For the second time this summer, President Trump is ordering the National Guard to a major American city, this time Washington, D.C.
At a White House press conference on Monday morning, Trump declared his effort to be “Liberation Day in D.C” with the announcement of “a historic action to rescue our nation’s capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam, and squalor — and worse.” He cited violent street crime, disorder, homeless encampments, and open-air drug use, all of which are indeed persistent problems in D.C. although violent crime has been falling recently.
Declaring a “crime emergency” in the city, the president — to Mayor Muriel Bowser’s consternation — will assume temporary control of Washington’s Metropolitan Police Department, delegating the responsibility to Attorney General Pam Bondi.
Can the president do that? Should he?
As we have noted before, the president has the legal authority to deploy the National Guard to American cities to protect federal property and personnel and to restore order during states of emergency, even if uninvited by state and local governments.
And because this is the federal District of Columbia, the president’s powers arguably go further in this case because the D.C. Guard reports to President Trump, not the city’s mayor; in the case of the states, it would be to their governors outside of limited circumstances. …
… Accordingly — whatever the histrionics in the press or from the mayor’s office — President Trump’s moves are in no way an extralegal totalitarian takeover.
That does not, however, make what he’s doing necessarily wise.
As Americans from coast to coast learned the hard way in the late 20th century, the best way to fight lawbreaking and disorder in our cities is through sustained active policing, by putting more cops on the streets, by focusing on crime hot-spots and gang members, and by putting violent criminals behind bars. But hiring, training, and deploying more cops takes time, and it takes even more time to see results.
