Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll, centre, poses for a photo with members of the District of Columbia Army National Guard near the Washington Monument in Washington. Photo / Kenny Holston, The New York Times
Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll, centre, poses for a photo with members of the District of Columbia Army National Guard near the Washington Monument in Washington. Photo / Kenny Holston, The New York Times
Teams of federal agents and local police officers rolled out of the parking lot of a United States Park Police facility in southeast Washington as President Donald Trump’s takeover of law enforcement in the nation’s capital continued to ramp up.
Scores of National Guard troops gathered on the lawn ofthe facility by a US Marshals tent, and hundreds of official vehicles filled the parking lot and grass outside the facility in the Anacostia neighbourhood.
With 800 National Guard members and Washington’s municipal police department, the Metropolitan Police, under his command, Trump, who announced the federal crackdown on crime in the capital on Tuesday, has vowed that the city would be “essentially crime-free” under his watch.
In the next day or two, the DC National Guard will build up to about 100 to 200 soldiers out at any given time in support of federal law enforcement officials, Colonel Dave Butler, an Army spokesperson, said.
City officials have said the National Guard troops would not have the authority to make arrests.
They began arriving on the streets yesterday. About 500 federal law enforcement agents would be deployed in the city, officials have said.
As night fell on the U Street corridor in northwest Washington, one of the city’s most popular nightlife destinations, a checkpoint was set up, manned by an array of law enforcement officers, including Department of Homeland Security agents.
Plastic cones formed a large oval that took up the whole median of a block near 14th Street.
Drivers were pulled over for not wearing seatbelts or for busted taillights, among other offences.
Speaking at the Kennedy Centre earlier today, Trump appeared to suggest that he could maintain oversight of crime-fighting in Washington beyond the 30 days that the law allows his Administration to be in control of the Metropolitan Police.
While the President has described the city in apocalyptic terms as a crime-infested wasteland, violent crime in Washington fell to a 30-year low last year and has continued to fall sharply this year.
A member of Homeland Security Investigations outside a local eatery on U Street in Washington. Photo / Alex Kent, The New York Times
At least 66 people have been arrested in Washington since Tuesday, according to federal officials.
A federal task force that includes some local officers made 23 arrests on the first day, said Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary. Yesterday, 43 more people were arrested, according to FBI Director Kash Patel.
He said the FBI had assisted in 18 arrests so far this week, on charges that included unlawful gun possession, assault with a dangerous weapon and theft.
By comparison, in the first 10 days of August 2024, the Metropolitan Police made 635 arrests, or about 63 per day, according to department statistics.
About 10% of those arrested were juveniles. The number of crimes recorded during the first 10 days of August was virtually the same this year as last year.
Washington’s Democratic Mayor, Muriel Bowser, has shifted her stance on the President’s takeover several times, initially criticising it, then saying she would try to make good use of the federal law enforcement help, then condemning it yesterday as an “authoritarian push” and an “intrusion on our autonomy”.
Today she softened her tone again and suggested in an interview on Fox 5 Washington that additional federal resources could help drive down crime.
Bowser deflected questions about whether she believed the President’s crackdown was good for the city and pointed instead to the need for more money to recruit and retain municipal police officers.
“To the extent that you see the federal surge creating more arrests, taking more guns, MPD officers would do the same thing,” she said.
When asked where her relationship with the President stood, Bowser responded, “I’m the mayor, and he’s the president. That’s always been our relationship.”
