Media largely ignored the December release of the FBI's quarterly crime report, which revealed a “large, potentially historic, decrease in crime occurring nationwide,” according to crime analyst Jeff Asher. 

Almost every category of crime decreased in 2023 compared to 2022, and the report “suggests either the largest or one of the largest national declines in murder on record,” wrote Asher. Despite the historic nature of the report, it received scant coverage in national TV media.

In the month following the release of the FBI's Quarterly Uniform Crime Report highlighting the downward national trend in almost all types of crime, national broadcast and cable news networks spent just a little over 19 minutes covering it in total.

From December 4, 2023, when the FBI released the report, through January 4, 2024, ABC’s Good Morning America, World News Tonight, and This Week; CBS’ Mornings, Evening News, and Face the Nation; and NBC’s Today, Nightly News, and Meet the Press spent only 3 minutes in total covering the historic downward national trend in crime. ABC programming completely ignored the national decrease in crime, while CBS shows mentioned it twice for a total of 34 seconds. NBC programming dedicated the most time of any of the broadcast channels, but still had only one 2-minute correspondent report and a couple of mentions of the trend for a total of 2 and a half minutes. 

Over the same period, cable news fared only slightly better, dedicating just over 16 minutes in total to the report. MSNBC devoted just one correspondent report and a handful of mentions lasting 4 and a quarter minutes in total to the FBI report. Jessica Tarlov, one of Fox News' Democratic personalities, mentioned the data twice for a total of 2 minutes on the network. CNN dedicated the most time to the report, but still covered it for just under 10 minutes.

Despite the significant decrease in crime, Americans' perception of crime seems to be just the opposite. In recent Gallup polling, when asked about national crime, 63% of respondents assessed crime as “extremely/very serious,” the highest percentage since Gallup began asking the question in 2000.  

As Republicans attempt to retool past campaigns leveraging perceptions of crime as a major issue, national media should better illuminate the positive trends from 2023 instead of simply cherry-picking negative crime data.

Media Matters searched transcripts in the SnapStream video database for all original programming on CNN, Fox News Channel, and MSNBC as well as all original episodes of ABC’s Good Morning America, World News Tonight, and This Week; CBS’ Mornings, Evening News, and Face the Nation; and NBC’s Today, Nightly News, and Meet the Press for any of the terms “murder,” “homicide,” “robbery,” “theft,” or “larceny” or any variation of either of the terms “crime” or “violent” within close proximity of any of the terms “drop,” “decrease,” “downward,” “decline,” “fell,” “plummet,” “trend,” or “rate” or any variation of the term “low” from December 4, 2023, when the FBI released the FBI Quarterly Uniform Crime Report for Quarter 3, through January 4, 2024. 

We timed TV segments, which we defined as instances when the downward national trend in crime highlighted in the FBI Quarterly Uniform Crime Report for Quarter 3, inclusive of January through September 2023, was the stated topic of discussion or when we found significant discussion of the downward trend highlighted in the report. We defined significant discussion as instances when two or more speakers in a multitopic segment discussed the downward trend with one another.

We also timed mentions, which we defined as instances when a single speaker in a segment on another topic mentioned the downward trend without another speaker in the segment engaging with the comment, and teasers, which we defined as instances when the anchor or host promoted a segment about the downward trend scheduled to air later in the broadcast.