Where DC crime is bad, residents question Trump's motives

Straits Times

7 hours ago

WASHINGTON – In the Congress Heights neighborhood in the south-east corner of Washington, DC, where there have been several murders and more than a dozen robberies so far this year, residents have greeted President Donald Trump's promise of liberation from crime with a mix of skepticism, suspicion and outright derision.
It's not that they don't believe crime is a problem in the nation's capital. They know it is.
They just don't believe the president cares – at least not about them. If he did, they asked, why are residents hearing of federal agents roving the whiter areas of 16th Street Northwest but less so in their largely Black neighborhood? Why are National Guard members posing with tourists at the Washington Monument?
'If Trump is genuinely concerned about safety of DC residents, I would see National Guard in my neighborhood,' said Ms Karen Lake, 62, a lawyer who has lived in Congress Heights since 2017, in the far eastern corner of the diamond-shaped district. 'I'm not seeing it, and I don't expect to see it. I don't think Trump is bringing in the National Guard to protect Black babies in South-east.'
Mr Trump might have found a more sympathetic audience in the distant south-eastern quadrant of the city, far away from the National Mall, the White House, or the restaurants and clubs of 16th Street and 14th Street, where a young employee of the Department of Government Efficiency recently was beaten in an assault that raised the city's criminal profile to presidential level.
In neighborhoods such as Congress Heights and Washington Highlands, where the District of Columbia abuts Prince George's County, Maryland, the city's Black working class struggles with the twin challenges that have diminished the ranks of what was once, when Washington still had a majority-Black population, affectionately called Chocolate City. There's crime, for sure, but also gentrification driving Black residents into suburban Maryland and Virginia.
In Ward 8, where Congress Heights is found, there have been 38 homicides this year, according to data from the District of Columbia government. That's almost 10 times as many as Ward 2, where the National Mall is located.
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But when Mr Trump last week described the district as 'dirty' and 'disgusting,' menaced by 'roving mobs of wild youth', he offended some who otherwise might have been more receptive to his 'law-and-order' pitch.
'I know that we're not those things,' said Mr Le'Greg Harrison, who lives in Congress Heights and said he is supportive of more law enforcement, so long as Black residents aren't the target. 'I know we have a beautiful city.'
Mr Trump did not mention Congress Heights by name, but residents say they are well aware of the community's crime statistics and the challenges their neighborhood faces.
Ms Abigail Jackson, a White House spokesperson, said that federal law enforcement agents had increased their presence in all of the city's neighborhoods, including those in Ward 8. In parts of the ward, she said, arrests have been made in connection with illegal guns and drugs, as well as murder, cruelty to the elderly and other offenses.
'President Trump is committed to making DC safe again for all residents,' she said in a written statement.
On a humid, overcast afternoon in Washington last week, hungry patrons, mostly Black, pulled up to the retail space known as Sycamore & Oak, which Mr Harrison helped bring to Congress Heights. They grabbed a bite from Black-owned restaurants and discussed what they called Mr Trump's takeover of their city.
Among the residents of Congress Heights and other neighborhoods of South-east Washington, the apparent new order has been met with a sense of both incredulity and inevitability. Despite the area's challenges, residents say they take pride in their neighborhood and their city and feel disrespected by the president's portrayal.
They feel unseen and misunderstood, their challenges reduced to crime statistics, their children cast as threats, and their culture caricatured. They don't reject safety measures outright.
Mr Gerald Walker, a 38-year-old Congress Heights resident, said federal intervention was 'definitely needed'. The National Guard, the FBI, a federalised District of Columbia police force – 'the more the better'.
But many said they were by no means seeking out additional federal involvement in their neighborhoods. And some said they resented being treated as political piñatas in a larger national narrative.
It has 'nothing to do with crime in D', said Mr Ronnie McLeod, 68, a retired bus driver and lifelong Washingtonian who lives in Congress Heights. 'Crime is already down!'
'It's got something to do with something else,' he said.
Most of all, many Congress Heights residents say they do not trust Mr Trump's motives.
'He's very out of touch with DC people in general,' said Ms Michelle Lee, 42, who lives in South-east Washington. He may know the political culture of the city, may even have a passing understanding of the ritzier parts of town, she said. Ms Lee, seeming to address the president personally, added, 'You have no idea what an actual resident of DC does, goes through.'
It's not the first time a violent crime against a young, white political staffer has prompted outrage from the federal government. In 1992, an aide to senator Richard Shelby of Alabama was murdered on Capitol Hill. In the aftermath, Mr Shelby forced a referendum to restore the death penalty in Washington; the initiative was overwhelmingly rejected by voters.
Some residents of South-east described the president's decision to declare a crime emergency and federalise the Metropolitan Police Department for a 30-day period as a power grab or a way to appease affluent white Washingtonians who are anxious about crime - any extension would have to be granted by Congress.
Some residents saw the move as a sly way to further gentrify what is left of affordable Washington, by striking fear in residents of low-income neighborhoods that federalised police officers will harass them, or worse.
The city has already showed more interest in developing luxury condominiums than in building community recreation centers for children, said Mr Jimmie Jenkins, 35, who grew up in Congress Heights. Many Black residents are not benefiting from the city's growth, he said, and if conditions don't change, Black people will no longer be a significant part of the city's future.
Now Mr Trump is pushing aside the city's Black leadership and bringing in federal troops.
'They're definitely aiming to push more Black people out,' said Mr Tyree Jones, 30, who works in Congress Heights.
Like opponents of Mr Trump on national cable talk shows and social media, residents of South-east Washington said the president's message of 'law and order' was undermined when he pardoned even the most violent assailants who attacked police officers during the attack on the Capitol on Jan 6, 2021.
They also brought up his own criminality and raised the possibility that he was deploying forces in Washington to distract from the Jeffrey Epstein scandal.
But the residents of South-east Washington have taken the president's moves personally. Mr Trump, they said, is using them.
Older residents remember a time when crime was much worse.
'I grew up in the town in the '90s, when we were, quote unquote, the murder capital for almost 10 years,' said Mr Harrison, 40. 'I wouldn't call what we have a state of emergency,' he said. Still, any deployment of extra enforcement must be done with sensitivity for Black citizens, he added. NYTIMES