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Trump expected to order a crackdown on D.C. crime, homeless encampments
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2025/02/10/trump-dc-crime-homeless-camps-graffiti-crackdown/
President Donald Trump is expected to issue an executive order that would seek to ratchet up penalties and enforcement of violent and petty crimes, clear homeless camps, and clean graffiti in the District of Columbia, according to three people briefed on the matter.
The directives targeting a city Trump has often vilified could come in an executive order as early as this week and emphasize public safety and beautification of Washington, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss private conversations between the White House and the administration of D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D).
Details of the executive order may shift, but early drafts have included language that would order homeless encampments cleared, direct prosecutors to pursue tougher penalties for gun violence as well as petty crime such as public urination, and revive one of Trump’s 2020 executive orders to protect national monuments, the people said. The order is also expected to focus broadly on federal parks controlled by the National Park Service.
Trump has long derided D.C. as a haven of crime, even though violence has decreased in the past year, and some in the city are likely to view the executive action as furthering a political attack on a deep-blue urban center. Local officials, too, fear the president might threaten D.C.’s self-governance, over which he and the Republican-controlled Congress have significant power.
But on some issues of criminal justice, Trump is aligned with Bowser, who has advocated for more aggressive approaches to crime in recent years in response to spikes in killings and carjackings. The two could find common ground, particularly if Trump offers federal resources to beef up law enforcement in the District.
President Donald Trump is expected to issue an executive order that would seek to ratchet up penalties and enforcement of violent and petty crimes, clear homeless camps, and clean graffiti in the District of Columbia, according to three people briefed on the matter.
The directives targeting a city Trump has often vilified could come in an executive order as early as this week and emphasize public safety and beautification of Washington, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss private conversations between the White House and the administration of D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D).
Details of the executive order may shift, but early drafts have included language that would order homeless encampments cleared, direct prosecutors to pursue tougher penalties for gun violence as well as petty crime such as public urination, and revive one of Trump’s 2020 executive orders to protect national monuments, the people said. The order is also expected to focus broadly on federal parks controlled by the National Park Service.
Trump has long derided D.C. as a haven of crime, even though violence has decreased in the past year, and some in the city are likely to view the executive action as furthering a political attack on a deep-blue urban center. Local officials, too, fear the president might threaten D.C.’s self-governance, over which he and the Republican-controlled Congress have significant power.
But on some issues of criminal justice, Trump is aligned with Bowser, who has advocated for more aggressive approaches to crime in recent years in response to spikes in killings and carjackings. The two could find common ground, particularly if Trump offers federal resources to beef up law enforcement in the District.
I'm all for less crime but where are the homeless supposed to go when they're thrown out? They're not the ones doing the shootings and carjackings.
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