Serious violent crime and property crime rates will drop significantly in 2025, down 25% and 19% respectively, according to preliminary Justice Department findings obtained exclusively by Breitbart News.
It is estimated that there will be around 669,000 fewer victims of rape or sexual assault, robbery and aggravated assault compared to 2024. Property crime against households also fell by about 3.5 million in the same 12 months.
The Bureau of Justice Statistics report shows the violent victimization rate, excluding simple assault, was 7.4 per 1,000 residents ages 12 and older, down from 9.9 in 2024. The estimated number of victims dropped from approximately 2.83 million to 2.16 million.
The number of robbery victims fell from 626,420 to 453,870, robberies fell by approximately 172,000 incidents, and the robbery rate fell from 2.2 to 1.6 per 1,000 inhabitants.
In the broader violent crime category, which includes simple assault, the total number of victims fell from 8.2 million to about 7.5 million by 2025. This brought the overall victimization rate down from 28.7 to 25.7 per 1,000 people, although researchers believe the change is not statistically significant. Among them, simple attacks accounted for the most, with a total of 5.33 million cases.
All major categories of property crime declined. The number of households experiencing property damage was 14.89 million, down from 18.37 million in 2024, bringing the rate per 1,000 households down to 111.2 from 138.
Burglaries and trespassing fell by about 460,000 to 1.41 million, with the incidence rate falling 25% to 10.5 per 1,000 households. Vehicle thefts decreased by 349,000 vehicles from 1.19 million to 841,130 vehicles, and the vehicle theft rate dropped by approximately 30%. General home burglaries also dropped 19%, from 13.93 million to 11.41 million.
The Census Bureau conducts an annual survey for BJS, interviewing victims directly to learn about crimes missing from police records. It excludes homicides because it relies on victim interviews, but covers attempted, threatened and completed crimes.
The survey results, combined with separate data from the FBI, show a decline in the number of crimes recorded by law enforcement, although investigations recorded a much larger decline. For example, police-reported aggravated assaults fell 7.2% in FBI data, while investigations fell 31%.
Sources note that the discrepancy suggests that real crime rates are falling faster than reported figures suggest, and are attributed to improvements in police detection rates and encouraging victims to report crimes more frequently. The Justice Department report noted that because the two collection systems measure crime differently, the gap between their numbers would not in itself lead to a change in victim reporting habits.
The decline comes during President Donald Trump’s first year back in office, as federal authorities expand border enforcement and target violent criminals, drug gangs and illegal firearms.
The White House reported a surge at the border in January 2026, announcing that more than 400,000 illegal immigrants who had been charged or convicted of illegal immigration were deported in Trump’s first year back in office. Administration officials credit increased enforcement and a sharp decline in illegal border crossings to the nation’s public safety transformation, adding that increased enforcement has had a deterrent effect on crime among undocumented immigrants who remain in the country.
There has also been a significant increase in enforcement actions by federal agencies. In September 2025, FBI Director Kash Patel testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee that agents seized more than 1,600 kilograms of fentanyl — a 25% increase from 2024 — while dismantling approximately 1,800 gangs and criminal enterprises.
Patel linked the drop in crime to pulling agents out of headquarters and flooding high-density areas. Additionally, ATF reports that federal criminal charges under six gun trafficking statutes will surge 57% through 2025, attributable to concentrated enforcement against repeat offenders, criminal organizations and illegal firearms networks.
The findings are still preliminary, with final estimates for 2025 expected in 2027. BJS fully adopted the redesigned survey in January 2025 and used comparable redesigned survey estimates for 2024 comparisons. The bureau said the new estimates were not directly comparable to older survey series, limiting claims that the decline was the largest since 1973.