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On August 11, Trump announced he would deploy 800 members of the National Guard to Washington, D.C., citing the city’s crime and homeless situation as a “tragic emergency.” Civil rights activists view this move as another unprecedented overreach to strip away civil rights protections, particularly in a city that symbolizes democracy.
Gloria Browne-Marshall, a professor of Constitutional Law at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, stated, “There’s a hostility against African Americans that has not been discussed. We’re talking about a city with significant Black power.”
Derrick Johnson, president of the NAACP, said, “The National Guard is part of our defense against domestic emergencies, and there’s no emergency in D.C., so why would he deploy them?”
Taylor Rogers, White House assistant press secretary, defended Trump’s actions: “President Trump is making Washington, D.C., safer for all Americans by stopping the vicious crime that has been plaguing the city.”
The move has reignited conflicts between the federal government and local leaders. In 2020, during George Floyd protests, Trump called in outside law enforcement to push back protesters. Republican congressional leaders have also clashed with D.C. leaders, including when they threatened to withhold federal funding if Mayor Muriel Bowser didn’t remove letters spelling “Black Lives Matter” from a street leading to the White House.
Some civil rights leaders argue that this is an effort by Trump to distract from the Epstein scandal. Al Sharpton, president of the National Action Network, said: “Trump is simply trying to feed them red meat in hopes they’ll be full after he broke one of his biggest campaign promises to them.”
The demographics of Washington D.C. have shifted over recent years. The Black population is now just over 40%, while the White population is just below that. The city has a long history of electing Black leaders, many of whom came up through the Civil Rights Movement.
Todd A. Cox, associate director-counsel at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, said: “President Trump is advancing a fictional story of a city that is overwhelmingly Black … beset by crime to justify the deployment of National Guard resources and to advance lawless policing.”
The controversy surrounding this move extends beyond Washington D.C. As Trump has warned he plans to target other cities run by Democratic mayors, including Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York. Civil rights leaders are concerned that other cities need a plan for this “abuse of power” taking place by the White House.
Gloria Browne-Marshall, a professor of Constitutional Law at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, said: “There’s a hostility against African Americans that has not been discussed. We’re talking about a city that has a great deal of Black power.”
