Republicans don’t wear seat belts in DC “due to carjacking” despite data showing decline; | Republicans

one Republicans The senator said he wouldn’t wear a seat belt while driving in Washington, D.C. so he could act quickly if he was hijacked, Trump administration Despite public statistics, the crime is still increasing.

Markwayne Mullin Tell Fox News on Wednesday he avoided surrendering and violated local traffic laws so he could “quit” him.

“I’m not kidding when I say this. I’m driving there Washington, DC In my jeep, yes, I do drive myself. And I don’t give in. The reason I don’t give in, people can say anything they want to say, they can raise their eyebrows at me again, is because of carjacking. ” he said.

Praise at the same time Donald Trump’s Mullin said the controversial National Guard unit took over the federal government of the U.S. capital and Metropolitan Police Department, and he said he would not wear seat belts in other cities controlled by Democratic parties. But he said he did wear seat belts in other jurisdictions.

“If you only look at theft cars, if Washington, D.C. is a state, Washington, D.C. would be three times as good as any other state,” Mullin said. “We’re talking about a city. We’re comparing it to the statewide.”

Mullin’s comment is a war of words about crime rates in Washington, D.C., which continues between supporters and opponents of Trump’s orders, and he puts it into practice to combat record-breaking levels of violent crime.

“The murder rate in 2023 may have reached its highest rate,” Trump said Monday. “They said 25 years, but they don’t know what that means because it goes back to 25 years.”

But the official statistics tell a different story. Homicides fell to 187 from 274 in the same period last year, the highest number since 1997. This year, there have been 100 homicides until August 12. According to the New York Times Last year, there was a slight decline in 112 years.

However, with a homicide rate of 39.1 per 100,000, the homicide rate in Washington, D.C. data Written by the Igarapé Institute in 2023, it is not as bad as Port-au-Prince, Port-au-Prince. Cape Town, South Africa; Kingston, Jamaica; Caracas, Venezuela; or Guatemala City.

“The number of car thefts has doubled over the past five years, and the number of robberies has more than tripled,” Trump claimed. The city’s dashboard It shows that carjacking has increased by three years since 2020 and has declined in 2024.

This year, by August 9, there were 188 carjackings, compared to 299 in the same period in 2024, compared to 607 in 2023 Police spokesman told Politifact. Car theft also dropped by 25% from 2023 to 2024.