Donald Trump on Monday threatened to again take control of Washington DC’s police department if the city did not cooperate with his plans for mass deportations of undocumented immigrants.
The president’s threat comes days after the expiration of a 30-day takeover of the Washington Metropolitan police department (MPD), which Trump ordered in response to his claim the capital was experiencing an “out of control” crime wave. He also ordered in national guard troops and federal agents, who remain in the city.
“Mayor Muriel Bowser, who has presided over this violent criminal takeover of our Capital for years, has informed the Federal Government that the Metropolitan Police Department will no longer cooperate with ICE in removing and relocating dangerous illegal aliens. If I allowed this to happen, CRIME would come roaring back,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“To the people and businesses of Washington, D.C., DON’T WORRY, I AM WITH YOU, AND WON’T ALLOW THIS TO HAPPEN. I’ll call a National Emergency, and Federalize, if necessary!!!”
Bowser, a Democrat, earlier this month issued an executive order creating an “emergency operations center” that would coordinate with several federal law enforcement agencies.
The order did not mention Immigration and Customs and Enforcement, whose masked agents have been seen targeting suspected undocumented immigrants across the city in the past month. In a press conference last week, the mayor emphasized that the police would no longer be involved with such arrests.
“Immigration enforcement is not what the MPD does. And with the end of the emergency, it won’t be what MPD does in the future,” she said. Her administration has otherwise signaled support for having federal agents patrol the city, with Bowser writing in her executive order that violent crime had “notably decreased”.
Though rates of violent crime in the capital are at 30-year lows, Trump on 11 August exercised a never-before-used clause of Washington DC’s Home Rule Act to put the police department under his administration’s control for the 30-day period allowed by law, and also ordered the national guard and officers from several federal law enforcement agencies to patrol its streets.
An Associated Press analysis of the more than 2,300 arrests the White House credited to the takeover found that about 40% were immigration-related.
The Trump administration asked Congress to extend the emergency, but the Republican-controlled House and Senate declined to vote on the issue.
