The FBI confirmed a significant drop in violent crime in the United States, placing the homicide rate at 4.1 per 100,000 residents, matching the numbers recorded in 1955 and 1956 as the lowest in the historical series.
Murders and non-negligent homicides decreased by 18.1% compared to 2024, while violent crimes overall fell by 9.3%, according to newly released data from the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) program.
The agency indicated that between 2024 and 2025, there was the largest year-on-year decrease in the rate of violent crimes since it began making national estimates in 1936.
The report was compiled with data provided by over 17,000 state, county, municipal, tribal, and university agencies, collectively representing 96.2% of the U.S. population.
The reduction extended to the main categories of violent crimes. According to the FBI, robberies decreased by 18.5%, rapes by 7.6%, and aggravated assaults by 7.2%.
Property crimes also decreased in 2025. The figures indicate a continuation of the significant decline in crime recorded after the increase observed during the pandemic years.
The report also provides new data on hate crimes. Using a comparable set of agencies that reported information for at least six months in both 2024 and 2025, the FBI found that reported incidents decreased by 7.0%, from 11,404 to 10,606.
In general terms, the participating agencies communicated to the FBI information regarding over 13 million reported crimes in 2025.
Kash Patel attributes the results to Trump's leadership
The FBI director, Kash Patel, highlighted the figures and publicly linked the results to the security policies promoted by President Donald Trump.
"The president Trump promised to restore order and law, and the results speak for themselves," stated Patel in a post on X.
The official described 2025 as the year with the "greatest reduction in violent crime in the history of the United States" and also highlighted the operations carried out by the agency during that period.
"President Trump reads about these cases. He knows the victims. He feels the pain of the families who have lost loved ones. And he has provided law enforcement with the necessary support to deliver historic results," Patel added.
The director also assured that nine out of the ten most wanted fugitives by the FBI have been captured, and thanked Trump for his "unwavering leadership and support for law enforcement in the United States."
Patel's attribution represents a political assessment of the causes of the decline. FBI data documents the extent of the drop, but on its own, it does not establish a causal relationship between a specific administration and the trend in criminality.
In fact, the reduction in homicides began before 2025. An independent analysis by the Council on Criminal Justice (CCJ) places the start of the current downward trend in the second half of 2022 and warns that there is no single explanation for the phenomenon.
The trend, however, has continued into 2026. An analysis by the CCJ for the first half of the year found an 18% decrease in homicides across the 30 cities in its sample that have available data for this crime, which amounts to approximately 215 fewer homicides compared to the same period in 2025.
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