President Donald Trump is threatening to take back federal control over the District of Columbia after a member of the president’s Department of Government Efficiency was brutally beaten in the city in the early hours of Sunday morning.
The president on Tuesday sounded off on the failure of the District’s government to properly police the city’s streets.
“Crime in Washington, D.C., is totally out of control. Local “youths” and gang members, some only 14-, 15-, and 16-years-old, are randomly attacking, mugging, maiming, and shooting innocent Citizens, at the same time knowing that they will be almost immediately released,” Trump posted on Truth Social.
The president went on to threaten action if the local government continued its failure to protect its residents.
“If D.C. doesn’t get its act together, and quickly, we will have no choice but to take Federal control of the City, and run this City how it should be run, and put criminals on notice that they’re not going to get away with it anymore. Perhaps it should have been done a long time ago, then this incredible young man, and so many others, would not have had to go through the horrors of Violent Crime. If this continues, I am going to exert my powers, and FEDERALIZE this City. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” Trump explained.
One of the most prominent Republican donors and former DOGE head, Elon Musk, also endorsed federalizing the District in a post on the social media platform X.
“It is time to federalize DC,” he wrote.
The president would need a filibusterproof majority in the Senate as well as approval from the House of Representatives to pass any sort of legislation repealing the District of Columbia Home Rule Act passed in 1973.
However, there’s still a lot Trump can do to alleviate some of the federal district’s problems without the help of Congress.
The Senate recently confirmed Jeanine Pirro, a former district attorney and judge in New York’s Westchester County, as the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. In that capacity, Pirro can prosecute crimes such as petty theft, carjackings, robbery, and homicide that would, in a U.S. state, fall under the jurisdiction of a local prosecutor.
The unique federal district status of Washington, D.C., means that its local attorney general handles the majority of juvenile crime cases. The current D.C. attorney general, Brian Schwalb, has reportedly declined to prosecute several juvenile cases leading to the involvement of D.C. youths in serious crimes.
Schwalb has spoken at length about his opposition to prosecuting some teenagers as adults.
The Daily Signal spoke with Zack Smith, a senior legal fellow in the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation, who has written extensively about the legal issues involving the District of Columbia.
Smith told The Daily Signal that the D.C. attorney general’s policies are harming public safety.
“[Y]ou’re seeing a lot of gangs going out recruiting very young children to commit very heinous acts, and you’re seeing juveniles who commit even murder receiving, relatively, slaps on the wrist for their crimes,” he explained.
“I would encourage Judge Jeanine to take as many juvenile cases in appropriate circumstances, transfer those to adult court, and for Congress to pass legislation to allow her to take even more of those cases to adult court in appropriate circumstances,” Smith added.
Smith noted that, in certain instances, the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department can be placed under federal control, which may be something the president could explore in the near future. He further noted that there is a significant amount of federal park land within the District that the National Park Service already polices directly under the Trump administration’s control.
“[Y]ou’ve seen the Park Police going in and trying to enforce laws, things like simple possession [of alcohol and marijuana] on federal park land, whereas the local city police have not been enforcing those provisions. And then you’ve also seen the president direct administration officials to take action to make sure that homeless encampments, others, are not being allowed to build up, as we saw several years ago on that federal property that is dispersed throughout the District,” the legal scholar explained.
Asserting federal control over the District has considerable historical precedent. In 1995, Congress created the District of Columbia Financial Control Board to address the federal district’s financial mismanagement and empowered the five-person body to overrule major financial decisions made by the mayor or D.C. Council. After the District successfully balanced its budget for four consecutive years, the board was dissolved in 2001. Congress could also appoint a special committee to be more engaged in the District’s affairs and make recommendations that could be then put to a vote before federal lawmakers.
At least one senator is ready for Congress to restore the status quo ante.
“This attack on a young man who came to Washington to help fix America’s government is simply the latest outrage in a series of assaults and murders that have made our nation’s capital a national embarrassment. We should pass my BOWSER Act, which revokes D.C. Home Rule, as well as bills preventing the D.C. Council from avoiding accountability through secret meetings,” Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, told The Daily Signal.
Lee’s BOWSER Act bill—Bringing Oversight to Washington and Safety to Every Resident Act is a not-so-subtle swipe at D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser.
“I will be working with my GOP colleagues and President Trump on every avenue possible to restore a safe, clean Washington Americans can be proud of,” Lee said.
This article has been updated since publication to cite Lee’s legislation.
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