Donald Trump said on Wednesday he would ask Congress for “longterm” control of Washington DC’s police department and signaled he expected other Democratic-led cities to change their laws in response to his deployment of national guard troops and federal agents into the capital.
The president’s comments came as the White House took credit for dozens of arrests overnight in Washington as part of Trump’s campaign to fight a “crime crisis”, which its leaders say does not exist.
Trump earlier this week invoked a never-before-used clause of the law that sets out the federal district’s governance structure to take temporary control of the police department, but will need Congress’s permission to extend it beyond the 30 days allowed under the statute.
“We’re going to need a crime bill that we’re going to be putting in, and it’s going to pertain initially to DC,” Trump said during a visit to the Kennedy Center performing arts venue in Washington. “We’re going to use it as a very positive example, and we’re going to be asking for extensions on that, longterm extensions, because you can’t have 30 days.”
He said he expected to propose the legislation “very quickly”, though the Senate and House of Representatives are out of session and not scheduled to return until 2 September. Trump alluded to other options for extending control of the police department, saying “if it’s a national emergency, we can do it without Congress”.
The president spoke after national guard troops appeared on the National Mall on Tuesday evening as officers from the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration and Department of Homeland Security and other federal agencies appeared in neighborhoods across the city. Video circulating on local media showed police and federal agents arresting at least one person that evening in Columbia Heights, home to the city’s largest Hispanic population. Other videos showed traffic stops near Kennedy Street in north-west Washington, which in years past has been the site of gang activity.
The administration argues the steps are necessary to fight what Trump has called an “out of control” crime problem in the nation’s capital, but local officials have disputed that characterization. Data shows that crime rates plunged last year to the lowest levels in three decades, though the capital does have higher rates of some violent crimes compared with cities with similar populations. Trump ordered federal assets into the capital after a staffer with the so-called “department of government efficiency” was attacked early in the morning in an upscale entertainment district.
A White House official credited Tuesday night’s deployment with a total of 43 arrests, twice the total of the previous evening. It was unclear how much more that was than a typical night. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police Department said a total of 76 arrests were made throughout the day citywide on Tuesday, and the agency’s data showed they made an average of 56 arrests per day in 2024.
More than 1,450 officers participated in the deployment, about half of which were from the city’s police department, while only 30 national guard troops were deployed of the roughly 800 that defense officials have said are expected to arrive for the mission.
A White House official said to expect a “significantly higher” presence of national guard troops over the days to come, as well as round-the-clock patrols by federal agents, which have thus far only been present in the evenings.
Democratic lawmakers have condemned Trump’s incursion as an authoritarian move intended to distract his supporters from outrage over his refusal to make public files related to the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, a one-time friend who has become a fixation of conspiracy theorists.
Trump on Wednesday accused the Democrats of being “afraid to do anything because they don’t want to be criticized. But fighting crime is a good thing”. He warned that he would seek changes to Washington DC’s crime laws that he expected other cities to adopt, pointing to a cash bail reform lawmakers in DC approved in 1992.
“We’re going to go for statutes in DC and then ultimately for the rest of the country, where that’s not going to be allowed,” Trump said, singling out New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, all cities governed by Democrats. He also criticized the city government’s long-term push to be made a state, saying it was an attempt by Democrats to get two more senators. “Statehood is ridiculous. We want to straighten the place out,” Trump said.
Washington DC is the second US city to which Trump has deployed troops since taking office in January. In June, he ordered US marines and federalized national guard into Los Angeles to quell protests over his immigration crackdown.
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Officials in the overwhelmingly Democratic city have chafed at Trump’s deployment, with the attorney general, Brian Schwalb, saying earlier this week that the government was “considering all of our options and will do what is necessary to protect the rights and safety of District residents”.
The Democratic mayor, Muriel Bowser, has sought a cordial relationship with Trump since his return to the White House, but changed her tone on Tuesday, urging residents and voters during a social media event “to protect our city, to protect our autonomy, to protect our home rule and get to the other side of this guy and make sure we elect a Democratic House so that we have a backstop to this authoritarian push”.
The White House said a total of 19 teams of officers from various federal agencies are in the city “to promote public safety and arrest violent offenders”, while the national guard will “protect federal assets, provide a safe environment for law enforcement officers to make arrests, and deter violent crime with a visible law enforcement presence”.
On Tuesday night, arrests were made of people suspected of driving under the influence, unlawful entry and resisting arrest, and of an individual with an outstanding warrant for assault with a deadly weapon, the White House official said. Seven illegal firearms were also recovered.
In an opinion piece published in the Washington Post, Jeanine Pirro, the Fox News personality recently confirmed as Washington DC’s US attorney, said she would push the city council to change laws around criminal sentencing, particularly for the juveniles she blamed for violence.
“Young criminals have been emboldened to think they can get away with committing crime in this city, and, very often, they do. But together with our local and federal partners, our message to them today is: we will identify you, prosecute you and convict you,” Pirro said.
The 700,000 residents of the federal district have no voting representation in Congress and the president and federal lawmakers have the power to meddle in laws passed by the city council.
