A new study from the Council on Criminal Justice (CCJ) delivers some inconvenient facts for the usual fearmongers: murders in the United States dropped sharply in 2025—the first year of President Donald Trump’s second term.
According to the CCJ, “The rate of reported homicides was 21% lower in 2025 than in 2024 in the 35 study cities providing data for that crime.” In plain English, that translates to roughly 922 fewer murders in just one year.
And it gets better.
The CCJ notes that forthcoming FBI data could show 2025 recorded “the lowest [homicide] rate ever recorded in law enforcement or public health data going back to 1900.” Yes—ever. But don’t expect that headline to dominate cable news.
The researchers also examined broader violent crime trends and found that “violent crime overall in 2025 was at or below levels in 2019.” In other words, America didn’t descend into chaos. It got safer.
Naturally, the CCJ hedges its language, suggesting the decline is “likely the result of a complex tangle of broad social and technological changes and direct policy interventions.” Translation: they don’t want to say the obvious part out loud.
President Trump has long emphasized enforcing the law rather than apologizing for it. During his first term, he pushed for stronger policing and tougher enforcement, and in his second term, that approach appears to be paying dividends again.
Then there’s the issue of gun policy—another narrative that collapsed under real-world data.
There are now 29 constitutional carry states in the country. As these laws spread, the Left predicted “blood in the streets,” “the Wild West,” and total societal breakdown. Instead, reality intervened.
South Carolina became the 29th constitutional carry state on March 6, 2024. The following year, homicides and violent crime fell sharply. So much for the apocalypse.
Once again, the data tells a story the political class doesn’t like: enforcing the law works, empowering law-abiding citizens doesn’t cause mayhem, and under President Trump, Americans are safer—not less so.
