The U.S. murder rate kept falling in the first half of 2026, continuing what researchers describe as a historic downward streak—yet the national picture masks troubling local reversals in parts of the country. A new study, reported by CBS News, found that while the overall homicide trend remains in decline, eight cities recorded spikes compared with the same period in 2025. The findings underscore how a broad national improvement can coexist with sharp pockets of deterioration.
According to CBS News, Anna Schecter, a senior coordinating producer for CBS News and Stations’ Crime and Public Safety Unit, reported that the national homicide rate continued its long-running decline during the first six months of 2026. The report also notes that final FBI crime statistics for the year were not yet complete, meaning the numbers are subject to later revision. Even so, the study indicates the downward trend is continuing from last year, when the U.S. logged its largest single year-over-year drop and what researchers called likely the lowest murder rate in the country since 1900.
While the national trend points strongly toward improvement, the study identifies eight cities where the first-half homicide rate rose relative to the first half of 2025. Those cities include San Francisco, Dallas, and Norfolk, Virginia, among others. The existence of these spikes suggests that crime patterns are not uniform across the country, even as national averages improve.
San Francisco’s data stands out in the CBS News report: homicide rates in the city increased by 55% compared with the same period in 2025. That kind of jump—measured within a half-year window—signals a significant local shift that can distort how residents experience safety compared with the broader national narrative. The study’s approach, comparing like-for-like periods year to year, makes the rise especially stark in San Francisco’s case.
Beyond murders, the study also examined violence more broadly. The CBS News report says aggravated assaults remained roughly stable, with a 2% drop when compared to the first half of 2025 and a 3% decline compared to the first half of 2019. Those figures indicate that even where homicide falls, other forms of violent crime may not move in lockstep—either because the underlying causes differ or because certain categories are affected differently by enforcement, reporting, and community interventions.
Public debate over violence trends has been active in recent months, as some commentators argue that mainstream reporting can underemphasize large improvements. Fox News highlighted that former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino criticized outlets for downplaying the historic crime drop, pointing to how some coverage acknowledges the fall in violence while emphasizing other narratives. The CBS News study, which points to continued national decline alongside city-level spikes, offers a more granular framework for that argument: improvement can be real nationally while still leaving real problems locally. Fox News
The broader context is that many American cities have recently reported declines, though not always at the same pace or magnitude. In Baltimore, city officials have publicly promoted what they described as a historic drop in crime in 2025, according to CBS Baltimore. While the CBS Baltimore snippet does not provide the same set of statistics as the new study, it aligns with a wider pattern of municipal announcements emphasizing reductions. CBS News
Still, the most meaningful takeaway from the CBS News report may be its emphasis on uneven geography. Eight cities experiencing spikes despite a national decline suggests that city leadership, policing strategies, local economic conditions, and gang or organized-crime activity may affect homicide levels differently from one jurisdiction to another. For residents, that means safety outcomes can improve overall while their own neighborhoods face new pressures.
Other cities have also described reductions in violent crime while simultaneously implementing additional public-safety measures. For example, AP reported that New Orleans saw violent crime decline for a third straight year in 2025, even as National Guard troops began patrolling on President Donald Trump’s orders. AP described the city’s Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick discussing final 2025 crime statistics as the Guard deployment began, and said Trump credited the deployment with the drop. AP News
Taken together, the new CBS News study and related local reporting illustrate a recurring reality in U.S. crime data: national averages often trend in one direction—downward in this case—while subnational figures can diverge sharply. A surge in one city’s homicide rate, such as San Francisco’s 55% increase, can reflect a temporary fluctuation or a deeper shift. Either way, it can complicate how officials allocate resources and how the public interprets progress.
Ultimately, the study’s findings arrive at a moment when national homicide rates are said to be near their lowest level in more than a century, though final annual FBI numbers were still pending. With eight cities showing first-half spikes and aggravated assaults only slightly lower, the question for the next set of statistics will be whether local increases persist or fade, and whether violence trends remain on their downward trajectory across more jurisdictions. For now, the data points to continued national improvement alongside clear and urgent challenges in specific cities—an uneven map of safety that will likely shape policy and public messaging well beyond 2026’s halfway mark.
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