WASHINGTON—On Aug. 11, President Donald Trump federalized control over the Washington D.C. Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) and ordered 800 National Guard troops to be activated in the nation’s capital.
“I’m announcing a historic action to rescue our nation’s capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam, and squalor, and worse,” Trump said at a White House press briefing. “This is Liberation Day in DC, and we’re going to take our capital back.”
As the president spoke, he compared the crime rate in the nation’s capital to those of some of the most crime-ridden cities around the world, including Baghdad, Mexico City, and Bogotá, Colombia….