Trump deploys more federal agents, lashes out at 'radical left'
De Blasio and Cuomo warn Trump
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said that what federal agents are doing in Portland is unconstitutional. He warned that New York will sue the Trump administration if it tries to do something similar here. Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he told the president that the state doesn't need the feds to get involved in local law enforcement issues.
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Donald Trump announced Wednesday that he will send federal agents into Chicago and Albuquerque, New Mexico, to help combat rising crime, expanding the administration's intervention in local enforcement as he runs for reelection under a "law-and-order" mantle.
Using the same alarmist language he has employed to describe illegal immigration, Trump painted Democrat-led cities as out of control and lashed out at the "radical left," even though criminal justice experts say a spike in violence in some cities defies easy explanation.
"In recent weeks there has been a radical movement to defund, dismantle and dissolve our police department," Trump said at a White House event, blaming the movement for "a shocking explosion of shootings, killings, murders and heinous crimes of violence."
"This bloodshed must end," he said. "This bloodshed will end."
The decision to dispatch federal agents to American cities is playing out at a hyperpoliticized moment when Trump is grasping for a reelection strategy now that the coronavirus has upended the economy and immigration is largely at a standstill. With less than four months until Election Day, Trump has been warning that violence will worsen if his Democratic rival Joe Biden is elected in November and Democrats have a chance to make the police reforms they seek.
Crime has surged in some cities like Chicago, New York and Philadelphia before any major policing overhauls could be made. In trying to explain violence in some cities, experts point to the unprecedented moment in the country — a pandemic that has killed more than 140,000 Americans, historic unemployment, stay-at-home orders, a mass reckoning over race and police brutality, intense stress and even the weather. And compared with other years, crime in 2020 is down overall.
Local authorities have complained that deploying federal agents to their cities has exacerbated tensions on the streets, while residents have accused the government of violating their constitutional rights. Civil unrest in Portland, Oregon, only escalated after federal agents were accused of whisking people away in unmarked cars without probable case.
Hundreds of federal agents have been sent to Kansas City, Missouri, to help quell a record rise in violence after a 4-year-old boy's shooting death. Sending federal agents to help localities is not uncommon. Barr announced a similar surge effort in December for seven cities that had seen spiking violence.
Usually, the Justice Department sends agents under its own umbrella, like agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives or the Drug Enforcement Agency. But this surge effort will include at least 100 Department of Homeland Security Investigations officers working in the region who generally conduct drug trafficking and child exploitation investigations.
DHS officers have already been dispatched to Portland and other localities to protect federal property and monuments as Trump has lambasted efforts by protesters to knock down Confederate statues.
Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf drew a distinction between the mission in Portland — to protect federal property — and the surges in Kansas City, Chicago and Albuquerque to aid in stopping violence.
Associated Press writers Michael Tarm in Chicago and Michael Balsamo in Washington contributed to this report.