Homeless must be moved 'far' from Washington
The Republican billionaire has announced a press conference for tomorrow, in which he is expected to reveal his plans for Washington - which is run by the locally elected government of the District of Columbia under congressional oversight.
It is an arrangement Mr Trump has long publicly chafed at. He has threatened to federalize the city and give the White House the final say in how it is run.
"I'm going to make our Capital safer and more beautiful than it ever was before," the president posted on his Truth Social platform.
"The Homeless have to move out, IMMEDIATELY. We will give you places to stay, but FAR from the Capital," he continued, adding that criminals in the city would be swiftly imprisoned.
"It's all going to happen very fast," he said.
Washington is ranked 15th on a list of major US cities by homeless population, according to government statistics from last year.
While thousands of people spend each night in shelters or on the streets, the figure are down from pre-pandemic levels.
Earlier this week, Mr Trump also threatened to deploy the National Guard as part of a crackdown on what he falsely says is rising crime in Washington.
Violent crime in the capital fell in the first half of 2025 by 26 percent compared with a year earlier, police statistics show.
The city's crime rates in 2024 were already their lowest in three decades, according to figures produced by the Justice Department before Trump took office.
"We are not experiencing a crime spike," Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser said on MSNBC.
While the mayor, a Democrat, was not critical of Mr Trump in her remarks, she said "any comparison to a war torn country is hyperbolic and false."
Mr Trump's threat to send in the National Guard comes weeks after he deployed California's military reserve force into Los Angeles to quell protests over immigration raids, despite objections from local leaders and law enforcement.
The president has frequently mused about using the military to control America's cities, many of which are under Democratic control and hostile to his nationalist impulses.
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The Irish Sun
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Irish Independent
2 hours ago
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Wednesday's call eased their fears of a Trump-Putin deal that would leave Ukraine under pressure to make territorial and other concessions. Putin, whose war economy is showing signs of strain, needs Trump to help Russia break out of its straitjacket of ever-tightening Western sanctions, or at the very least not to hit Moscow with more sanctions, something Trump has threatened. The day before the summit, the Kremlin leader held out the prospect of something else he knows Trump wants - a new nuclear arms control agreement to replace the last surviving one, which is due to expire in February next year. Deal Trump said on the eve of the summit that he thought Putin would do a deal on Ukraine, but he has blown hot and cold on the chances of a breakthrough. Putin, meanwhile, praised what he called "sincere efforts" by the US to end the war. A source close to the Kremlin told Reuters it looked as if the two sides had been able to find some unspecified common ground beforehand. "Apparently, some terms will be agreed upon tomorrow (Friday) because Trump cannot be refused, and we are not in a position to refuse (due to sanctions pressure)," said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the matter's sensitivity. Putin has set stringent conditions for a full ceasefire, but one compromise could be a phased truce in the air war, although both sides have accused the other of flouting a previous accord. Analysts say Putin could try to look like he's giving Trump what he wants while remaining free to escalate in Ukraine if he wants to. "If they (the Russians) are able to put a deal on the table that creates some kind of a ceasefire but that leaves Russia in control of those escalatory dynamics, does not create any kind of genuine deterrence on the ground or in the skies over Ukraine... that would be a wonderful outcome from Putin's perspective," said Sam Greene, director of Democratic Resilience at the Center for European Policy Analysis. Land transfers Zelensky has accused Putin of bluffing and playing for time to avoid US secondary sanctions and has ruled out handing Moscow any territory. Trump has said land transfers between Russia and Ukraine could be a possible way of breaking the logjam. Putin, whose forces control nearly one fifth of Ukraine, wants Trump to start reviving the two countries' shrunken economic, political and business ties and, ideally, not to make that process contingent on progress on Ukraine. But it is unclear whether Putin is willing to compromise on Ukraine. In power for a quarter of a century, the Kremlin chief has staked his legacy on coming out of the war with something he can sell to his people as a victory. Chief among his war aims is complete Russian control over the Donbas industrial region in eastern Ukraine, which comprises the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. Despite steady advances, around 25% of Donetsk remains beyond Russian control. Putin also wants full control of Ukraine's Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions; NATO membership to be taken off the table for Kyiv; and limits on the size of Ukraine's armed forces. Ukraine has said these terms are unacceptable and tantamount to asking it to capitulate.
