Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said Tuesday that President Donald Trump’s deploying the National Guard to Democratic-led cities across the country is not politically motivated, telling CNN’s Kaitlan Collins in an interview the Republican president is “not targeting anything.”
“I completely concur with the president when he says if … this administration is against crime, then the opposite position was what? Are you for crime? And so this is, what seems to me, should be non-partisan,” Burgum said.
“When you take a look at the top 20 or 25 largest cities in this country, virtually all of those are the ones that have crime issues, and virtually all of those are run by, you know, a particular party, and so this isn’t really a partisan thing,” he continued.
Trump has deployed the National Guard in both Los Angeles and Washington, DC, this year over the protestations of local Democrats, and he’s telegraphed plans to do the same in Chicago. Illinois Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker said at a news conference Monday that Trump is “neither wanted here nor needed here.”
At least 10 cities in states whose Republican governors have deployed National Guard troops to Washington, DC, had higher rates of violent crime or homicide than DC last year, according to a CNN review of FBI data.
During a marathon Cabinet meeting at the White House earlier Tuesday, Trump acknowledged he’d “love it” if the nations’ governors “invite[d]” guard troops into their cities to address crime. He also suggested Democrats would pay for opposing those moves at the ballot box.
“I think that crime is going to be a big thing, and we are the party, the Republicans are the party that wants to stop crime, we’re against crime. The Democrats like crime. I don’t know why,” Trump said.
And Burgum pushed back against the idea that Trump was only targeting Democratic municipalities.
“He’s not targeting anything — he’s basically just, he’s putting out an offer to say, ‘Hey, if you have an issue, you know, give us a call, we’ll be there to help.”
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