When Should the Federal Government Step In?
On August 11, 2025, President Trump invoked Section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act to place the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department under temporary federal control by citing “special conditions of an emergency nature” under that law. He also ordered the deployment of about 800 D.C. National Guard members and roughly 120 FBI agents to support law enforcement operations in the city. These moves followed an attempted carjacking that left a former U.S. Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) staffer injured. The statute limits federal control to 30 days unless extended by Congress. This was not the first time that Trump enacted policies relating to local D.C. law enforcement as he signed an Executive Order earlier this year calling for greater coordination of law enforcement agencies within D.C.
Local D.C. politicians and many DC residents unsurprisingly had a dour reaction to these initiatives. A small rally formed outside the White House on August 11 to protest the new measures. D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser reacted to President Trump’s moves by saying “We don’t–and I think I speak for all Americans—we don’t believe it’s legal to use the American military against American citizens on American soil.” D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb labeled the actions “unprecedented, unnecessary, and unlawful,” arguing that “there is no crime emergency in the District of Columbia,” and noting, “violent crime in DC reached historic 30-year lows last year and is down another 26% so far this year.” The D.C. City Council issued a statement denouncing these policies as a “manufactured intrusion on local authority,” saying that “federalizing the Metropolitan Police Department is unwarranted” and that calling up the National Guard is “an unnecessary deployment with no real mission.”
The hard question is when, if ever, the federal government should step in to manage a city’s public safety crisis. As noted above, D.C.’s attorney general says “there is no crime emergency,” yet the District recorded a 2024 homicide rate of about 27 per 100,000—roughly six times New York City’s and higher, on a per-capita basis, than Philadelphia and Chicago. And while carjackings have fallen sharply since their 2023 peak, D.C. still led the nation in 2024 motor-vehicle thefts (not the same thing as carjackings but you get the picture), with 842.4 per 100,000 residents, which was more than triple the national average of 250.2.
Opponents of the federal takeover lean hard on recent trends, and they’re right that the numbers have improved. After 274 homicides in 2023, D.C. recorded 187 in 2024 (a 32% drop). As of August 11, 2025, MPD reports 101 homicides year-to-date, 11% fewer than the 113 at the same point last year. MPD’s dashboard also shows violent crime overall down 26% versus 2024 year-to-date. Even if you believe that some of the stats have been fabricated to make the crime rate seem less severe than it is, there is evidence that the trend is still downwards for many types of violent crime in the District. However, the core issue isn’t whether crime is down from last year—it’s whether current levels justify federal control.
We shouldn’t normalize serious violence just because citywide averages have improved. The snarky “see, D.C. is fine” videos—usually shot in the city’s wealthier corridors—ignore who bears the risk. In 2023, 57% of homicides occurred in Wards 7 and 8, and violence is intensely concentrated in DC overall as just ten blocks accounted for about 14% of all homicides. That reality, not the vibes from safer neighborhoods, should anchor our policy debate. In 2024 more than 70 businesses wrote a letter to Mayor Bowser asking her to address the crime issue in DC. Should we dismiss their concerns too?
Temporary federal control of a city’s police force troubles me, especially since it also involves the National Guard and a more militaristic feel, but portraying D.C. as some crime-free paradise is just as unmoored from reality. A better response is to acknowledge that today’s violence is unacceptable and to channel the outrage into solutions. Perhaps the political climate is too polarized now, but in an alternate reality the president should have partnered with the mayor, MPD, and community leaders on a comprehensive solution that could have included targeted policing, more funding for recruitment and retention, and the expansion of evidence-based technology and camera coverage with strong civil-liberties safeguards. President Trump may have gone too far, but I am not satisfied with the overall approach D.C. has to violent crime in the city. There are many others that feel the same. I ask all of you reading this to answer the question of when is enough, enough?
