More Americans believe crime in US is becoming ‘extremely’ serious: Gallup

Nearly two-thirds of Americans believe crime is an “extremely” or “very” serious problem in the U.S., according to a Gallup poll released Thursday.

The 63 percent rate is the highest collected by Gallup, with the previous high of 60 percent found in 2000, 2010 and 2016.

A small proportion of respondents considered crime extremely serious in their local communities — 17 percent — but more than half of them believe crime has gone up in their area.

Nationally, about three-quarters of Americans believe crime has gone up, underlining the tough-on-crime political narrative of conservative politicians.

Republicans were significantly more likely to believe that crime is going up nationally, with 92 percent holding that belief compared to 58 percent of Democrats. Republican respondents also believed national crime was a more serious issue, 78 percent to 51 percent of Democrats.

It’s difficult to compare the perception of crime to real-life factors because the FBI has recently changed how it collects data, but Gallup’s self-reporting of crime victimhood has increased.

A fifth of respondents said someone in their household was a victim of a crime this year, near a record high. Most of those reported crimes were vandalism and car break-ins, according to the poll.

But the increase in crime perception could also be a result of frequent messaging about crime through politics and the increase in murders in some cities, which draws attention in media, Gallup said.

Despite an increase in attention, crime is still only the most important issue to 3 percent of Americans, according to a separate Gallup poll, a stark contrast to 1994, when crime was the top issue for more than 40 percent of respondents. The figure hasn’t crossed 10 percent since the recession.

The Gallup crime survey questioned about 1,000 Americans throughout October, with a 4 percent margin of error.