President Trump paints the nation's capital as a city beset by crime, declaring an emergency

and calling in National Guard troops under those emergency powers.

D.C. leaders contend there is no crisis, pointing to crime rates trending down now at a 30-year

low. Charles Lehman of the Conservative Manhattan Institute argues neither side is telling the complete truth.

He joins us now to discuss the extent of Washington's challenge with crime and how both the locals and feds could pursue smarter solutions.

Charles, welcome to the News Hour. Thanks for joining us.

Thanks so much for having me on.

So this DC takeover, as you've heard, was justified by the president as a

response to crime. From what you've looked at, how you've studied it, in your view, was that

takeover justified? That's a big complicated question. You know, I think whether or not it's

justified comes down to how those resources get used, how MPD, the city's police department gets used,

how the additional federal agents get used. The reality is that there is a history of

local federal cooperation on law enforcement issues that have yielded real results.

This is obviously a much more aggressive approach on the president's part.

That doesn't mean it can't work. The capital is ultimately subject to the whims of the federal

government a way that no other city in the United States is. But a lot depends on how the folks

at the federal level and to some extent they're still cooperating entities

at the local level are thinking about where they deploy their resources, where the real

problems are, what problems they're trying to solve, and how they cognize success over

the next 30 days.

So if you were looking at where some of those troops and forces were deployed,

if it was to address crime, where should they be deployed? And is that where they're actually

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