The federal surge has “worked”, Mayor Muriel Bowser said Wednesday. More federal officers on the street has resulted in a decrease in illegal guns, violent crime and carjacking, when compared to the same 20-day period, Bowser noted.
The District presented statistics for Aug. 7 to 26 showing a 45 percent decline in violent crime and an 87 percent decline in carjackings (down to 4 versus 31) for the same 20 day period versus last year.
“This is pretty pro,” Bowser agreed, when one reporter noted the press conference was “pretty pro-surge”. “They have seen reductions in crime.”
Bowser framed the additional federal officers as a sort of stop-gap given the low number of Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) officers currently on the force. There are currently 3,100 MPD officers, down from a high of 4,000 in 2016. The city is working to recruit another 500 officers, offering signing bonuses and other benefits.
Bowser said she “appreciates” federal officers, but added, “If there were 500 additional MPD officers, that same activity, arrests and gun recovery, would have likely been made,” Bowser said.
There was a courtesy meeting between the Mayor and the President the same day, but Bowser declined to discuss details of that or of a “more substantial” conversation that followed with US Attorney General (AG) Pamela Bondi.
Trump’s Aug. 25 Executive Order (EO) directs the AG to review MPD general orders, which direct the day-to-day conduct of officers. Bondi can ask the mayor to make changes to orders that Bondi determines are necessary to address the crime emergency and ensure public safety.
Bowser said she has limits to which requests she would grant. If the President asked the District to change general orders to loosen standards on use of force, pursuits and to get rid of body cameras, that would be “too far,” she allowed.
“But that hasn’t happened,” the mayor said.
Asked about whether the federal surge will end in thirty days —and if she wanted it to— Bowser said she wanted local control over public safety. “I think we’re going to have officers, and we want to have officers. We want to enhance our officer presence.” District sanctuary law has not changed, Bowser added.
The Mayor said the city has created a Safe and Beautiful Emergency Operations Center to coordinate and support federal activities. In the next few days she will issue her own EO to spell out how the emergency operation will engage with the federal task force.
Officials sidestepped questions about ICE and immigration enforcment, expcept to note that DC has no information on the people detained. “We should focus on these additional federal resources on violence,” Bowser said.
But she did respond when asked to speak directly to residents and workers in fear. “I am devastated by people living in fear,” Bowser said, adding that Congress should establish a pathway to citizenship for law-abiding people already in the country. Speaking to Hispanic workers in the District, Bowser said, “I would just express to them as a neighbor, how very sorry I am that they’re living in this terror.”
Pushback
Bowser is in a difficult position. Since DC is a federal city, the president —and a Congress that so far has voted largely to support his policies —has a tremendous amount of power over the city’s purse strings, justice system and ultimately, the law giving DC Home Rule.
The mayor said more police, more gun stops and more accountability have helped. But there’s not enough trust between federal partners and the community, she added pointing to masked ICE agents as well as National Guard from other states. What DC needs is more police, prosecutors, judeges, effective prevention programs and services as well as to ensure local control, she noted.
But some residents found her comments insufficient. “I don’t care what the numbers say,” Jamie told me, walking the family dog in Lincoln Park the afternoon after the Mayor spoke. “I don’t want to live in a fascist state in exchange for lower crime.”
Others just don’t feel safe. On Saturday morning, another dog walker, Troy, saw an officer with an assault rifle at Lincoln Park. “I don’t feel safer,” Troy told me Wednesday morning, before the press conference. “If they were going to make it a serious thing about combating crime or things like that, they should make investment into the programs to fight those things and not escalate to a military state.”
Councilmembers have also pushed back against the Mayor’s position. “It’s a moral moment for DC. Washingtonians are being taken off the streets & charged with crimes that even grand juries won’t indict, residents are scared to leave home & workers scared to go to their jobs. All while they drag our city through the mud,” said Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen (D) on X. This is wrong. Call it out.” Others echoed those sentiments on the platfrom. Ward 5 Councilmember Zachary Parker wrote that city leaders should be “unequivocal” that the number of federal agents and the deployment of National Guardsmen deployed by the administration is “dangerous, unnecessary and an affront to Home Rule.”
“We ought to be real clear about that. Real clear,” he said.
Precedent?
At-Large Councilmember Robert White, Jr. (D) responded directly to the Mayor’s statements, saying neither he nor DC residents or voters are okay with the federal surge.
“People are scared. People’s rights are being violated. People are being snatched off the streets while they’re on the way to school or work,” White said, pointing out that a law passed in 2001 gives federal authority to work with DC when the Mayor and US Attorney agree. The federal takeover is not necessary, he said, other than to start an authoritarian takeover that the President plans to take to other states.
Trump has made comments indicating he could send National Guard troops to Chicago, Baltimore or New York City. Crime is also cited as the reason for federal intervention.
“He said that already,” White noted. “So we should not as the District of Columbia be giving people the impression that this is a good thing, that we are okay with it, that it is helping the city, that it is intended to help us.”
At the conference, Bowser declined to offer advice to leaders in those jurisdictions, saying her comments were only applicable to the District.
“We are unique in that we’re always going to have a different relationship with the federal government, because we are the seat of the nation’s capital, and so that’s different,” the Mayor said Wednesday. “So I wouldn’t comment or extrapolate to any other place. This is what we are dealing with.”
