President plots expansion of crime crackdown as Pentagon chief says troops patrolling DC streets will be armed
Donald Trump has threatened to take his federal crackdown on crime and city cleanliness to New York and Chicago, as the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, ordered that national guard troops patrolling the streets of Washington DC under federal control will now be armed.
The US president talked to reporters in the Oval Office and said: “When ready, we will start in Chicago … Chicago is a mess.” He added that then the administration “will help with New York”, amid the controversial and aggressive federal efforts to control leading Democratic-voting cities, each of which has a Black mayor.
On the issue of suddenly announcing that it would now arm the federalized troops in DC, the defense department did not immediately offer any other details about the new development or why it was needed.
The step is an escalation in the federal government’s rare intervention into policing in the nation’s capital and came as nearly 2,000 national guard members are stationed in the city.
