When Donald Trump first announced his plans for a crime crackdown in Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser appeared to be on board, saying she was going to put federal assets to good use.
She seemed to have had a change of heart after Democratic Party officials got in her ear, but she appeared to come around once more last week, applauding the results of Trump's efforts.
Trump, who has been oddly tame in his treatment of Bowser, just gave the mayor props for working with the Feds to lower crime rates, a move that I am sure will not sit well with Democrats.
I reported on Bowser’s initial reaction when Trump first announced that he would federalize D.C.
I praised her for her words, and I further stated that I thought the mayor was someone who would have been willing to work with Trump on this issue if the offer had been framed correctly rather than as a direct federalization of the city.
Unfortunately, I believe the powers that be in the Democratic Party reached out to Bowser, as she immediately changed her position, stating, “This is a time where community needs to jump in and we all need to do what we can in our space, in our lane, to protect our city and to protect our autonomy, to protect our Home Rule, and get to the other side of this guy, and make sure we elect a Democratic House so that we have a backstop to this authoritarian push.”
I say very seriously that this broke my heart. For one second, I thought we might be ready to start getting past this hardline “bad orange man” stance, and have mayors realize that politics aside, Trump really just wants violent crime eliminated in this country.
After nearly three weeks of having Trump’s plan in place, Bowser had to admit that it was working to decrease violent crime as well as offenses such as carjackings, which saw a staggering reduction.
Bowser stated, "We greatly appreciate the surge of officers that enhance what MPD has been able to do in this city."
She continued, "This is what we think in just a couple of weeks of experience has worked. Having more federal law enforcement officers on the street -- we think having more stops that got to illegal guns has helped.”
Bowser concluded, “We think that there is more accountability in the system, or at least perceived accountability in the system, that is driving down illegal behavior. We know that we have had fewer gun crimes, fewer homicides, and we have experienced an extreme reduction in carjackings."
I give Trump credit because when a Democrat works with him, he has no problem at all giving them kudos for their efforts. In this case, Trump stated, "Wow! Mayor Muriel Bowser of D.C. has become very popular because she worked with me and my great people in bringing crime down to virtually nothing in D.C.”
He continued, "Her statements and actions were positive, instead of others like [Illinois Gov. J.B.] Pritzker, [Maryland Gov.] Wes Moore, [California Gov. Gavin] Newsom, and the 5% approval-rated mayor of Chicago, who spend all of their time trying to justify violent crime instead of working with us to completely eliminate it, which we have done in Washington, D.C., now a crime-free zone.”
So, the biggest attack Democrats have against Trump regarding his crackdown is that he is only targeting Democrat-led cities with Black mayors, so take that card out of the deck. We would be ignorant to think that there are no major cities run by Republicans that have a crime problem.
My idea is to call these mayors in and offer them the same help that was offered to D.C. We know they would accept that help, and that would take the attack opportunity away from Democrats. Specifically, go after cities with white mayors to eliminate the racism allegations leveled by the left. Then make a huge deal of it when the city’s crime rates dip, proving that if you accept the help of federal authorities, you can make your city safer for your residents. I just don’t understand why this strategy is not being employed by the Trump administration and the president continues to give his opponents ammunition for this narrative when it could very quickly be eliminated.
