Trump Federalizes Washington's Police And Deploys National Guard To Capital Whose Violent Crime Has Declined Two Years Running, Resolving Long-Standing Concern That District Was Policing Itself Without Federal Assistance

WASHINGTON. President Donald J. Trump on Monday placed the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia under direct federal control and ordered the deployment of National Guard troops and a multi-agency federal law enforcement contingent to the nation's capital, an emergency action the White House described as a long-overdue response to a violent crime crisis that, according to the District's own published data, had been declining for two consecutive years.

Speaking from a briefing room podium, the President said the federalization had been required by deteriorating conditions in a jurisdiction where police-reported violent crime stood lower than it had been at the same point the previous year. "Our capital city has been overtaken by violent gangs and bloodthirsty criminals, roving mobs of wild youth, drugged out maniacs, and homeless people," Trump told reporters of a city whose 2024 homicide count was its smallest in roughly a decade. Asked whether the deployment was authorized by the Home Rule Act, the President confirmed that it was and moved on.

Officials clarified that the takeover would be executed under Section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act, a thirty-day window during which the President may direct the Mayor regarding the disposition of the Metropolitan Police. Personnel from the Drug Enforcement Administration, U.S. Marshals Service, FBI, ATF, ICE, Customs and Border Protection, and the United States Park Police would also be deployed. A city of roughly 700,000 residents would now host approximately one federal officer per several dozen civilians, an officer-to-civilian ratio more commonly associated with foreign capitals during occupations.

Mayor Muriel Bowser, who is permitted under federal law to be informed of such measures but not to be consulted regarding them, said she would comply with the order while disputing its factual premise. The Chief of the federalized Metropolitan Police was directed to begin reporting to the Attorney General. Administration officials said the President had been moved to act, in part, by recent coverage of a single carjacking attempt against a former DOGE employee, and by his repeated public observation that the District looked, in his estimation, "filthy."

District residents, who do not have a voting member of Congress, cannot adjust their own tax laws without congressional approval, and have voted for the Democratic nominee in every presidential election since the Twenty-third Amendment took effect in 1961, were not consulted in advance. The President noted on Monday that they would benefit greatly from the new arrangement. Several of them, reached by reporters outside their homes, said they would prefer not to be liberated.

At press time, the President was reportedly studying whether to extend similar emergency authority to other large American cities, none of which, an aide added helpfully, had voted for him.