Over the last week, President Donald Trump has tried his best to make a spectacle of sending federal agents and the National Guard into Washington to combat a nonexistent crime surge. The act has been a clear attempt to shift focus away from both his administration’s ongoing cover-up of its files on accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, and the deterioration of the economy because of Trump’s tariff policies.

Violent crime in Washington hit a 30-year low last year, and that trend is continuing this year. However, Trump, a serial liar, has tried to counteract reality with conspiracy theories about crime statistics, and his conservative base is eating it up—but why?

Groundwork for crime narrative

In 2015 and 2016, as he pivoted from pushing the racist “birther” conspiracy theory about then-President Barack Obama and ran for president himself, Trump repeatedly claimed the country was in the middle of a dangerous crime surge, though the violent crime rate remained low. After he won the election, he used his inaugural address to speak about so-called “American carnage,” which he attributed in part to immigration—reinforcing the falsehood that Latino immigrants are mostly criminals.

Trump’s demagoguery had deep roots in the Republican Party. Former President Ronald Reagan blamed societal ills on mythological welfare queens, and former President George W. Bush curtailed civil liberties and pushed for the invasion of Iraq based on fears of terrorist attacks from al-Qaida.

The conservative movement loves to connect fear of crime to rhetoric about racial minorities. It preys on deep-seated bigotry and motivates conservative voters to get out and vote, all as a way to stop the “other” from gaining control and allowing the spread of crime.

In more recent times, conservatives have circulated lies about the murder of Black teenager Trayvon Martin, and some right-wing circles have even celebrated his killer, George Zimmerman, as a hero. This resurfaced during Trump’s first term with the murder of George Floyd and the nationwide protests against police brutality that ensued. Instead of taking these organic expressions seriously, the right saw it as an affront to Trump and labeled even the most peaceful protests as riots blessed by top Democrats.

Trump loses to Biden, and the right doubles down on “crime”

After Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, he and the right were thrown off-balance. Reeling from this loss, he pushed for the violent attack on the government on Jan. 6, 2021, and then spent the next few years blaming Biden for a crime surge that began on his watch, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Trump, alongside his propaganda allies at Fox News, saw crime begin to decline under Biden but kept pushing the lie that it hadn’t. To do otherwise would have undermined years of attacks against Democrats and would be an acknowledgement that the right’s “tough on crime” approach had not worked.

The right blamed this supposed crime wave on migrants, reinforcing the conservative movement’s nativist, racist message. And they used the narrative to reinforce a long-held conservative bias against cities, which the right has railed against for their successful progressive policies and their racial and cultural diversity.

Much of this doesn’t make logical sense. The facts do not align with putting crime, racial minorities, and liberal policies all in a pile together. It makes even less sense when we remember that Fox News is headquartered in New York City, the metropolis Trump himself is a product of.

But the right loves conspiracies, and it is far easier for them to argue that liberal policies celebrating ethnic unity also promote crime than it is for them to live in reality.

Trump pulls the trigger

Trump understands his core audience more than he understands anything else in the world, and while complex ideas are out of his grasp, he is fluent in the language of bigotry.

By invoking crime, particularly at a moment of political vulnerability, he understands that he is activating long-simmering conservative resentments. By raising the idea of a crime wave occurring in cities with large Black populations, the tensions raised within the MAGA movement about Epstein can be eased, at least temporarily. 

This is why Trump can open prison cells and release Jan. 6 rioters who were tried and convicted, and also continue to proclaim that he is for “law and order.”

Right-wing lawmakers and media have sold conservative voters on a false narrative for so long that those voters truly believe Trump and his cohorts are fighting crime—even as they continue to cover up for an accused sex trafficker and pedophile.

Democratic leaders can bring tons of facts to conversations about crime, but most of the right is too far gone. They are too steeped in propaganda and paranoia to give reality a chance.

They were always going to believe the lies from Trump and the rest when it comes to crime. It was only a question of when it was going to happen.