President Trump offers to 'destroy' a state senator's career

(Image credit: Andrew Harrer - Pool/Getty Images)

published 7 February 2017

During a meeting at the White House on Tuesday with local sheriffs, President Trump offered to "destroy" a state senator's career and cited some incorrect statistics about the U.S. murder rate. Per the pool report, a sheriff from Texas was telling Trump about a state senator who "was getting in the way of some things that would be helpful." "Do you want to give his name?" Trump said. "We'll destroy his career." The sheriff "declined," the pool report noted.

At another point in the meeting with "nearly a dozen" sheriffs," Trump claimed the country's murder rate is "the highest it's been in 45-47 years." The FBI's crime report for 2015 indicated that while violent crimes increased slightly from 2014 to 2015, the rates has consistently fallen since 1996. New York University School of Law's Brennan Center for Justice also concluded in an analysis of 2016 crime statistics that the nation's crime rates "remain near historic lows."