Mayor Trump

How Trump is planning to assert more control over D.C.

Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser in the Oval Office with President Trump in May for an announcement about the NFL. (Photo by the White House)

Donald Trump has lived in Washington, D.C. for more than four and a half years now. For most of that time, he didn’t give it much attention.

In his first term, Trump mostly experienced the city from within the White House fortress and the black-tinted windows of his motorcade. He made annual trips to the Capitol to deliver his State of the Union address, and occasionally made stops at other federal buildings, but didn’t venture much into D.C. beyond that. From 2017 to 2021, he only visited a single Washington restaurant: BLT Prime, the steakhouse at the Trump Hotel.

The first sign that his second term might be different came in August 2023, when Trump returned to D.C. while out of office — to be arraigned for his January 6th indictment. “It was also very sad driving through Washington, D.C., and seeing the filth and the decay and all of the broken buildings and walls and the graffiti,” Trump told reporters that day. “This is not the place that I left. It’s a very sad thing to see it.”

Three days later, Trump announced that he was calling for a “FEDERAL TAKEOVER OF THIS FILTHY AND CRIME RIDDEN EMBARRASSMENT TO OUR NATION,” which soon became a frequent talking point of his on the campaign trail. (In the same post, Trump also predicted that the takeover proposal would be “VERY UNPOPULAR WITH POTENTIAL AREA JURORS,” one indication that the idea wasn’t just about the policy merits, but also meant as grist for his argument that he wouldn’t be able to receive a fair trial in D.C. and should be tried somewhere else instead.)

As promised, Trump has paid more attention to his adopted hometown in his second term. He’s moved to take control over the city’s cultural institutions, like the Kennedy Center. He’s certainly made his mark on the White House, with plans for a ballroom to come. And the idea of a “federal takeover” hasn’t gone away: Trump is expected to announce his exact plans for D.C. in a press conference at 10 a.m. ET today.

“Before the tents, squalor, filth, and Crime, it was the most beautiful Capital in the World,” Trump wrote on Truth Social this weekend. “It will soon be that again.” Stealing from himself a bit, he added in another post that today will be “LIBERATION DAY IN D.C.” Here’s what to know…

The plans: Trump has already started directing federal law enforcement agencies to increase their presence in Washington. The administration has temporarily reassigned 120 FBI agents to take on nighttime patrol duties in the city; agencies including the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), and the U.S. Marshals Service are also expected to pitch in with personnel.

According to the New York Times, Trump is expected to announce today that he will be activating “several hundred” — maybe even 1,000 — members of the D.C. National Guard to support law enforcement officials in the city. In the 50 states, National Guard units are controlled by the governor, although presidents can federalize them without the state’s consent if “there is a rebellion or danger of a rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States.” (That’s what Trump did during the June immigration protests in California, sparking an ongoing legal battle.)

But calling up the D.C. National Guard will be even easier. Unlike a governor, the D.C. mayor has no role in the Guard’s activation process; as president, Trump is already the D.C. National Guard’s commander-in-chief.

The law: That’s what Trump will be able to do easily. Can he go any farther in “taking over” the District of Columbia?

Well, Congress can, but not the president. The Constitution gives the legislative branch the power to “exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States.”

Over the years, Congress has tried out many governmental schemes for D.C., with the most recent one codified by the District of Columbia Home Rule Act of 1973. The law created an elected mayor and council who would lead Washington, D.C., although Congress retained authority over the D.C. budget and the power to strike down any law passed by the D.C. Council.

A true “federal takeover” of D.C. — beyond just upping the law enforcement presence — is not something Trump could do unilaterally. It would require Congress to repeal of the Home Rule Act. Some congressional Republicans have proposed doing exactly that; one such bill is called the Bringing Oversight to Washington and Safety to Every Resident Act… aka the BOWSER Act, named for D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser.

Any repeal of the Home Rule Act would have to overcome a filibuster, which means it would need seven Democratic votes in the Senate, which it is highly unlikely to receive.

The stats: Trump’s recent focus on D.C. came after former DOGE employee Edward Coristine — better known as “Big Balls” — was attacked by a group of teenagers in an attempted carjacking. Since then, the president has repeatedly claimed that crime is on the rise in Washington.

According to stats from the city’s police department, that isn’t the case. Here’s a chart from the Washington Post that shows the rate of violent crime (including homicide, robbery, and assault) in Washington, D.C. per 100,000 residents. These types of crimes skyrocketed during Covid, like in other cities, but have since returned below pre-pandemic levels.

The police department also reports that violent crime is down 26% compared to this point last year, including a 12% drop in homicides, a 50% drop in sexual abuse, a 28% drop in robbery, and a 20% drop in assaults with a dangerous weapon.