President Trump has threatened to declare a national emergency in Washington, D.C., to ensure his controversial crime crackdown survives.
He railed against Democratic Mayor Muriel Bowser’s decision to end the cooperation between the district’s police force and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers he sent in.
Trump is also making bizarre claims about falling crime in Memphis being due to his intervention, even though he has not yet deployed any National Guard troops.
Writing on Truth Social at around 1 a.m. Monday, Trump, 79, wrote that the National Guard and ICE patrolling the streets of the capital had “been a beautiful thing to watch.”
He then suggested that Bowser had wilted in the face of political pressure from the left.
“But, now, under pressure from the Radical Left Democrats, Mayor Muriel Bowser, who has presided over this violent criminal takeover of our Capital for years, has informed the Federal Government that the Metropolitan Police Department will no longer cooperate with ICE in removing and relocating dangerous illegal aliens,” he wrote.
He then threatened to declare a national emergency, saying, “If I allowed this to happen, CRIME would come roaring back. To the people and businesses of Washington, D.C., DON’T WORRY, I AM WITH YOU, AND WON’T ALLOW THIS TO HAPPEN. I’ll call a National Emergency, and Federalize, if necessary!!!”
Bowser said last week that the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia would no longer help ICE.
“Immigration enforcement is not what MPD does, and with the end of the emergency, it won’t be what MPD does,” she said, referring to the expiration of an emergency order that had justified federal agencies patrolling the streets.
Bowser had walked a political tightrope for a month, as ICE and the National Guard did Trump’s bidding in the city of over 700,000 people. The takeover was launched in August, with D.C. police instructed to support federal agents and National Guard troops.
“We don’t need a presidential emergency,” Bowser proclaimed in early September. However, in an apparent attempt to appease the Trump administration, she announced the creation of the Safe and Beautiful Emergency Operations Center, a body to oversee the ongoing response to issues Trump sees as having ravaged the district.
Bowser said the strategy “lays out a framework for how we will exit the emergency.”
In the same Truth Social post where Trump blasted her for severing ties, he credited his incursion for making the city a virtually crime-free zone.
“The Federal Government, under my auspices as President of the United States of America, has stepped into the complete criminal mess that was Washington, D.C., our Nation’s Capital,” he ranted.
“Because of this, D.C. has gone from one of the most dangerous and murder ridden cities in the U.S.A., and even around the World, to one of the safest - In just a few weeks. The ‘place’ is absolutely booming, with restaurants, stores, and businesses packed and, for the first time in decades, virtually NO CRIME.”
The White House and Bowser’s office have been contacted for comment.
