Trump deploys National Guard to Washington DC and pledges crime crackdown

The president also takes control of the city's police force, as the mayor rejects his claims of a crime wave.

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Trump declared a "public safety emergency" on Monday, deploying 800 National Guard troops to bolster hundreds of federal law enforcement officers who were deployed over the weekend.

"It's becoming a situation of complete and total lawlessness," he told reporters at the White House.

The city's Mayor Muriel Bowser has rejected the president's claims about crime, and while there was a spike in 2023, statistics show it has fallen since then. Violent crime in the city is also at a 30-year low.

"I'm announcing a historic action to rescue our nation's capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam and squalor and worse," Trump said during a news conference in which he was flanked by US Attorney General Pam Bondi, who will lead the city's police force while it is under federal control.