Violent crime in DC has fallen, but remains higher than most other American cities

Washington, D.C. officials continue to make the argument, as President Donald Trump takes over law enforcement in the nation’s capital, that violent crime has dropped by about 30% since the end of the pandemic. But D.C. is still statistically one of the most dangerous places among U.S. cities.

By asserting direct federal control over Washington, D.C.'s police department, the president hopes to address the declining but persistently high violent crime in the nation’s capital, which, according to the most recent data, ranks high in violent crimes, especially homicides. 

The executive action signed by the president on Monday marks the first time the chief executive has invoked Section 270 of the Home Rule Act to assume leadership of the city’s Metropolitan Police Department directly since Washington, D.C. was granted self-governance in the 1970s.  

Trump: "Violent gangs and bloodthirsty criminals"

"I'm announcing a historic action to rescue our nation's capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam, and squalor, and worse. This is Liberation Day in D.C. and we're going to take our capital back," President Trump said at a White House press conference announcing his new executive order that places the capital police under the direct control of his Justice Department. 

“Our capital city has been overtaken by violent gangs and bloodthirsty criminals, roving mobs of wild youth, drugged-out maniacs and homeless people, and we're not going to let it happen anymore,” he added. 

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, violent crime rates in Washington, D.C. skyrocketed to a 2023 peak, which saw high rates of carjackings, assaults, and the highest murder rate in decades. But, D.C. officials say that violent crime has declined significantly since that spike, in part due to efforts by the city to reform its criminal codes. According to the latest data compiled by the Center for Public Safety Initiatives, the murder rate in the capital city declined by about 30% in 2024 from 2023 levels. 

"It is true that we had a terrible spike in crime in 2023, but this is not 2023, this is 2025, and we've done that by working with the community, working with the police, working with our prosecutors, and, in fact, working with the federal government,” D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser told MSNBC, responding to the president’s earlier comments about crime in the city.

The D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb also pushed back against the president, citing those statistics. "The Administration’s actions are unprecedented, unnecessary, and unlawful. There is no crime emergency in the District of Columbia. Violent crime in DC reached historic 30-year lows last year, and is down another 26% so far this year. We are considering all of our options and will do what’s necessary to protect the rights and safety of District residents,” he said.

Crime in D.C. at nearly pre-pandemic levels

Despite the declining rates, Washington, D.C. officials ignore the wider picture. 2024 data shows that D.C. still persists as one of the deadliest cities in the United States. The capital city has the fourth-highest murder rate among all U.S. cities, measuring behind only St. Louis, MO, New Orleans, LA, and Detroit, MI, according to the Center for Public Safety Initiatives, which analyzed 2024 data. 

According to an analysis by Jeff Asher, founder of AH Datalytics and former crime analyst for the City of New Orleans, D.C.’s current 2025 murder numbers are on track to match pre-COVID-19 levels, signaling a return to pre-pandemic rates. 

That would place the city among the most violent cities in the nation. The violent crime wave from which the city is beginning to pull itself out of is even more stark when compared with other national capitals in the same time period. In 2023, D.C. had a homicide rate of 40.9 homicides per 100,000 residents. By way of comparison, the 2023 rate for Mexico City stood at about 8 per 100,000. Bogota, Colombia boasted a rate of 14 per 100,000 in 2023. Quito, Ecuador boasted a rate of 45 per 100,000, just slightly higher than D.C. in that year.

Senseless murders, like a Republican congressional intern gunned down on his way home from work, have heightened scrutiny from Republicans about the city’s crime problem. Eric Tarpinian-Jachym, from Granby, Massachusetts, an intern in the office of GOP Rep. Ron Estes, was killed in a drive-by shooting last month near a downtown metro station. Tarpinian-Jachym is not believed to have been the intended target of the shooting, according to police. 

Carjacking and attempted murder on the rise

Along with murders, the capital city suffered a large spike in carjackings in 2023, which peaked at 140 individual incidents in June of that year, according to Metropolitan Police Department data. Despite a decline since that peak, carjackings still remain significantly elevated compared to pre-pandemic rates, the data show. 

Anecdotally, these incidents remain top of mind, especially for the Trump administration. At the Monday press conference, President Trump recalled the assault last week by 10 “juveniles” on former Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) staffer Edward Coristine, known by his social media moniker “Big Balls.” Coristine had intervened to stop the group from assaulting and carjacking a woman in the early morning hours, Just the News previously reported. He was left beaten and bloodied, according to photographs taken at the scene. 

Complicating the picture, Trump said he would direct Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate whether the city is accurately reporting crime statistics. At the press conference Monday, the president insisted that crime in the federal district is getting worse, not better. The president pointed to the recent suspension of a Metropolitan Police captain who alleged that the department leadership was juicing crime numbers. 

“Juvenile offenders and crimes against persons, as they say, it's getting worse, not getting better. It's getting worse,” Trump said. 

“And we had a recent indication, and there was a story about a man who was… that just left. He quit because he was asked to do phony numbers on crime, and we're going to look into that,” the president said. 

FOP: "Altering crime statistics"

In May, a D.C. police commander was suspended and accused of improperly altering crime statistics for his area of responsibility. This suspension came just weeks after the captain, Michael Pulliam, filed an equal employment opportunity complaint against an assistant chief. Pulliam denies the allegations. 

The Fraternal Order of Police, the union which represents MPD officers, said that crime data manipulation is widespread in the department, directed by leadership to improve the numbers. 

“What we've heard through our members and through members of management that were willing to talk with the union is that this is a directive from the command staff, is that they want to make sure that these classifications of these reports are adjusted over time to make sure that the overall crime stats stay down,” FOP Chairman Gregg Pemberton told NBC 4 Washington. “And this is deliberately done.” 

MPD Chief Pamela Smith told the outlet that she could not comment on the ongoing investigation but that “[any] irregularity in crime data brought to my attention will be addressed immediately.”