How can the president take over a city's police department?

Civics 101

NHPR

Society & Culture, Government, History

4.6 • 2.4K Ratings

🗓️ 15 August 2025

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On Monday, August 11th, Trump announced a takeover of Washington, D.C.'s Metropolitan police. He also deployed National Guard troops and federal agents to the streets, all in the name of cracking down on crime. We called on political scientist and historian Dan Cassino to help us understand what happened, why it's legal and what could happen next. CLICK HERE: Visit our website to see all of our episodes, donate to the podcast, sign up for our newsletter, get free educational materials, and more! To see Civics 101 in book form, check out A User's Guide to Democracy: How America Works by Hannah McCarthy and Nick Capodice, featuring illustrations by Tom Toro. Check out our other weekly NHPR podcast, Outside/In - we think you'll love it! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to Civics 101. I'm Nick Capidiche.
0:09.1	On August 11, 2025, President Donald Trump took control of the metropolitan police in our nation's capital, Washington, D.C.
0:17.9	He also deployed federalized National Guard troops and FBI agents to patrol
0:23.7	the streets alongside police officers in the name of cracking down on crime in the city.
0:33.0	Overnight, confrontations in Washington, D.C.
0:35.9	Are you proud of what you're doing?
0:38.8	As protesters pushed back against President Trump's move to expand the National Guard
0:43.1	and Federal officer presence in the nation's capital.
0:46.0	Both statistics and statements from D.C. leadership tell us that crime is at a 30-year
0:51.4	low in the Capitol. And still, the president declared a crime emergency in the
0:57.0	city using a federal law called the District of Columbia Home Rule Act, which allows the president
1:02.7	to seize control of the police under emergency circumstances for up to 30 days. This happened shortly
1:10.0	after the 19-year-old Edward Corristine, former
1:13.1	staffer of Doge, who's known by nickname, I will not say on a podcast that lots of high schoolers
1:17.8	listened to, was carjacked earlier this month, and Trump posted his photo to truth social,
1:23.7	promising to, quote, federalize this city. So, since we at Civics 101 do shows on things like the Declaration of Independence or how a bill becomes a law,
1:34.8	but we also do shows on things happening right now in our democracy, we wanted to jump into this quickly.
1:42.7	We wanted to know how this action is legal, what mechanisms
1:47.1	keep this situation in check, and whether this can happen where you live. To get to it fast,
1:54.1	Hannah McCarthy reached out to one of our most beloved, most trusted, and certainly fastest responding
1:58.8	guests, Dan Casino of Fairley Dickinson University.
2:02.7	They talked on Thursday, August 14th. Since then, the Washington, D.C. Attorney General has
	...

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