Approximately 800 troops will be sent to assist local law enforcement in the nation’s capital.
On Monday, President Trump announced plans to activate approximately 800 National Guard troops in Washington, D.C. The announcement comes as Trump has pledged to ramp up efforts to make the nation’s capital safer.
National Guard troops will be utilized to support local law enforcement, a senior defense official said. They will assist with logistics, transportation, and guarding facilities.
President Trump deployed the National Guard in Los Angeles, California recently to put down violent protests against immigration enforcement officials.
“Currently, the National Guard is being deployed to protect federal assets, provide a safe environment for law enforcement officers to make arrests, and deter violent crime with a visible law enforcement presence,” a White House official said.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was with President Trump as he gave his directive. He said people should expect to see guard members “flowing into the streets of Washington in the coming week,” and that the Army is prepared to bring in other specialized units as needed.
President Trump’s memorandum directs Hegseth to coordinate with governors across the country and “authorize the orders of any additional members of the National Guard to active service, as he deems necessary and appropriate, to augment this mission.”
While crime in the city has reached a historic low, law enforcement officers have acknowledged that it is still a prevalent problem.
Greggory Pemberton, chairman of the D.C. Police Union, expressed his support for Trump’s order in a recent interview. He said crime was still “ubiquitous” in the city. He cited staffing shortages as the reason for law enforcement struggling to fight crime.
“As a short-term, stop-gap measure, if they want to give us 1,000 National Guard members and 500 federal agents to help us do our job, we’ll take it. We’ll take anything we can to try to keep these criminals from victimizing citizens,” he said.
Trump’s memorandum said the mobilization of National Guard troops in D.C. would end once the “conditions of law and order have been restored in the District of Columbia.” Troops have been notified that they would be deployed until September 25th.
On Tuesday morning, troops began arriving at the D.C. Armory to report for duty in the capital city.
