U.S. victim survey: serious violent crime fell 25% in 2025, property crime 19% — preliminary BJS estimates

The Bureau of Justice Statistics’ preliminary 2025 National Crime Victimization Survey estimates, released 26 October, put the rate of violent crime excluding simple assault at 7.4 per 1,000 people aged 12+, down from 9.9 in 2024. Aggravated assault fell 31% and household property victimization 19%. But the overall violent-victimization drop (28.7 to 25.7) is not flagged as statistically significant, the figures may change, and two months of 2025 interviews were lost to the federal shutdown.

Verified October 27, 20264 primary sourcesLean methodCorrections

Verification

How we verify →

Claim → finding → sources. We also list claims we refused to publish as fact.

Claim 1
Violent crime excl. simple assault 9.9 → 7.4 per 1,000 (−25%), significant
FindingBJS Table 1 and highlights.
- Source: https://bjs.ojp.gov/document/pvencvs25.pdf
Claim 2
Total violent 28.7 → 25.7 not marked significant
FindingTable 1: no significance marker on total.
- Source: https://bjs.ojp.gov/document/pvencvs25.pdf
Claim 3
Property 138.0 → 111.2 per 1,000 households (−19%)
FindingTable 2.
- Source: https://bjs.ojp.gov/document/pvencvs25.pdf
Claim 4
Oct–Nov 2025 interviews missing; weights ×1.5
FindingMethodology section.
- Source: https://bjs.ojp.gov/document/pvencvs25.pdf
Claim 5
DOJ release headline and Woodward quote
FindingDOJ OPA release, 26 Oct.
- Source: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/national-crime-victimization-survey-shows-violent-crime-plummeted-2025

Refused as fact

Epoch Times / X “Violent crime dropped 25 percent” without the simple-assault qualifier — corrected framing.
Causal claims crediting or blaming any administration — not in BJS report.

By Daily Teabag Desk

Published Oct 27, 2026, 7:08 a.m. EDT

LeanCentre(0)Methodology

LeftCentreRight

Why this lean: Statistics report from the agency’s own tables, with its caveats (non-significant changes, preliminary status, shutdown gap) given equal weight to the headline drop; DOJ’s political framing attributed. Scored 0.

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U.S. Capitol west front — illustrative; not a BJS or Justice Department building — Photo: Architect of the Capitol, public domain

On 26 October 2026 the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) published Preliminary Victimization Estimates from the NCVS, 2025 (NCJ 312234). The National Crime Victimization Survey asks a national sample of households about crimes against them, whether or not they were reported to police. It does not cover homicide.

The headline numbers (rates per 1,000)

Violent crime excluding simple assault (rape or sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault): 9.9 → 7.4, down 25%. Statistically significant.
Aggravated assault: 4.5 → 3.1, down 31%. Significant.
All violent crime: 28.7 → 25.7 (8.2 million → 7.5 million victimizations). Not marked significant in BJS’s table.
Rape/sexual assault 3.2 → 2.8, robbery 2.2 → 1.6, simple assault 18.8 → 18.3: none marked significant.
Property victimization (per 1,000 households): 138.0 → 111.2, down 19%. Burglary or trespassing down 25%, motor vehicle theft down 30%, other theft down 19%: all significant. Vandalism 10.4 → 9.2, not significant.

These estimates may change when the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) publishes final estimates from the 2025 NCVS in Criminal Victimization, 2025 (forthcoming in 2027). — BJS, NCJ 312234

Caveats in BJS’s own report

Preliminary. Final 2025 estimates come in 2027.
New survey instrument. BJS moved fully to a redesigned questionnaire (NCVS-R) in January 2025 and says these figures are not comparable with legacy NCVS estimates. The 2024 comparison figures come from the redesigned instrument.
Missing months. No interviews were done in October and November 2025 during the lapse in appropriations. BJS multiplied base weights by 1.5 so four months of data could stand in for the second half of the year.
Response rates. 53% of eligible households and 78% of persons within them completed interviews.

How the Justice Department framed it

The Justice Department’s release the same day was headed “National Crime Victimization Survey Shows Violent Crime Plummeted in 2025” and quoted Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward crediting President Trump’s “Make America Safe Again” agenda. BJS’s statistical report itself makes no claim about causes, and neither do we.

Citizen impact: On Americans’ own reports, including crimes never reported to police, serious violence and property crime were less common in 2025 than in 2024. The size of the drop in total violent crime is not certain enough for BJS to call it significant, and the numbers are preliminary.

What this piece refuses

We do not say “violent crime fell 25%” without the qualifier “excluding simple assault”. We do not attribute the drop to any policy; BJS doesn’t. We do not compare these numbers with FBI police-reported data or with older NCVS years, which BJS says are not comparable.

Bottom line

Serious violent victimization 9.9 → 7.4 per 1,000 and property crime 138.0 → 111.2 per 1,000 households, both significant drops. Preliminary, new instrument, two shutdown months imputed.

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