Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) is pressing Trump administration officials about the cost of the National Guard deployment to the nation’s capital, in addition to the scope and legal parameters of the operation.
“D.C. did not request or consent to the mass deployment of National Guard troops, who were recently authorized to carry weapons in the District despite D.C.’s crime rate being at a 30-year low,” Norton said Monday in a statement.
“A tenet of our democracy is that the military does not engage in civilian law enforcement, and it is not trained to do so in any case, which puts servicemembers and the public at risk. I urge you to end this gross abuse of power and withdraw the troops immediately.”
In a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Steven Nordhaus, chief of the National Guard Bureau, Norton reiterated her staunch opposition to the administration’s deployment and called it “a raw assertion of power over the more than 700,000 disenfranchised D.C. residents, a majority of whom are Black and Brown.”
She requested officials to respond to a list of questions regarding the deployment by the end of the week, including asks about the cost of the operation, troops’ authority to “stop, detain or arrest people” and “enforce the laws of the United States or the District of Columbia.”
She also asked about the use of force policy for the troops, the training they have received, the overall mission and if the troops are “subject to the laws” of the District.
The Hill has reached out to the Pentagon and the National Guard for comment.
Trump deployed hundreds of guard members in the District earlier this month and federalized the local police department as part of a federal takeover aimed at cracking down on crime. Multiple states — including Mississippi, Ohio and West Virginia — have also sent personnel.
Democrats have sharply criticized the ongoing efforts, and city officials have shared data showing crime had already been decreasing in recent years in multiple categories.
Trump has challenged those figures, however, and has accused the city of producing “fake crime numbers in order to create a false illusion of safety,” while defending his administration’s efforts for making the District “safe again.”
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