abt, ajoined by thomas senior research fellow with the harvard kennedy government school. in particular, we wanted you on this morning, following up on your opinion piece from the new york times on crime statistics, which was headlined, "how not to respond to the rising murder rate." tell us about the murder rate in the u.s. and where it has gone into the fbi report. guest: sure. it is a pleasure to be on. thank you for having me. the first thing to understand is surge in recent homicides in the u.s. is cause for concern but not panic. of a bit of context, rates violent crimes and all crimes has been falling fairly consistently since the early 1990's. it is only in 2014 -- 2015 and 2016 that we have seen this pronounced spike in homicides. it is about an increase of 12% 2014 to to 2014 -- 2015.we have had an increase of about 22% in the last two years. that increase is the largest we have seen in about 25 years. t to minimizent no this, but also to keep it in perspective. there is no crime wave, but there is a serious spike in homicide. host: reflecting some of that, your

host: thomas abt, you can read some of his findings on this and other issues. he is on twitter. ank you for being with us. thomas: pleasure to be with you. host: we will be joined next by florida international frank mora, looking at the tensions with cuba after the expelling of diplomats in havana, as washington journal continues. ♪ >> it became clear that my impression of breitbart was having an out font -- outside influence on the election, was an understatement. it had been extreme. in fact, including to research breitbart was the driving force on the right side of the political spectrum. announcer: tonight, new york times magazine conjured a writer will health and talks about his future story, down the breitbart will. >> i think this is really what gets to the disparity between the way that i have always heard people talk about breitbart, as a sort of hysterical, shouty machine for creating a fence -- offense, in a much more reality of the news organization as it functions on a daily basis. announcer: tonight on c-span's "q & a." announcer: c-span, where history unfolds daily

abt, ajoined by thomas senior research fellow with the harvard kennedy government school. in particular, we wanted you on this morning, following up on your opinion piece from the new york times on crime statistics, which was headlined, "how not to respond to the rising murder rate." tell us about the murder rate in the u.s. and where it has gone into the fbi report. guest: sure. it is a pleasure to be on. thank you for having me. the first thg