3.11
“but that’s not the topic”
…how very convenient…
I thought we were talking about violent crime. Murder doesn't always occur at the end of a gun.
I am entitled to my opinion no matter how bogus it is
You’re right on both counts.
Wouldn't surprise me a bit.
Exactly, the MAGA’s are shooting up Baltimore, New Orleans, Detroit and now this last weekend, Sacramento.
“Sacramento”
The unnamed tragedy is whenever and wherever the next mass shooting occurs.
And it is inevitable…
…both sides eagerly awaiting the background (read race) of the perpetrator, and then only so willing to jump in and add to a preconceived narrative…to somehow justify the meaningless words of an unjustifiable deed.
We are sick.
We are sick.
So is the point of this seed.
“So is the point of this seed.”
…said wryly, missing the point and needing a drink.
Let me join you.
Sure thing, my wife and I are having some Loveblock Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand.
Morning Drinker...yes the Kiwis produce some good wines and there are some excellent Aussie wines out there as well.. enjoy..🦘🦘
We love both and they go with the crab cakes that we enjoyed.
I think there are a lot of reasons that varied places could have different murder rates. The public policies of each party are not so homogenous across the nation that I think we can credit or blame the whole party for the murder rates in Nashville or Cleveland.
Our whole society has grown more violent by the decade - in it's media, in it's speech and in it's politics. It's a lot more complex than can be discussed on social media or in a political sound bite. Decorum and respect is dead when cops have to arrest grade school children and revere symbols like The Punisher. Superman & Batman now kill people. Politicians can say they want to see their opponents in front of firing squads and get cheered. Logic and science is openly mocked and politicized for clicks.
Has it? My sense was that - statistically - violent crime has been decreasing over the past few decades, after peaking in like the late 80s/early 90s. Is that not so?
Maybe. But it does seem the rhetoric is more violent
If you mean in politics, I think that’s probably true.
... but but but we had a (D) as governor in 2020...!
I am curious how the US can ever be united again, when there is so much out there seeking to divide it .. I hope tax dollars do not pay for studies like this, it is bad enough having 'our' elected officials seeking to keep the divide growing.