D.C. police chief retains position, but perhaps not as much power

Washington Post

10 hours ago

D.C. officials who cast President Donald Trump's takeover of the city's police force as an opportunity at the start of the week had declared it an emergency by Friday, suing the administration over its attempt to install an 'emergency police commissioner' with the full powers of police chief and to eliminate policies limiting local police's collaboration with immigration enforcement. The legal battle revolves around a question with a still murky answer as of Friday night: Who is ultimately in charge of law enforcement priorities in the nation's capital?
D.C. Police Chief Pamela A. Smith downplayed the takeover in her first communication to officers Monday, writing in an email reviewed by The Washington Post that 'Our relationship working with federal partners is nothing new to MPD.' But Friday, in a sworn declaration in U.S. District Court, she said that Attorney General Pam Bondi's order granting DEA head Terry Cole the full powers of the D.C. chief would 'upend the command structure of MPD, endangering the safety of the public and law enforcement officers alike.'
In the court filing, Smith said that the proposed new command structure would 'wreak operational havoc' on the department.
'The confusion and delays caused by this upending of the command structure will endanger public safety, placing the lives of MPD officers and District residents at grave risk,' she said in the filing. 'There is no greater risk to public safety in paramilitary organization than to not know who is in command.'
Yet the city seemed unable to answer that question Friday morning. Asked who is actively issuing orders to officers in the wake of the Bondi order, a D.C. police spokesperson directed questions to the mayor's office. The mayor's office directed questions back to D.C. police. Even U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes did not definitively answer the question in the hearing Friday, as she did not issue a ruling, but rather forged a compromise that kept police under local command. The administration backed off its claim that Cole would act with the powers of police chief, a move that Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) celebrated in a statement Friday night.
'I am pleased to be able to report that, after a day in court and in accordance with Home Rule, Pamela Smith remains our Chief of Police, in command and control of the 3,100 men and women at the Metropolitan Police Department,' Bowser said in the statement.
However, under the rewritten order from Bondi, Cole would 'direct' the mayor to provide D.C. police for federal priorities. Bondi signaled that Cole would call on officers to assist in immigration enforcement, a violation of current D.C. police policies, and in clearing homeless encampments.
As the legal battle played out in court, Cole addressed D.C. police officers for the first time since Bondi moved to appoint him as 'emergency police commissioner.' According to an X post from the D.C. Police Union, Cole attended the 1st Police District Friday evening roll call and told officers that the 'chain of command is still in place and to follow their lawful orders.'
Even as questions mount about who holds more power, D.C. resident have seen the law enforcement presence around the city spike over the course of the week, with more than 1,750 officers and agents participating in the federal crackdown overnight Thursday, according to a White House official.
Federal agents sporting FBI, U.S. Customs and Border Protection and Homeland Security Investigations vests swarmed three tents at Washington Circle on Thursday night, but drove away without evicting anyone. By Friday, videos posted to social media show D.C. police had returned and cleared the tents, despite some people receiving city health department notices allowing them to remain for several more days.
Nearly 30 cars were stopped as part of an operation D.C. police characterized as a standard 'traffic safety compliance checkpoint' at a busy intersection in Northwest Washington on Wednesday night, but dozens of onlookers gathered when they noticed ICE officers appeared to be questioning the drivers who had originally been stopped for minor infractions like seat belt violations or broken taillights. And a weekly comedy show in Columbia Heights turned into an impromptu protest when witnesses say roughly 30 law enforcement officers, including U.S. Border Patrol, gathered to arrest a 25-year-old man riding an illegal dirt bike.
In an X post Friday, Bondi touted 189 arrests in D.C. since Trump tapped federal law enforcement to police the nation's capital this week. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers accounted for 75 of those arrests, according to the post. Bondi's order Thursday sought to abolish policies limiting D.C. police's cooperation with ICE, signaling the Trump administration's desire to use its takeover of D.C. police to crack down on immigration. Over Wednesday and Thursday nights, more than half of the arrests reported by the White House were for immigration enforcement, though it is unclear if they were made with direct involvement from D.C. police.
Though federal forces have been visible across the city all week, from National Guard troops in Humvees near the base of the Washington Monument on Wednesday to more than a dozen law enforcement vehicles parked outside a Southeast public housing complex Thursday, no federal officers were spotted at the scene of the District's 100th homicide this year — the first homicide after Trump said that he was federalizing D.C. police. Tymark Wells, of Northwest Washington, was fatally shot around 7 p.m. Monday within a half-mile of two of the high-profile homicides Trump cited in his news conference as examples of crime that federal law enforcement could help prevent. D.C. officers at the scene Monday evening said no federal agencies had participated in the response to the shooting.
The power struggle will continue to play out in court next week, when Reyes is expected to rule on whether Trump can direct D.C. police officers to enforce immigration laws. In the meantime, both D.C. police and federal agencies will continue to patrol the District as leadership grapples to establish authority.