Trump is thinking about sending troops to more cities; National Guard to start armed patrols at DC

The troops of the American National Guard are patrolling the streets of Washington, DC, as part of President Donald Trump said that his repression against crime will start weapons on Sunday evening, two officials announced.

The exact number of troops that would carry their weapons was fluid, but they will wear their M17 pistols or their M4 rifles, according to officials who spoke under the cover of anonymity because they were not allowed to discuss the question.

Hundreds of troops in the unarmed National Guard are in the streets of Washington in the past two weeks after Trump has declared a criminal emergency in the district. Defense secretary Pete Hegseth authorized the troops last week to wear weapons.

On Sunday, the Guard’s joint working group said in a written statement that its staff would only use force “as a last resort and only in response to an imminent threat of death or serious bodily lesions”.

Some Republican governors have sent hundreds of national guard troops to the country’s capital at the request of Trump.

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Donald Whitehead, Executive Director of the National Coalition for the Homeless, said the deployment of the National Guard to Washington, DC, `SAPER ” The work based on evidence that was done after US President Donald Trump announced on Monday that he would deploy custody and take control of the district police service, citing an emergency of crime in the region.

The president described Washington as being in the grip of a wave of crime, although official data show that crime is broken in the city.

Trump said on Sunday, without evidence that there was now no crime in the city and credited it to its deployment of troops and hundreds of federal members of the law.

Chicago, Baltimore could be the next

Meanwhile, Trump, a Republican, said that he would probably broaden his crime repression in Chicago, working in another city governed by Democrats. And on Sunday, he suggested the possibility of deploying troops in Baltimore managed by the Democrats in Maryland.

Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, the minority chief of the United States House of Representatives, said Trump did not have the power to deploy troops in Chicago on Sunday while the Pentagon was making an initial planning for a possible deployment.

US officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that there had been an initial planning to the Pentagon of what a deployment of national guard troops would look like in Chicago.

An official said plans were part of the army efforts to anticipate all of Trump’s requests and noted that senior Pentagon officials had not yet been informed. It is not uncommon for the Pentagon to plan potential deployments before formal commands are given.

Jeffries said any decision to deploy troops in Chicago was Trump’s attempt to make a crisis. The crime, including murders, decreased in Chicago last year.

“There is no basis, no authority for Donald Trump to potentially try to deposit federal troops in the city of Chicago,” Jeffries told CNN Union state Sunday.

He quoted the comments made by JB Pritzker, the Illinois Democratic Governor, who includes Chicago, who said that there was no emergency justifying the deployment of the National Guard or other soldiers.

Acquit criticism against the governor of Maryland Wes Moore, a democrat, on crime levels in Baltimore, Trump said that he was also ready to deploy troops there.

In July, the Baltimore police department said that there had been a two -digit reduction in armed violence compared to the previous year. The city has had 84 homicides so far this year – the least and more than 50 years, according to the mayor.

“If Wes Moore needs help … I will send the troops that take place in DC nearby and quickly clean the crime,” Trump said on his Truth social platform on Sunday.

Trump has much less power in Chicago and Baltimore than in the Columbia district, while as president, he has more hold.

Title 10 of the American Code, a federal law which describes the role of the American armed forces, includes a provision allowing the president to deploy units of the National Guard to repel an invasion, to remove a rebellion or allow the president to execute the law.

Trump quoted this provision, known as article 12406, when he sent the National Guard units to California earlier this year to counter the demonstrations, against the objections of the Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom.

In the case of Chicago, which is a so-called sanctuary city, Trump can say that local laws prohibiting city officials from cooperating with federal immigration agents prevent the president from executing the law, justifying the military presence.

Trump is almost certain to face judicial disputes if he uses article 12406 to send troops from the National Guard of States led by the Republicans in democratic bastions.