Memphis Mayor: Crime Here 'All Directly Related to Poverty'

On Friday’s broadcast of NewsNation’s “Elizabeth Vargas Reports,” Memphis Mayor Paul Young stated that crime in his city “and many other cities is all directly related to poverty.”

Young began by saying he wants and is pleased to have other federal officers coming to the city.

Later, host Elizabeth Vargas asked, “[W]e do know that the president has said that just the presence of uniformed National Guardsmen on the streets in Washington, D.C., he says, has really dramatically lowered crime in Washington, D.C., Memphis has some of the highest crime in the country. Can the National Guard being on the streets help?”

Young responded, “Well, I can tell you that there are residents all across our city that have varying perspectives, as to whether they want the guard here, whether they don’t want the guard here. The reality is that they will be here, and my goal is to make sure that, as they’re here, that they are supplementing our law enforcement, the individuals that have been working hard over the past two years to reduce crime. We’ve seen some significant declines in crime, across the board, in 2024, and so far in 2025. And our goal is to make sure that we are continuing that trend in the downward trajectory that we’re seeing in all right now.”

Vargas then asked, “Why is crime so high? It has been very, very high in Memphis, for many, many years now.”

Young answered, “Crime in Memphis and many other cities is all directly related to poverty. There are so many circumstances that individuals are dealing with in their lives, and when you get to a point where you have a lack of hope, a lack of belief that tomorrow is going to be better than today, then you take on different activities, where you just go and do different things. And so, our goal, as a city, as we are doing all of these law enforcement strategies, we have to lean into the things that are going to change the [mindset] of individuals, the prevention and intervention work.”

He added that the city needs more resources for mental health, “trauma-informed counseling,” housing, and cleaning up blight.

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett