President Donald Trump on Monday said he was sending National Guard and other federal law enforcement resources to Memphis, Tennessee to combat what he called “the crime that’s going on” in the Volunteer State’s second-largest city, continuing his attacks on large cities with Democratic-led municipal governments and Black mayors.
Speaking in the Oval Office alongside Tennessee governor Bill Lee, the president said he would sign a memorandum establishing what he called the “Memphis Safe Task Force” and compared the new initiative to his attempt to take over law enforcement in Washington, D.C. over the last month.
“This task force will be a replica of our extraordinarily successful efforts here, and you’ll see it’s a lot of the same thing,” he said.
The president claimed that the move was necessary because of anecdotal evidence gleaned from a conversation he’d had with a FedEx board member who had lamented the state of the city.
“The effort will include the National Guard as well as the FBI, ATF, DEA, ICE, Homeland Security Investigations and the US Marshals and more along with the prosecutors,” he said before noting that the task force would be led by Attorney General Pam Bondi.
“This team will deploy the full powers of federal law enforcement agencies and enforcement generally to restore public safety and get dangerous career criminals off of our streets. We’re going to get them off,” he added.
Trump’s move to send federal resources into Memphis — a state controlled by Republicans — avoids a confrontation with a Democratic governor who by law commands the state’s national guard unless it is being used for federal purposes.
He had threatened to send troops into Chicago — another Democratic-controlled city with a Black mayor — but had been met with resistance from Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, who had vowed to fight any effort to use the state’s guard in Chicago.
But Trump has been able to use his authority over the D.C. National Guard to keep soldiers in the nation’s capital alongside other guard members from GOP-controlled states.
Lee, a Republican who is a close ally of the president, said his state’s guardsmen and women are “honored to be part of this mission” as part of the new task force.
“When you talk to them, when you talk to the actual population out there who interact with them every day. They say it’s a blessing to have them as a part of their life. And then for the National Guard, getting to have this where they get to improve their communities, where their kids are growing up and they’re going to church, and this is where their families are. Many of them, sir, have said this is the honor of their lifetime,” he said.
Despite the constitutional and legal obstacles preventing Trump from sending soldiers into Chicago against the will of that state’s governor, he has vowed to do so nevertheless.
“I know all about Chicago. I have a great, beautiful building. I’m so proud of it. But you know, you get less proud when you see all the crime. When they announced two weeks ago, 11 people killed. There’s over a weekend, I think they said 38 people shot, and 11 people dead,” he said.
“We think Chicago is going to be next, and we’ll get to St Louis and New Orleans.
