Trump’s fixation on urban crime ignores worsening rural violence, experts say

Trump’s fixation on urban crime ignores worsening rural violence, experts say

In the nearly three weeks since President Donald Trump deployed the National Guard to the nation’s capital, he has threatened to send troops to other cities, including Baltimore, New York, and Chicago, most recently calling that Midwestern metropolis “a hellhole.” Longtime public health experts say the administration’s focus on gun violence solely as an urban issue, purportedly driven by communities of color, fails to address its complexity and could cost lives.

“We have heard this rhetoric before; it was used by the Nixon administration, Reagan, and Bush … it’s a national narrative to frame cities as chaotic when in all of the cities that are mentioned, statistically, violence has decreased,” said Dr. Joseph R