President Trump said he plans to go out on patrol with the Metropolitan Police Department and National Guard troops around Washington, D.C., on Thursday night amid a federal crackdown on crime.
“I’m going to be going out tonight, I think, with the police and with the military, of course. So we’re going to do a job,” Trump told conservative radio host Todd Starnes on his show. “The National Guard is great. They’ve done a fantastic job.”
A White House official told The Hill that details of what Trump would be doing were forthcoming.
The Trump administration earlier this month began surging federal law enforcement across parts of the District to crack down on what the White House said was an unacceptable level of crime, despite statistics showing violent crime has declined in the city.
Last week, Trump took federal control of the Metropolitan Police Department and deployed hundreds of National Guard troops across the city to further the crack-down on crime.
White House officials said earlier Thursday that there had been more than 600 total arrests made since federal officers were deployed around the city on Aug. 7. Of those, 251 were arrests of immigrants in the country illegally, the White House said.
Critics of Trump’s aggressive crackdown across D.C. have pointed to statistics that show the city’s violent crime rate fell in 2024 and is down again 2025. And some local residents have expressed their disapproval, protesting federal officers stationed in their neighborhoods.
A Washington Post-Schar School poll of 604 D.C. residents published Wednesday found 65 percent do not think Trump’s actions will make the city safer. Roughly 80 percent of residents said they opposed Trump’s executive order to federalize the city’s police department.
But White House officials have been adamant that statistics do not accurately capture the state of crime and decay in the nation’s capital.
Vice President Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller met with National Guard troops at Union Station on Wednesday to thank them for their work. The officials were greeted with protests at the transportation hub, which Miller mocked.
“We’re going to ignore these stupid white hippies that all need to go home and take a nap because they’re all over 90 years old,” he said. “And we’re going to get back to the business of protecting the American people and the citizens of Washington, D.C.”
Updated at 1:03 p.m. EDT.
