California Dems Touted Decline In Violent Blue City’s Crime Rate. But The Data Isn’t What It Seems

While prominent California Democrats touted a supposed reduction in crime in Oakland, one of the state’s most notorious crime-ridden cities, the numbers they cited contained significant gaps in reporting, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Wednesday.

California Governor Gavin Newsom touted a 33% overall crime drop in Oakland in a June press release, with Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao also citing the figure in a May press release. However, the figure stems from incomplete year-to-date non-violent crime and burglary reports, according to the Chronicle’s analysis. The real decline may be closer to 20%, the outlet reported.

Non-violent crimes and burglaries get reported to the Oakland Police Department (OPD) through an online portal and take up to six weeks to appear in crime data, according to the Chronicle. The result is an underreported 2024 year-to-date crime figure, which artificially inflates the reported change in crime from the previous year.

Lt. Barry Donelan, head of Oakland’s burglary and general crimes detail, said that the OPD is not trying to deliberately mislead the public, citing “decrepit IT infrastructure” as the reason for the delay in reporting, according to the Chronicle.

“There can be a delay in the overall number of reported property crimes based on our community’s use of the online reporting system,” an OPD spokesperson told the Chronicle. “Each of these online crime reports must be reviewed and verified by a member of our staff before being included in crime statistics.”

Each OPD weekly report