CLAIM: President Biden and his fellow Democrats claim crime is down based on an FBI report.
VERDICT: False. Biden and his fellow Democrats do not mention that thousands of police precincts are not reporting crime data to the FBI.
The Marshall Project explained that that in 2020, “almost every law enforcement agency was included in the FBI’s database.” However, in 2021, the FBI went to a new system for compiling data and would only accept police precinct reports through the new system.
The result? “Thousands of police agencies fell through the cracks because they didn’t catch up with the changes on time.” Thus, in 2022 there were far fewer police precincts turning in crime data; the Marshall Project reported in 2023 that “more than 6,000 law enforcement agencies were missing from the FBI’s national crime data last year, representing nearly one-third of the nation’s 18,000 police agencies.”
At some point in 2023 the FBI pivoted, announcing that it would accept crime data via the old reporting system once more. But the Marshall Project says it remains to be seen how many of the over 6,000 outstanding police precincts will begin or have begun reporting again.
One thing that the Marshall Project noted as certain: NYPD and LAPD are still not reporting crime data to the FBI.