Donald Trump Tweets Fake, Racist And Wildly Inaccurate Murder Statistics
Judd Legum Nov 22, 2015, 9:10 pm
Donald Trump, the leading candidate in the Republican presidential primary, tweeted a graphic with fake statistics about murders in the United States.
The statistics are also racist and wildly inaccurate.
"
@SeanSean252:
@WayneDupreeShow @Rockprincess818 @CheriJacobus https://t.co/5GUwhhtvyN"
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)
November 22, 2015
Official crime statistics for the United States are collected by the FBI. The racial breakdown of the victims and offenders for murders are
detailed in a report that is released yearly. The 2015 report, therefore, has not yet been released.
The data, however, is stable from year-to-year. The FBI’s 2014 report, which was
released in late September, reveals that the statistics in Trump’s graphic are fake and designed to stoke racial prejudice against blacks.
Trump’s graphic states that 81% of whites who are murdered are murdered by blacks. This is false. The actual data shows that
14% of white murder victims are murdered by a black person. (In 2013, it was
13.6%.)
The percentage of blacks murdered by other blacks (89.9%) is
similar to the percentage of whites murdered by other whites (82.3%). Trump’s graphic falsely states that 97% of blacks are killed by other blacks but just 16% of whites are killed by other whites.
On Sunday morning, Trump said that a Black Lives Matter protester who was beaten up by his supporters at a campaign event
probably deserved it. He has dismissed the Black Lives Matter movement as “looking for trouble” and described efforts by Democratic candidates to engage them as “
disgraceful.”
Trump is currently leading the national polls by
nearly 10 points. He also holds leads in the early states of Iowa and New Hampshire.