Trump embraces tough-on-crime mantra amid DC takeover
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House and Senate Democrats, along with Washington's non-voting delegates in both chambers, argued that had Washington D.C. been a state, the president would not have been able to federalize the police force.
WASHINGTON (AP) — With National Guard troops in the streets and federal agents at the door of his former adviser, President Donald Trump spent a heavy dose of his Friday channeling his inner tourist and reliving his bygone days as a sports team owner and construction mogul.
The US capital, he declared, had been "overtaken by violent gangs and bloodthirsty criminals, roving mobs of wild youth, drugged-out maniacs and homeless people". He vowed to rescue it from "bedlam and squalor" and to let the police "do whatever the hell they want".
Washington DC is seeing a major escalation in security, with the Pentagon arming National Guard troops deployed under Donald Trump’s law-and-order drive, a move ordered by Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth amid rising political tensions in the capital.
In case you haven't heard, Donald Trump signed an executive order that effectively put Washington, DC under federal control. He seized authority over the local police and deployed 800 National Guard troops to the city.
Nearly 2,000 National Guard troops have now been deployed to join President Donald Trump's crackdown on Washington, DC.
At least ten cities in states whose Republican governors are deploying National Guard troops to Washington, DC, had higher rates of violent crime or homicide than DC last year, according to a CNN review of FBI data.