Trump says he’ll take control of DC police department and deploy National Guard: Live

Elon Musk’s anti-woke AI chatbot Grok has declared President Donald Trump “the most notorious criminal” in Washington D.C. in a series of posts on Musk’s social network X.

Responding to questions from users on Sunday and Monday about crime in the U.S. capital, Grok repeatedly claimed that Trump’s 34 felony convictions in New York for falsifying business records made him the city’s most infamous perp.

Grok’s statements probably do not reflect any underlying ‘opinion’ held by Grok, and may or may not be the result of any deep analysis about crime in D.C.

Long before he was leading a White House sending federal troops into U.S. cities and taking over municipal police departments, Donald Trump was calling for a harsh law-and-order style response to big city crime.

Perhaps most famously, Trump bought out full-page ads in all four major New York newspapers and called for the use of the death penalty against a group of five Black and Latino teenagers convicted of the rape of a jogger in Central Park in 1989.

The group’s convictions were later found to be wrongful and were vacated, and the city paid $41m in 2014 to settle a civil rights lawsuit.

Donald Trump has once again postponed triple-digit tariffs from taking effect against China.

The move was announced in an executive order on Monday shortly before tariffs were set to snap back to April levels, which saw levies on Chinese imports climb as high as 145 percent, with nearly equal tariffs on U.S. goods.

“This action is necessary to facilitate ongoing and productive discussion with China about remedying trade imbalances, unfair trade practices, expanding market access for American exports, and aligning with the United States on national security and economic matters,” the order reads.

At present the U.S. has a 30 percent tariff on China, and China has a 10 percent levy on the U.S.

Negotiators have until November 10 to reach a new deal.

Donald Trump claims rampant street crime justifies federal authorities taking control of the Washington, DC, police department and sending National Guard troops into the capital.

In a press conference, Trump said the dramatic moves were necessary to “rescue our nation’s capital from crime, bloodshed, bedlam and squalor and worse.”

However, statistics paint a very different story of street crime in Washington, according to mayor Mayor Muriel Bowser, who says there is no crime wave hitting the city.

“It is true that we had a terrible spike in crime in 2023, but this is not 2023,” Bowser told MSNBC. “We have spent over the last two years driving down violent crime in this city, driving it down to a 30-year low.”

In fact, violent crime was down 26 percent during the first seven months of the year compared to 2024.

Meanwhile, preliminary Washington police data shows robbery down 28 percent compared to the same point last year.

However, thanks to reporting differences, the FBI shows only a 9 percent drop in violent crime compared with last year.

President Trump on Monday announced he was nominating a new pick to lead the Bureau of Labor Statistics, days after taking the highly unusual move of firing the previous commissioner and accusing her of using “phony” numbers resulting in a poor July jobs report.

“I am pleased to announce that I am nominating Highly Respected Economist, Dr. E.J. Antoni, as the next Commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, nodding towards the previous firing. “Our Economy is booming, and E.J. will ensure that the Numbers released are HONEST and ACCURATE. I know E.J. Antoni will do an incredible job in this new role. Congratulations E.J.!”

Antoni serves as chief economist at the conservative Heritage Foundation, a think tank closely aligned with the administration.

As the Capitol was buzzing with major news — with the president off to Alaska for talks with Vladimir Putin later this week, and federal authorities taking control over Washington police — the vice president sat down for some decidedly lighter fare.

In an interview aired on Monday, JD Vance spoke with Katie Miller, a former Trump administration official and wife of current deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller.

On the show, when asked about who would be his top three dinner guests, living or dead, Vance said the list included Isaac Newton, Abraham Lincoln, and Donald Trump.

The Trump administration and the state of California headed to federal court in San Francisco on Monday for arguments in a suit from the governor alleging the White House illegally deployed nearly 5,000 federal troops to Los Angeles during protests this summer against immigration raids.

During arguments, we learned a few new details about the nearly unprecedented deployment, which took place over the objection of state and local officials.

William Harrington, an official at U.S. Army North’s Contingency Command Post, said he did not believe troops engaged in civilian law enforcement during the deployment, where federalized California National Guard troops and U.S. Marines helped guard federal buildings and accompanied immigration officers on operations.

The official also said Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth personally approved the Guard’s role in a controversial mission where heavily armed Border Patrol agents on horseback and other troops marched through Los Angeles’s MacArthur Park, in a mission seen by critics as a ceremonial show of force.

Later, Major General Scott Sherman of the National Guard U.S. Army North said no one at the Defense Department used the term “rebellion” to describe the Los Angeles protests, despite Trump administration officials consistently claiming a rebellion justified sending in federal troops.

About 250 National Guard troops remain in the area, largely on standby.

Harvard University is reportedly nearing a $500 million agreement to end its long-running battle with the Trump administration. The figure is more than double what Columbia agreed to pay the administration last month to end its own back-and-form with the White House.

The potential Harvard deal, reported by The New York Times, would see the Ivy League school invest $500 million in vocational and education programs and continue its commitments to fight antisemitism on campus.

In exchange, billions of suspended federal research funding would be restored, and Harvard would avoid the appointment of an outside monitor or direct payments to the government.

In addition to freezing funds and launching investigations into Harvard, the administration has sought to strip its ability to enroll international students.

Harvard sued the administration in April and has argued the administration is violating its constitutional rights.

The potential deal comes as the University of California announced last week it had entered into negotiations with the administration to head off similar allegations regarding UCLA.

Muriel Bowser told reporters that she had reached out to Attorney General Pam Bondi and hopes to meet with her soon, after Donald Trump’s announcement about the takeover of the DC police department.

“The executive order is also clear that the president has delegated his authority to make requests of us to Attorney General Pam Bondi. I have reached out to Attorney General Bondi and hope to schedule a meeting soon,” Bowser said Monday.