President Trump: I'm announcing a historic action to rescue our nation's capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam, and squalor, and worse. This is Liberation Day in DC, and we're gonna take our Capital back. We're taking it back. Under the authorities vested in me as the president of the United States, I'm officially invoking Section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act, and placing the DC Metropolitan Police Department under direct federal control.
President Trump: Every American has a constitutional right to be able to access and petition their government in safety, and employees, likewise, have the right to carry out their jobs in peace without being shot.
President Trump: This will go further; we're starting very strongly with DC, and we're gonna clean it up real quick. Real quickly, as they say.
President Trump: Caravans of mass youth rampage through city streets at all times od the day. They're on ATVs, motorbikes; they travel pretty well. Entire neighborhoods are now under emergency curfews.
President Trump: This dire public safety crisis stems directly from the abject failures of the city's local leadership. The radical-left city council adopted no cash bail. By the way, every place in the country where you have no cash bail is a disaster.
President Trump: They turned our nation's capital into a sanctuary jurisdiction. That's the other thing; we have to get rid of sanctuary cities as quickly as possibly. We're gonna do it too. We have to. Because it's sanctuary for criminals. Releasing illegal alien gangmembers onto the streets in 2022, nearly seventy percent of criminals arrested in Washington went unprosecuted.
President Trump: Today we're formally declaring a public safety emergency. This is an emergency. This is a tragic emergency.
President Trump: Attorney General Pam Bondi is taking command of the Metropolitan Police Department as of this moment.
President Trump: This city will no longer be a sanctuary for illegal alien criminals. We will have full, seamless integrated cooperation at all levels of law enforcement, and we'll deploy officers across the District with an overwhelming presence…we will bring in the military if it's needed, by the way.
Secretary Hegseth: At your direction [President Trump], we've mobilized the DC National Guard. It'll be operationalized by the Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll. Through the DC Guard, You will see them flowing into the streets of Washington in the coming week. At your direction as well, sir, there are other units we are prepared to bring in. Other National Guard units, other specialized units; they will be strong, they will be tough, and they will stand with their law enforcement partners.
President Trump: The Metropolitan Police Department and the federal authorities will be supported in the effort, a really big effort. The eight hundred DC National Guardsmen that we'll put on, and much more if necessary. Much more…if necessary we're gonna move servicemembers directly to joining the guardsmen.
US Attorney Pirro: We need to go after the DC Council and their absurd laws. We need to get rid of this concept of no cash bail. We need to recognize that the people who matter are the law-abiding citizens, and it starts today.
President Trump: Other cities are hopefully watching this; they're all watching, and maybe they'll self-clean up, and self do this, and get rid of the cashless bail thing, and all of the things that caused the problem…if we need to, we're going to do the same thing in Chicago, which is a disaster.
That there would be National Guard deployment was known last night.
Pittsburgh Action News reporting dozens injured in U.S. Steel pant explosion.