Welcome back in for Al’s Afternoon Tea, where we can sample the latest news. And with the election less than three weeks away, the latest is flying faster than cars at Daytona Speedway.

FBI Stealthily Revises Crime Data: There Wasn’t a 2.1% Drop in Violent Crime in 2022. There Was a 4.5% Increase

You know how the Democrats have been disputing Donald Trump’s claims that violent crime has gone up under Kamala Harris and Joe Biden’s administration? They’ve been citing an FBI report from September 2023 that said violent crime had gone down 2.1% in 2022. We’ve always known that was suspicious, since the administration had stopped requiring major cities to report their crime statistics.

But now revised data, buried deeply by the FBI, is confirming the original report was off. WAY off. Real Clear Investigations reports the FBI quietly revised the 2022 data to show that violent crime in 2022 actually increased by 4.5%.

And by quiet, we mean it took RCI’s sharp eyes to catch it. It notes the change was not in the agency’s September 2024 press release, but an obscure reference on the FBI website stating, “The 2022 violent crime rate has been updated for inclusion in CIUS, 2023.” There was no mention of the numbers increasing. As RCI says, “One only sees the change by downloading the FBI’s new crime data and comparing it to the file released last year.”

Looking at the graph put together by Crime Prevention Research Center, it appears the FBI didn’t initially count 1,699 murders and 7,780 rapes. How on earth does that happen? And they ask, “Should the FBI’s 2023 numbers be believed?”

Courtesy of the Crime Prevention Research Center

Could the FBI’s efforts to bury the real crime rate under the Biden-Harris administration be considered another example of the FBI engaging in election interference?

Harris Pandering Tour Continues: Suggests Support for Reparations

If pandering were an art form, Kamala Harris would be in the process of becoming Hunter Biden. Harris. In a town hall with popular Breakfast Club host Charlamagne Tha God on Tuesday, Harris suggested that she supports reparations for slavery in a desperate effort to lure black people back into her camp, saying:

I do have clear eyes about the disparities that exist and the context in which they exist, meaning history, to your point. So my agenda, well, first of all, on the point of reparations, it has to be studied. There’s no question about that.

Then she went off about being raised in a middle-class family again. See? It’s just like Hunter Biden’s paintings — a splattering of nonsense she hopes will pay off big.

Given the fact that Harris’s own family were slave owners, perhaps she should be the first to gin up the reparations. Leave those whose families had nothing to do with slavery, or whose forefathers died in the fight to end that accursed institution, alone.

Harris Interview With Fox News Airs Tonight

Harris’s interview with Brett Baier will be broadcast at 6 p.m. Eastern time tonight. Though it was prerecorded, Baier insists it will run unedited. Previously, the Special Edition host was soliciting questions from viewers that he should ask. Oh, there are so many. But one I really want to hear him ask is:

“You keep suggesting Donald Trump will use the Department of Justice to go after his political enemies. Put aside the fact that your DOJ is doing that very thing to him. When you were attorney general of California, you raided and tried to imprison the journalist who exposed Planned Parenthood’s baby-organ selling operation. Planned Parenthood was one of your major political backers. How do explain using your power to quash the freedom of the press when it endangers your political allies, and why are you okay with Planned Parenthood tearing apart the innocent unborn to harvest and sell their organs?”  

Harris and Allies Lie About Trump Town Hall

I was going to leave this one alone because the attack is so transparently cheap and juvenile and reeking of desperation. But the fact that Harris herself pushed it and Democrats keep harping on it means we have to take a quick look.

On Monday, Donald Trump held a town hall meeting in Pennsylvania. About half an hour in, two attendees suffered medical emergencies. Rather than continue answering questions as they were being treated, Trump decided to play some music instead. As the minutes stretched on, the former president decided to keep playing Boss Jock.

Kamala Harris, who couldn’t be spontaneous with a crowd to save her life, and her campaign managers decided to turn what happened into some indictment of Trump’s mental facilities. Yes, this is the same woman who spent nearly four years lying about Joe Biden’s clear mental  incapacitation.

Hope he's okay. https://t.co/WGhGteFpjm

— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) October 15, 2024

Even ABC News on Tuesday was having no part of Harris’s lies, with veteran reporter Terry Moran reporting what happened, and explaining that the crowd was having a good time.

Still, the disinformation artists kept at it, but Scott Adams putting it into perspective. 

The hoaxes are so transparent now, and coming in waves.

The Kamala Collapse is now. https://t.co/TqPMpd7dBX

— Scott Adams (@ScottAdamsSays) October 15, 2024

Meanwhile, Tim Walz delivered another beauty, saying his team doesn’t want him talking off the cuff because “they know what that means.” It means he makes stuff up. For example, he claimed Tuesday that he and Harris are the first Democratic running mate duo in history to both be gun owners. Let’s see … the first Democratic ticket was Andrew Jackson, a war hero with a fondness for duels, and his running mate, John C. Calhoun, was a hunter who grew up on the Carolina frontier. But don’t worry. Harris-Walz are the first gun-toting Democratic presidential ticket. 

By the way, the man who wants to be second in charge of our nation’s business says, “I don’t even know what a venture capitalist does.”

Make America Fries Again

Donald Trump has confirmed he’ll “work the fryer cooker” at a McDonalds Sunday in Pennsylvania as a way to troll Harris over her claim of having once worked for the fast-food giant. And who are we kidding? He’s also in it for the free fries. Which McDonalds franchise he’ll be working at is unclear, though the Philadelphia Inquirer reports that Trump is expected to attend the Steelers-Jets game in Pittsburgh on Sunday. 

On the Stream Menu

Boy, did we cook up some good ones for you this morning.

Stream contributor Jason Jones offers “A Fellow Dad’s Letter to President Trump: A Real America-First Agenda.”

Meanwhile, Wanda Alger returns with “Witchcraft in the Church and Voting for the Democratic Agenda.” 

Al Perrotta is The Stream’s Washington bureau chief, coauthor with John Zmirak of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration, and coauthor of the counterterrorism memoir Hostile Intent: Protecting Yourself Against Terrorism.