According to a Wirepoints survey of the 75 largest U.S. cities, Chicago and New Orleans have the dubious honor of being the murder capitals of the nation. For the Windy City, that marks its 11th year in a row of taking the top spot.
That distinction came by counting the actual number of homicides. By murder rate per 100,000 population, the title goes to New Orleans.
Chicago’s total murders for 2022 reached 697, but that number is lower than the actual total due to creative bookkeeping by Chicago authorities. The city does not tabulate murders that take place where its police department does not have jurisdiction.
In other words, killings on the interstate highway system, on university property, forest areas and others were not tallied. The true number for Chicago for last year is 737, even further outpacing the closest competition.
How far? Philadelphia came in second with 516, followed by New York City with 438, Houston’s 435, and Los Angeles’ 382.
As for the homicide rate for 2022, New Orleans suffered 74.3 murders per 100,000 population. That just continued the skyrocketing of homicides for the city. In fact, between 2019 and 2022, their murder rate shot up a staggering 139%.
The rest of the top five were St. Louis with 68.2, Baltimore 58.1, Detroit 48.9, and Memphis 45.9.
For comparison’s sake, the nationwide homicide rate for the most recent year available was 6.5 per 100,000 in 2020.
Geographically, it is much safer to be in the western U.S. than in the east. Of 2022’s top 10 cities for homicide rate, nine of them were east of or on the Mississippi River.
That number flips when considering the 10 cities with the lowest homicide rates, as nine of them were west of the Mississippi.
Cities with high murder rates also saw a dramatic upswing in homicides between 2019 and 2022. There are 20 cities listed by Wirepoints as “homicide hubs,” and half of them saw at least a 50% increase in murder rate in that three-year period alone. Milwaukee spiked 129% and Pittsburgh 92%, to name two of the cities that suffered the most.
Gun control arguments have become front and center in an argument between a pair of the nation’s leading cities. With the 2024 Democratic National Convention slated for next year, Chicago and Atlanta are battling to see which city will get to host the event.
Now Chicago officials claim that Atlanta is too dangerous to be the site for the political gathering. They assert that Georgia’s far less restrictive open-carry gun laws would make security very difficult to enforce. Georgia’s pro-Second Amendment governor, Brian Kemp, is not likely to roll back constitutional protections for the gathering, meaning guns will likely be present in hotels, meetings, and events away from the actual convention site.
Georgia’s Democrats are pitching for the convention to be held at State Farm Arena in Atlanta, and they note the center has protocols in place that ban the possession of weapons.
And for Chicago as the murder capital of the U.S. to call another city “too dangerous” is rich in irony. It is a city that never meets a gun restriction it doesn’t like and does everything it can to abolish the Second Amendment.
And still, it leads the U.S. in murders by a wide margin. Perhaps organizers of the Democratic National Convention should choose Atlanta BECAUSE of the state’s defense of individual liberties. After all, without a police presence at that very location, there is no better deterrent to violent crime than an armed and prepared civilian.
