'Pretext and distraction': Conservative exposes reason for Trump's 'desperate' crime push
In recent weeks, President Donald Trump has consistently harped on crime as the top issue for the 2026 midterm elections. But one conservative writer is arguing this is a "desperate" gambit to distract the American electorate.
On Monday, Jonathan V. Last – an editor for anti-Trump conservative site The Bulwark — suggested that Trump's "desperate" focus on crime is simply "pretext and distraction" aimed at pointing voters away from the flagging economy, and to later give cover for potential future attempts to disrupt the midterms with the military. He also reminded readers that before Trump was railing against violent crime in big cities, he campaigned alongside rapper Sheff G in 2024, who was later convicted for attempted murder and conspiracy.
"It’s almost like this thing we all watched never happened," Last wrote.
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"The pretext is to justify further deployments of the military into American cities," he continued. "The purpose of deploying the military into cities is to normalize the practice so that it can be done in November 2026 to depress turnout in Democratic areas."
Last went on to observe that in a country of 330 million people and more than 500 million guns, there will always be violent crime — despite 2024 FBI statistics showing violent crime is at a 50-year low in the United States. He lamented that because of this, Trump's rhetoric about crime will always resonate with a decent number of Americans because it is "perpetual" and "unfalsifiable."
"As for the distraction part: Trump is desperate to prevent people from noticing the economy," Last wrote. "Trump isn’t stupid ... [I]t allows him wiggle room to acknowledge some economic headwinds and then blame them on (a) criminals and (b) Democrats who have stabbed American in the back by supporting criminals."
"And if America is being stabbed in the back, then isn’t sending in the military the only rational response?" He added.
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Click here to read Last's full essay in The Bulwark.
