Crime and public safety are among the issues that have taken center stage in many midterm races nationwide, from Wisconsin to Pennsylvania to New York.

Republicans are repeating a page from their 2020 playbook by ramping up ads accusing Democrats of being soft on crime. The GOP spent nearly $40 million on crime-related messaging in September alone, and ad spending tends to be a good indication of what candidates and their backers think will sway voters.

Violent crime is on the rise in urban areas across the country.  Many small cities that typically have relatively few murders are seeing significant increases over last year. Killings in Albuquerque, N.M., Austin, Texas, and Pittsburgh, for example, have about doubled so far in 2021, while Portland, Ore., has had five times as many murders compared to last year, according to data compiled by Jeff Asher, a crime data analyst and co-founder of AH Datalytics. Most cities in the United States, including each of those named above, have a Democratic mayor. After protests last year over police violence against Black Americans, there has been a push from the left to "defund" police departments.