Voters angry about rising crime and the refusal of some progressive prosecutors to do something about it won another battle this week: Baltimore’s district attorney, Marilyn Mosby, lost her bid for re-election.

A Democrat, Ms. Mosby aligned herself with criminal justice reformers and gained national prominence and press plaudits for pursuing charges against six police officers in the death of Freddie Gray in 2015.

Yet she also faced her own legal challenges, complicating the Democratic primary. In January, Ms. Mosby was indicted on two counts of perjury and for making false statements on a loan application for the purchase of two Florida properties.

Baltimore is on track to surpass 300 murders for the eighth year in a row — Ms. Mosby’s entire tenure as district attorney — and her Democratic challenger, Ivan Bates, an African-American defense attorney and former assistant state’s attorney for the City of Baltimore, capitalized on this by promising “certainty of consequences for violent offenders” and a “safer Baltimore.”

Mr. Bates ran as a tough-on-crime reformer who will “fight against police corruption” and “against systemic issues faced by Black people,” but will also “hold violent repeat offenders accountable through effective prosecution.” The strategy worked.

Baltimore and San Francisco — which recalled its progressive district attorney, Chesa Boudin, in June — may be just the start. With the rise in violent crime these last two years, progressive DAs are now facing backlash, and it’s not just from the right.

Homicides increased nationally by nearly 30 percent in 2020, according to FBI statistics, and violent assaults increased by more than 10 percent.

The FBI has yet to release its 2021 national data, but a Council on Criminal Justice study of 22 American cities found that the number of murders in these cities increased another 5 percent in 2021.

Preliminary data for 2022 suggest that the murder rate this year will be about the same as it was in 2021, according to a crime data analyst, Jeff Asher, of AH Datalytics.

During the decade prior to the last two years, with crime in U.S. cities sinking to historic lows, a movement to elect progressive prosecutors emerged, funded in part by billionaire George Soros and his political action committees. Philadelphia’s Larry Krasner, Chicago’s Kim Foxx, Los Angeles’s George Gascón, and New York City’s Alvin Bragg are marquee examples.

In office, these district attorneys have adopted so-called reform measures aimed at reducing incarceration by eliminating cash bail, refusing to prosecute misdemeanors and low-level drug crimes, not trying juveniles as adults, and altering sentencing guidelines with a focus on racial equity.

​​There are many potential causes for the recent increases in violent crime nationwide, from Covid and its impact on the economy, school closures, and layoffs to the unrest in cities after the killing of George Floyd. Some, though, are pointing to these new criminal justice reforms, arguing: No punishment, no deterrence.

“These sorts of policy shifts are so new and many have been enacted during a very tumultuous time for the country,” a University of Pennsylvania criminologist, Aaron Chalfin, tells the Sun. “Anyone who is providing a simple answer with total confidence at this point is just grandstanding.” 

Voters, though, are looking for answers and setting their sights on their district attorneys. 

San Franciscans voted to recall Mr. Boudin last month over concerns about rising property crimes, muggings and smash-and-grab burglaries, widespread homelessness, and open-air drug use that they felt his office was failing to prosecute.

While Mr. Boudin blamed “rightwing billionaires” for his loss, it was regular citizens — many Democrats, who support the goals of criminal justice reform but not the reality of rampant crime — who voted him out.

Los Angeles’s district attorney, George Gascón, could be next. The Gascón recall effort reached a new milestone this month, when the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder announced that the 715,833 signatures collected in support of the recall met the threshold for a full review by August 17. If at least 566,857 signatures are deemed valid, a recall election will be held in November.

In the first half of 2022, murders hit the highest level in Los Angeles in 15 years. Mr. Gascón opposes enhancing penalties for crimes committed with guns or by known gang members.

Like in San Francisco, the recall effort in L.A. has received support from people across the political spectrum, including Democratic mega-donors and Hollywood executives.

In Philadelphia, the progressive district attorney, Larry Krasner, is facing a different sort of reckoning. Pennsylvania has no provision for the recall of elected officials, but earlier this month the speaker of the Pennsylvania House, Bryan Cutler, announced the formation of a legislative committee to investigate the rise in crime in Philadelphia. The committee could ultimately recommend impeachment proceedings against Mr. Krasner.

Murders are up nearly 60 percent since Mr. Krasner entered office in 2018, though he easily won re-election last year. The committee is planning to release its findings in the fall.

Crime may be a major issue in the midterms, particularly in local elections in large cities, generally run by Democrats.

In November, San Franciscans will vote for a new district attorney, and the victor will most likely combine tough-on-crime language with the rhetoric of criminal justice. In Baltimore, Mr. Bates is doing the same. Voters in these Democrat cities don’t want more incarceration, they just want safe streets.

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This article has been updated to more accurately reflect the prosecutors who received support from Mr. Soros.