Former President Donald Trump said Tuesday that Michigan voters must deliver him to the White House to prevent a “Kamala crime wave” in the coming years, saying Democrats “have it out for police” and are inviting crime with soft penalties and bail policies.
Mr. Trump said major cities look like war zones, highlighting shootings over the July 4 weekend. He also said stores are reeling from shoplifting and weak Democratic prosecutors who downgrade offenses and no longer demand cash bail.
“We want a crime-free America. We’re gonna stop violent crime in the United States,” Mr. Trump said in Howell, Michigan.
He said Vice President Kamala Harris is a flip-flopper who was open to defunding police earlier in her career, only to portray herself as a tough prosecutor in this campaign.
If elected, Mr. Trump said, Americans will never hear “defund the police” again. He said Democrats are quick to blame officers when there is a police-involved conflict.
“They lose their house, they lose their pension. They lose their family, they lose everything,” Mr. Trump said of officers.
Mr. Trump also vowed to deport MS-13 gang members and other immigrants without documentation who commit crimes.
Michigan is a major prize in the November election. It will award 15 electoral votes. Mr. Trump won Michigan narrowly in 2016 before President Biden won it back for Democrats in 2020.
Polling averages show Ms. Harris has a slight lead over Mr. Trump. However, the state is home to a large Arab American population that might sour on Ms. Harris over the Biden administration’s support for Israel during the war in Gaza.
Mr. Trump is counterprogramming the Democratic National Convention by holding themed events each day this week.
After focusing on crime Tuesday, he will do a national security event in North Carolina on Wednesday, and an immigration event Thursday at Montezuma Pass in Arizona.
He will close out the week with a rally on Friday in Glendale, Arizona, and a “no tax on tips” event in Las Vegas.
Mr. Trump started the week by focusing on the economy Monday at a factory in York, Pennsylvania, before turning to crime and public safety in Michigan.
Mr. Trump predicted he would do well with suburban voters, citing his efforts to restrict the flow of migrants crossing the border illegally and keep “low-income towers” away from their houses.
“They want to be safe,” Mr. Trump said.
Two large data sets show that reported crimes in the U.S. appear to be decreasing, while surveys show that Americans think the country is less safe now than it was a year ago or five years ago.
One dataset, held by the FBI, collects crimes reported by police departments nationwide. That measure shows a drop in overall crime rates from a peak during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The other set is held by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, which conducts a massive annual poll asking roughly 240,000 Americans whether they were affected by crime. The National Crime Victimization Survey says crime was rising under Mr. Biden.
The mismatch between the data sets gives both campaigns something to crow about with fewer than three months until Election Day.
The Harris campaign on Tuesday issued a rebuttal ahead of Mr. Trump’s remarks, which characterized Ms. Harris as a soft-on-crime “Marxist.”
“During her time as a prosecutor, the vice president pushed for a fairer criminal justice system that held criminals like Donald Trump accountable and made communities safer,” the campaign said. “Under the Biden-Harris administration, violent crime is at historic lows, compared to record highs under Trump.”
The Democrats’ campaign pointed to media reports that said felony conviction rates rose from 52% to 71% during her first five years in office as San Francisco district attorney.
• Stephen Dinan contributed to this report.
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.
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