Salena Zito: Democratic policies lead to ‘troubling’ crime and ‘strong’ GOP voter registrations

“The crime rate has increased since the beginning of COVID and also with the George Floyd protests. This has also been accompanied by a really sharp increase in fentanyl overdoses,” Zito said on The Ingraham angle.

Speaking about the rise in riots and crime in Philadelphia, Zito described one of her recent visits in which a group of bikers circled her car several times.

“It felt like hours. It was probably only two minutes, but it was just a disturbing experience,” she said. “You just have to think about the people who live in the city, who can't move out of the city, who can't move to the suburbs, who can't afford it. And they're forced to expect this every day, and they're also forced to make sure their children have to experience this every day on the way to school.”

Zito said rising crime in Philadelphia is one reason why more voters in Pennsylvania are registering as Republicans than Democrats.

“Republicans have been conducting a massive voter registration effort,” Zito said, noting that Governor Josh Shapiro (D-Penn.) last October introduced the option for voters to register to vote at the same time they apply for their driver's license.

“Within 10 days, 55,000 new Republicans had registered,” she noted. “That was significant.”

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In addition to a changing trend in voter registration, Democrats also expressed concern about declining voter turnout in Philadelphia since the 2020 election.

In addition, the 2020 numbers obscured a small but significant improvement for Trump in Philadelphia, winning 17.9% of the vote against Biden, compared to 15.4% four years earlier.