Trump calls out LA, Oakland during speech about crime in D.C.
President Trump calls out crime in LA
President Donald J. Trump called out LA, Oakland, and other cities for being "very bad" on crime.
WASHINGTON (KTVU) - In talking about crime in the nation's capital on Monday, President Donald Trump also called out crime in other big cities, including Los Angeles.
Trump: ‘We have other cities also that are bad. Very bad’
What they're saying:
"We have other cities also that are bad. Very bad," he said. "You look at Chicago, how bad it is. You look at Los Angeles, how bad it is. We have other cities that are very bad. New York has a problem. And then you have, of course, Baltimore and Oakland. We don't even mention that anymore there. They're so far gone. We're not going to let it happen. We're not going to lose our cities over this. And this will go further. We're starting very strongly with DC, and we're going to clean it up real quick, very quickly, as they say."
The main target of Trump's speech was Washington, D.C., where he said the murder rate was higher than that of Bogota, Columbia, and Mexico City, and he was placing the DC Metropolitan Police Department under direct federal control.
Trump said he is invoking Section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act to deploy members of the National Guard.
By the numbers:
The latest crime stats tell a different story and suggest the national crime rate is dropping.
Police statistics show homicides, robberies and burglaries are down this year when compared with this time in 2024. Overall, violent crime is down 26% compared with this time a year ago.
Homicides in Los Angeles also fell by more than 20% and is on pace to end 2025 with the lowest total in nearly 60 years.
RELATED COVERAGE: Overall crime in Los Angeles declined in 2024, LAPD Chief says
Also, violent crimes like homicide, aggravated assault and robberies are down in Oakland.
In D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat, questioned the effectiveness of using the Guard to enforce city laws and said the federal government could be far more helpful by funding more prosecutors or filling the 15 vacancies on the D.C. Superior Court, some of which have been open for years.
She noted that violent crime in Washington has decreased since a rise in 2023.
Trump’s weekend posts depicted the district as "one of the most dangerous cities anywhere in the world."
For Bowser, "Any comparison to a war-torn country is hyperbolic and false."