President Trump has announced the deployment of 800 National Guard troops to Washington to rescue the city from “crime, bloodshed, bedlam and squalor”. In a White House press conference on Monday, the president unveiled his plans to seize control of the capital’s police force and send soldiers to patrol the streets. He said the murder rate in Washington was worse than Bogotá and Baghdad. “I’m announcing a historic action to rescue our nation’s capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam and squalor and worse,” he said. Violent crime spiked in 2023 but has dropped dramatically ever since and is down 26 per cent this year.

Source: The Times August 11, 2025 15:26 UTC