By Vanguard Staff
President Donald Trump defended his takeover of Washington, D.C.,’s police department by claiming that murders in the city “reached the highest rate probably ever” in 2023, but crime statistics and expert analysis show otherwise. FactCheck.org reported that Trump’s statements ignored recent declines in homicides and violent crime, painting a distorted picture to justify deploying federal agents and National Guard troops.
At an Aug. 11 press conference, Trump declared a “crime emergency” in the District. “Murders in 2023 reached the highest rate probably ever. They say 25 years, but they don’t know what that means because it just goes back 25 years,” Trump said. He then signed an executive order seizing federal control of the Metropolitan Police Department for 30 days and ordered National Guard mobilization.
Data from the Metropolitan Police Department contradicted the president’s claim. The agency reported that homicides fell 32% from 2023 to 2024 and dropped another 12% so far in 2025. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for D.C. likewise announced in January that overall violent crime in 2024 declined 35% from the previous year, marking the lowest levels in over three decades. Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser countered Trump’s remarks directly, saying, “We also know that we are not experiencing a spike in crime but a decrease in crime.”
Experts cited by FactCheck.org also disputed Trump’s characterization. Jeff Asher, co-founder of AH Datalytics and a former CIA analyst, said Trump’s claim “is not accurate. DC’s murder rate in 2023 was 39 per [100,000] which was the highest in the city since 2003. That was still down more than 50% from 1991’s murder rate of more than 80 per 100K when the city had 482 murders. It has also since fallen and is on pace with 2019’s pace so far in 2025.” Adam Gelb, president of the Council on Criminal Justice, added that FBI data shows the city’s murder rate peaked in 1991 at 80.6 per 100,000, not in 2023.
The Council on Criminal Justice further reported that “overall, there is an unmistakable and large drop in reported violence in the District since the summer of 2023, when there were peaks in homicide, gun assaults, robbery, and carjacking.” The group said the homicide rate fell 19% in the first half of 2025 compared to the same period in 2024, a trend consistent with other large U.S. cities.
Trump also claimed D.C.’s murder rate exceeded that of cities such as Bogotá, Mexico City, and Baghdad. Asher cautioned against such comparisons, saying, “It’s generally inadvisable to compare crime rates between cities, especially international cities with populations many times that of DC.” According to the Center for Public Safety Initiatives, Washington had the fourth-highest homicide rate among 24 U.S. cities in 2024, behind St. Louis, New Orleans, and Detroit.
FactCheck.org noted that Trump’s remarks were more accurate in one respect: car crimes. Trump said car thefts doubled and carjackings tripled over the past five years. Asher confirmed this was true, but emphasized that “both car thefts and carjackings have fallen considerably after peaking in 2023.” The Council on Criminal Justice reported a 75% reduction in carjackings from June 2023 to June 2025.
Despite the data, Trump’s order brought sweeping federal intervention. The White House said 850 federal officers were deployed across D.C., making 23 arrests in a single evening. About 800 National Guard soldiers were also activated to provide logistical and street-level support. Stephen Vladeck, a Georgetown University law professor, pointed out that under the Home Rule Act, the president can use the Metropolitan Police “for federal purposes” but cannot direct their other duties.
The ongoing dispute over crime statistics underscores the tension between local officials and the Trump administration. While the White House portrays Washington as spiraling into lawlessness, independent analysts and city leaders argue that crime has been falling steadily since 2023, making Trump’s “crime emergency” a political maneuver rather than a data-driven decision.
Follow the Vanguard on Social Media – X, Instagram and Facebook. To learn make a tax-deductible donation, please visit davisvanguard.org/donate or give directly through ActBlue. Your support will ensure that the vital work of the Vanguard continues.
Here we go again, there are many factors skewing DC’s crime numbers down but one of the biggest is that their higher ups were either changing crimes to a lesser charge or directing officers to not to charge in the first place.
““When our members respond to the scene of a felony offense where there is a victim reporting that a felony occurred, inevitably there will be a lieutenant or a captain that will show up on that scene and direct those members to take a report for a lesser offense,” Fraternal Order of Police Chairman Gregg Pemberton said. “So, instead of taking a report for a shooting or a stabbing or a carjacking, they will order that officer to take a report for a theft or an injured person to the hospital or a felony assault, which is not the same type of classification.”
The police department’s command staff is focusing on two categories in order to get the numbers to fall, Pemberton said: armed with a dangerous weapon and injured person to the hospital.
“When management officials are directing officers to take reports for felony assault, or if they’re going back into police databases and changing offenses to felony assault, felony assault is not a category of crime that’s listed on the department’s daily crime stats,” Pemberton said. “It’s also not something that’s a requirement of the FBI’s uniform crime reporting program. So, by changing criminal offenses from, for example, ADW bat or ADW gun to felony assault, that would avoid both the MPD and the FBI from reporting that as a part one or a felony offense.”
https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/dc-police-commander-suspended-crime-statistics/3959566/
Violent crime is down in most major cities across the nation since the pandemic. The notion that this is all due to statistical manipulation is not in evidence.
Just one example of many showing the trends: https://majorcitieschiefs.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/MCCA-Violent-Crime-Report-2025-and-2024-First-Quarter.pdf
Attacking the data and the messengers has become a reflexive response of this administration and its supporters. There is no statistical justification for using federal troops in our cities, and it sets a terrible precedent. It’s allowed in DC, within limits. But it’s worth noting that the budget of the DC police department is controlled by Congress and the executive branch, so if they believe more police are needed in the nation’s capital, they are uniquely situated to fund more police officers there. Instead, House Republicans took $1 billion away from the DC budget this year.
Is it so surprising to find that crime stats are being fudged when police management pay, performance reviews and promotions are based on bringing down crime?
Trump haters are so afraid that Trump is going to clean up DC.
Uh oh, the Trump haters are not going to like this:
“According to the union, which represents the Metropolitan Police Department’s 3,000 personnel, carjackings are down 83% since federal control was enacted, while robberies dropped 46%.
Violent crime fell 22% in the seven days since federal law enforcement began patrolling D.C.’s streets, and car theft came down 21%. Assault with a deadly weapon and property crime are also each down 6%.”
https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/washington-d-c-police-union-crime/2025/08/18/id/1222922/
Apparently Keith doesn’t understand the arguments/ objections to the policy if he thinks this is means anything.
David appears to have a knowledge gap. ;)
As they used to say, Mussolini used to make the trains run on time. You’re supporting tyranny and justifying it by arguing public safety
Yup, Trump could cure cancer and his haters would find a problem with that.
At least today there are many residents in DC that are thankful that their streets are safer and getting cleaned up.
That’s because it would be injecting bleach, not an actual cure
I hope you keep up the rhetoric all the way through the midterms.
The GOP thanks you.
Ideology trumping political strategy gets us: Donald Trump.