But here are the facts: Violent crime fell 3% in 2023, while murder and manslaughter dipped by 11.6%, according to new data from the FBI. And as for those big cities that, according to Trump and his surrogates, are in anarchic free fall? Crime rates there are down for the second consecutive year.

Urban areas have long been a target for Republican ire and right-wing media criticism. But the FBI statistics show that cities with more than 1 million residents saw the most significant dips in violent crime, with a 7% decrease from 2022 to 2023.

While the homicide rate surged by 30% during the COVID-19 pandemic, that number has since fallen and violent crime rates overall are now back down to pre-pandemic levels from 2019—when Trump was in office.

The former president has made railing against “out of control” crime in deeply blue cities a 2024 campaign talking point, consistently blaming Democrats and their “soft on crime” policies as well as police reform efforts. That did not stop 100 law enforcement leaders representing the nonpartisan group Police Leaders for Community Safety from endorsing Trump’s opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, for president on Monday.

These new statistics won’t stop Trump’s torrent of lies. In fact, as Daily Kos’ Oliver Willis reports, the more lies Trump tells, the further his supporters become entrenched in them. A new study from Harvard Kennedy School’s Misinformation Review revealed that if one of Trump’s claims is labeled as ‘disputed,” his voters are more inclined to believe it.

“With crime at record levels, with terrorists and criminals pouring in and with inflation eating your hearts out, vote for Donald Trump,” he said to thousands at a New York rally Wednesday. “What the hell do you have to lose?”

Trump reiterated this lie at the September 10 debate against Harris.

“We have a new crime. It’s migrant crime and it’s happening at levels that nobody thought possible,” he said. When ABC host David Muir fact-checked Trump’s statement and clarified that violent crime is actually down, Trump pivoted to another false talking point, claiming the FBI’s data was faulty because it didn’t include the worst cities.

The latest FBI data includes Democratic-majority cities like Seattle, Portland, Baltimore, and Los Angeles, to name a few.

Congressional GOP leaders are happy to echo Trump’s deceitful rhetoric.

“Make no mistake—this uptick in violence is the direct result of the radical Democrats’ soft-on-crime politics and the defund the police movement,” GOP Rep. Pete Stauber of Minnesota said at a GOP press conference during National Police Week in May.

The latest FBI data may not change the minds of MAGA supporters, but that doesn't mean that falsehoods shouldn’t be called out and refuted. Facts matter—especially because some of us still want to live in a world of truth, not paranoia and xenophobia.