President Donald Trump is pushing back against critics who accuse him of overreach in his sweeping crime initiative in the nation’s capital.
On Monday, Aug. 25, Trump signed a series of executive orders in the Oval Office, including one instructing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to establish a new National Guard unit dedicated to “ensuring public safety and order in the Nation’s capital.”
“When I see what’s happening to our cities and then you send in troops, instead of being praised, they’re saying you’re trying to take over the Republic,” Trump, 79, told reporters. “These people are sick.”
He continued, “They say: ‘We don’t need him. Freedom, freedom, he’s a dictator, he’s a dictator.’ A lot of people are saying, ‘Maybe we like a dictator.’ I don’t like a dictator. I’m not a dictator. I’m a man with great common sense and a smart person.”
The following day, during a Cabinet meeting, Trump doubled down. “The line is that I’m a dictator, but I stop crime,” he said. “So a lot of people say, ‘If that’s the case, I’d rather have a dictator.’ But I’m not a dictator. I just know how to stop crime.”
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Earlier this month, on Aug. 11, Trump announced he was taking control of the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department and deploying the National Guard to target crime and address the city’s homeless population. Alongside local officers, federal agents from the FBI, Border Patrol, and ICE have joined street patrols.
Trump appointed Attorney General Pam Bondi to oversee the Metropolitan Police and warned that additional military forces could be used “if needed” to handle what he called a “public safety emergency.”
Since the crackdown began, arrests have risen across Washington, D.C. At the same time, demonstrations have intensified, with residents protesting the armed patrols, curfews, and roadside ICE checkpoints. In Dupont Circle, protesters were recently surrounded by a National Guard Humvee as they chanted, “Danger! Danger! There’s a fascist in the White House!”
On Aug. 13, Trump signaled his intention to extend the 30-day federal takeover of D.C. police and potentially broaden the program nationwide.
“We’re going to need a crime bill, and it’s going to pertain initially to D.C.,” Trump said while announcing the 2025 Kennedy Center nominees. “We’re going to use D.C. as a very positive example and we’re going to be asking for extensions on that long-term. That’s going to serve as a beacon for New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and other places all over the country. Our whole country is going to be so different and so great. It’s going to be clean and safe and beautiful, and people are going to love our flag more than they’ve ever loved it. And we’re going to do a great job.”
Trump declared the public safety emergency despite city data showing violent crime had dropped significantly over the past 18 months. He dismissed those statistics, claiming—without evidence—that officials were manipulating the numbers to downplay the severity of the problem.
