California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom dismissed his state having a problem with violent crime despite Fox News’ Sean Hannity pulling up the data that says otherwise during a debate Thursday.

Newsom and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis took part in “The Great Red State vs. Blue State” debate where they argued back and forth on their respective states’ policies. Hannity pressed Newsom on data pulled from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) that indicates California’s violent crime rate exceeded that of the national average and Florida’s, to which he immediately argued against.

“Your numbers are way higher than the national average. How do you explain that when safety and security, I would argue, is a prerequisite for the pursuit of happiness?” asked Hannity. (RELATED: ‘Why Don’t You Just Admit That You’re Running?’: DeSantis Presses Newsom On Presidential Aspirations In Fiery Debate)

“Well, I couldn’t agree with you more. We’re near 50 year lows, down 55% violent crimes in the state of California from the 1990s,” responded Newsom. “And I want to compare and contrast that with the issue in Florida that you didn’t mention, and that’s the murder rate. Let’s broaden that more broadly —”

“Those numbers were part of the murder rate,” Hannity interjected.

Newsom is objectively wrong about violent crime.

Thread of the top 20 most violent American cities are in California.

Not one is in Florida. https://t.co/QFc1cZUHSe pic.twitter.com/QslFYWOtmG

— Andrew Follett (@AndrewCFollett) December 1, 2023

The data showed combined rates for homicide, rape, robbery and aggravated assault during 2022. California had 499.5 offenses per 100,000 individuals compared to the national average at 380.7 and Florida’s at 258.9, according to the data from the FBI.

Newsom proceeded to make the case for cities in Florida, like Jacksonville, Orlando and Tampa, having higher murder rates than cities in California, like San Francisco, of which the governor previously was the mayor of.

DeSantis later responded criticizing Newsom for misrepresenting the data, and arguing Florida has a higher murder rate.

“So this is the slick politician — you put up the rates. He has 500 per 100,000. Florida is 250. So that’s almost twice as much, and he’s trying to spin that to say California’s doing good? People are leaving California in droves, largely because public safety has collapsed,” said DeSantis.

Also in the debate, DeSantis held up a map of human feces found in the city of San Francisco.

“There’s a lot of plots on that, you may be asking, ‘What is that plotting?’ Well, this is an app where they plot the human feces that are found on the streets of San Francisco, and you see how almost the whole thing is covered,” DeSantis said.

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