WASHINGTON — At a ceremony on Friday honoring police officers and sheriffs, President Trump praised the courage and devotion of law enforcement — and presented a not entirely accurate picture of the difficult conditions they face.
In the morning, before speaking at the F.B.I. Academy in Quantico, Va., Mr. Trump lamented the reputation of the bureau. Then, as he addressed police officers who graduated from the academy's training program, he claimed that they and the bureau's agents were "great people" and "heroes for all of us."
The about-face kicked off a series of misleading statements Mr. Trump made about crime, his predecessor and immigration. Here's an assessment.
He asked "what the hell is going on in Chicago," where most types of violent crime have declined since last year.
Mr. Trump spoke of "the steepest two-year consecutive increase in murders in nearly half a century" in 2015 and 2016, and focused on Chicago.
"What the hell is going on in Chicago? What the hell is happening there?" he said, before offering a sobering statistic. "For the second year in a row, a person was shot in Chicago every three hours."
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The national murder rate climbed 20 percent from 2014 to 2016, the highest two-year increase since the 1960s. The steep rise concerned many criminologists. But the murder rate itself was far higher over all in the 1990s.
In 2016, Chicago experienced its most violent year in nearly two decades, but Mr. Trump's points require some context and updating.
The Chicago Tribune tracks shootings in the city and has reported that 3,429 people have been shot so far this year, as of Dec. 9. That does amount to the shooting of at least one person every three hours. The Tribune also noted that 737 more people had been shot over the same period in 2016.
Shootings have declined 21 percent from the same period last year, according to the Chicago Police Department's most recent crime report. Murder has declined 15 percent and aggravated battery 8 percent, while robbery has not changed and sexual assault has increased 12 percent.
He misleadingly claimed the Obama administration refused to equip police with military gear.
In detailing his administration's support for law enforcement, Mr. Trump said he was "allowing our local police to access surplus military equipment — something the previous administration for some reason refused to do. Explain that one."
In August, Mr. Trump fully restored a program supplying military equipment to local police. But he is exaggerating the restrictions placed on the program by President Barack Obama and inaccurately suggested that Mr. Obama's decision came without a cause.
After the fatal shooting in 2014 of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager, by a white officer in Ferguson, Mo., the response by the police to protests highlighted the militarization of local law enforcement nationwide that occurred as part of a program that was created in the 1990s. A debate across the country and in Congress ensued.
In 2015, the Obama administration prohibited police departments from obtaining track armored vehicles, weaponized aircraft grenade launchers and bayonets, among other weapons, at the recommendation of a task force it assembled after the Ferguson protests.
But the program still allowed a number of other kinds of equipment — including unmanned aircraft, wheeled armored vehicles, specialized firearms, explosives and pyrotechnics, riot gear and breaching apparatus — to be available to local law enforcement.
He claimed, without evidence, that countries give "us their worst people" through the diversity immigration visa program.
The program, known as the diversity visa lottery, provides an immigration pathway for people who come to the United States from countries with low levels of immigration, have no close relatives living here and lack special skills.
Mr. Trump's claim that other countries use the program to expel undesirable members from their own societies is unfounded and implausible.
As its sobriquet implies, the selection process is based on luck. Millions of people apply every year for the chance of obtaining one of 50,000 visas. But lottery winners, chosen by a computer at random, do not automatically receive a visa. They must undergo a screening process and comply with the current immigration law.
Applicants could be deemed inadmissible if they raise security, terrorist or health concerns; have a criminal history; depend on public assistance; previously violated immigration or labor laws; or have previously been deported.
Data on lottery winner recipients also do not align with Mr. Trump's characterization. In the 2015 fiscal year, one-third of diversity immigrants were employed in professional or managerial occupations (compared with 10 percent of all immigrants) and just 1 percent were unemployed (compared with 8 percent of all immigrants).
He suggested that sanctuary cities protect criminals.
Sanctuary cities limit their cooperation with federal immigration officials. But they do not stop law enforcement from pursuing criminals, as Mr. Trump suggested when he claimed, "Our cities should not be sanctuaries for criminals."
For example, a directive from the Chicago Police Department on "responding to incidents involving citizenship status" instructs officers that they cannot arrest or detain people solely because of the belief that they entered the United States illegally. It notes, however, that instructions do not apply if the person has an outstanding criminal warrant, has been convicted of a felony, is a defendant in a criminal case or has been identified as a known gang member.
Similarly, the San Francisco Police Commission prohibits its officers from aiding federal immigration enforcement efforts, but says, "nothing in this general order prohibits members from performing their duties in enforcing state and local laws."
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