One message in campaign ads from Republican candidates and their allies ahead of the Nov. 8 elections is this: America is a dangerous place. Democrats made it that way. Ads in governor, U.S. Senate and U.S. House races aim to trigger fear.
on Sept. 26, citing data from AdImpact, a subscription service, that in the previous two weeks, Republican candidates and groups spent more than $21 million on ads about crime — more than on any other policy issue — and Democrats spent nearly $17 million.
the record rates of the early 1990s, several categories of violent crime have seen significant increases since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. "The murder rate is still 30 percent above its 2019 level," though murders in major cities and shootings nationwide have decreased this year, compared with the same period in 2021, the New York TimesIn 70 large U.S. cities, aggravated assaults and robberies increased in the first half of 2022, compared with the first half of 2021, while homicides and rapes decreased, according to police departmentby the Major Cities Chiefs Association, an organization of police executives representing the largest cities in the United States and Canada. Candace McCoy, a criminology professor at City University of New York, said the COVID-19 pandemic helped spur increases in violent crime as people recovered from isolation, the loss of loved ones and other residual effects. "People are just in despair and the trauma radiates," she said. "People get angry when they’re traumatized." Max Kapustin, a Cornell University economics and public policy professor who is affiliated with the University of Chicago Crime Lab, referenced theof George Floyd at the hands of police and said it’s not uncommon to see spikes of violence after incidents of police violence. "Combined with the strain and disruption caused by COVID, and the fact that acts of violence can kick off retaliatory cycles, it means this increase may be with us for some time," Kapustin said.Here’s a closer look at the New York ad plus ads in two hotly contested races for the Senate, which now has a 50-50 party split.Hochul has been governor since August 2021, following the resignation of Democrat Andrew Cuomo; she had served as lieutenant governor since 2015. The ad, released Sept. 14, said violent crime is "getting much worse on Kathy Hochul’s watch." It was from her Republican opponent, U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin. Zeldin’s campaign did not cite statewide crime figures when contacted by PolitiFact, but pointed to statistics for two cities, including New York. through Sept. 18 from New York City police shows that murder was down 13% from the same period in 2021, but other violent crimes increased year-over-year, including robbery and felony assault .
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