VIOLENCE IS THE MAGA BRAND:

The biggest risks for homicides came in conservative counties with iron-fist sheriffs and district attorneys, places where progressives in power are nearly as common as monkeys riding unicorns.

Kern County leads the locales where your chance of being murdered is greatest -- with a homicide rate of nearly 14 people per 100,000, compared with about 6 per 100,000 for the state as a whole and 8.5 per 100,000 in Los Angeles County. The number of people annually murdered (a legal term that implies conviction, but you get my point) in Kern has nearly doubled since 2015 to 124 lives last year.

Former President Trump, who legitimately lost the 2020 election, won nearly 54% of the count in Kern. Trump sycophant and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy also prevailed handily in Kern, raking in 64% of votes. My colleague Gustavo Arellano profiled Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood, pointing out that he's a dying breed of old-school lawman, not one to take the soft approach.

Merced County had the second-highest homicide rate at 9.5 per 100,000 residents. Merced is a political mixed bag, as a "blue wave" of Bay Area refugees and political converts have turned this agricultural stronghold into a nearly equally split county, but one where Democrats are far from a shoo-in to win any election.

Third place goes to Tulare County, running from Delano in the south to a bit north of Visalia, where people were violently killed at a rate of 8.8 per 100,000. Trump took nearly 53% of the vote there in 2020, and McCarthy, who also represents part of the area, took nearly 59%. Recently, after two suspects in a fentanyl bust were released on bail, Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux told Fox News that "California's system of justice is failing us all."

It's safe to say that none of these counties coddle their criminals -- presidential leanings don't define policy, but they are an indicator of how local politicians and law enforcement think about and handle crime. And yet, not only do these counties share the same problems of dark-blue Los Angeles and San Francisco -- poverty, homelessness, drugs -- they are doing worse on homicides. That's true, even given the fact that a few killings in less-populated counties can mean big jumps in year-to-year statistics.

At the other end of the spectrum is Contra Costa County, which has been successful at beating state averages on crime and has one of the state's only (along with L.A.'s George Gascón) openly progressive district attorneys, Diana Becton.

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