Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.
“President Donald Trump said he was deploying the National Guard to Washington DC and taking control of the city's police force as he pledged to crack down on crime and homelessness in the city. Trump declared a ‘public safety emergency’ on Monday, deploying 800 National Guard troops to bolster hundreds of federal law enforcement officers who were deployed over the weekend…
“The city's Mayor Muriel Bowser has rejected the president's claims about crime, and while there was a spike in 2023, statistics show it has fallen since then. Violent crime in the city is also at a 30-year low… As well as crime, Trump also spoke at length about homelessness in Washington DC. ‘We're getting rid of the slums,’ he said.” BBC
The left opposes the move, arguing that crime is already falling.
“As The Washington Post documented in advance of Trump’s declaration of what looks a lot like martial law within the District of Columbia, violent crime spiked in 2023 but fell sharply in 2024, and since the start of 2025 it’s stood lower than during nearly all Trump’s first term as president (when Trump paid D.C. crime little heed). This is part of a national trend; according to the Post, homicides are down 30 percent nationwide, as are burglaries and robberies…
“Trump’s federal takeover of the D.C. police and his deployment of the National Guard therefore have no justification in observable reality. Even Trump’s own FBI director, Kash Patel, in a hilariously off-message statement at the press conference announcing the deployment, said that ‘the murder rate is on track to be the lowest in U.S. history.’”
Timothy Noah, New Republic
“Serious policy experts, some of them conservative, have proposed solutions to bring down crime levels in Washington. The most straightforward remedy is to fill vacancies in the city’s courts to speed up the processing of criminal cases…
“At Trump’s press conference, the Fox News host turned (God help us) U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro denounced the District of Columbia’s laws restricting sentencing for juvenile offenders. That’s a reasonable complaint, but one that could be addressed by legislation, not by putting troops on the streets…
“The president himself does not appear committed to the belief that this will solve crime. In his press conference, Trump said that, by his reckoning, Washington already has more than enough police officers (3,500) to deter criminals. If that’s true, why would adding more bodies—specifically, members of the military who lack training in law enforcement—improve the situation? Nothing about this proposal makes sense.”
Jonathan Chait, The Atlantic
“A small traffic scrape on Sunday produced an overwhelming show of force all the more terrifying for the pointlessness of its summons: ‘At one intersection, a minor traffic accident between a car and a moped brought at least two dozen agents running, some wearing masks and one carrying a rifle.’ In a separate incident, a member of the DC Metro police taking part in a ‘federal task force operation’ opened fire on a pair of armed suspects near a Metro facility Saturday—a dramatic show of force…
“This incipient state of siege is poised to be the new normal in Washington—and Trump and his goon squads won’t stop there. When one reporter asked him what other cities might fall under the authority of this roving police state, Trump, of course, pointed to cities harboring large blue-voting populations. ‘I’m going to look at New York in a little while, to see if we need to do this,’ Trump replied, adding that similar appraisals would determine ‘if we’re going to do this in Chicago.’”
Chris Lehmann, The Nation
The right supports the move, arguing that it is necessary to reduce crime.
The right supports the move, arguing that it is necessary to reduce crime.
“Recall that President Biden signed a Congressional resolution in 2023, amid that year’s murder surge, to overturn the D.C. City Council’s revisions to its criminal code, which included a reduction in the maximum penalties for carjacking and illegal gun possession. The vote in Congress included dozens of Democratic ayes. One was Minnesota Rep. Angie Craig, who had been assaulted in an elevator at her D.C. apartment building. Another was Texas Rep. Henry Cuellar, who later that year was carjacked at gunpoint…
“On the whole, local control of D.C. looks like a failure. The city has enshrined noncitizen voting in local elections and ‘sanctuary’ policies to thwart federal immigration enforcement. Why should the President and Congress stand for this in America’s seat of government?… If he really helps to clean up D.C., clearing out homeless camps and making public spaces safer for residents and tourists, he’ll deserve thanks.”
Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal
“Carjackings and vehicle theft are three times the national average, and the homicide rate is six times that of New York City… Arguments from commentators on CNN and MSNBC immediately turned to official statistics, which show declines in violent crime in the past year and a half. The only problem? A DC police commander has already been suspended for cooking the books on those numbers, a practice that the DC police union claims is commonplace.”
Ben Domenech, Spectator World
“In 2023, a bad year for crime in the district, there were 40 murders per 100,000 residents. In 2024, that number fell to 27 per 100,000. So is that good? It is certainly a positive thing to have fewer murders, but… the homicide rate of 27 per 100,000 is the fourth-highest among U.S. cities… Trump is imagining a Washington with a far lower crime rate than its residents have become accustomed to.”
Byron York, Washington Examiner
“President Trump has already exercised his emergency authority to federalize the MPD for a month. In that time, he can direct them to target juvenile crime, gang activity, and visible disorder, with the goal of bringing a lasting reduction in such activity. At the same time, he can send a clear message that he is willing to intervene when the local government fails to protect D.C. residents…
“Taking a cue from the city’s successful fiscal reorganization in the 1990s, Congress could also establish a control board with jurisdiction over the District’s criminal-justice system. The board would be tasked with ensuring that D.C. has sufficient capacity to ensure that laws can be faithfully executed, overriding local legislation that stands in the way, such as restrictions on cash bail. Such a board… would target the city’s persistent crime problems without ending home rule.”
John Ketcham and Charles Fain Lehman, City Journal
“The motivation for Donald Trump’s plan to ‘federalize’ Washington, D.C. is same as his motivation for sending active duty troops into Los Angeles, deporting people to the CECOT torture prison in El Salvador, his politicization of the Department of Justice, and nearly every other authoritarian overreach of the last six months. He is testing the limits of his power — and, by extension, of our democracy…
“Trump has long dreamed of presiding over a police state. He has openly admired and been reluctant to criticize foreign leaders who helm one. He has now appointed people who have expressed their willingness to help him achieve one to the very positions with the power to make one happen. And both he and his highest-ranking advisors have both openly spoken about and written out their plans to implement one. It’s time to believe them.”
Radley Balko, The Intercept
