If Trump federal takeover comes to KC, the mess it made in DC will too | Opinion

I am alarmed that Missouri officials such as Sen. Eric Schmitt are holding up President Donald Trump’s federal takeover of Washington, D.C., as a “model” for Kansas City. That narrative is not just misleading — it’s dangerous. D.C.’s experience offers a cautionary tale, not a blueprint for public safety.

The deployment of federal agents into the District of Columbia was a political stunt disguised as a crime strategy. There was no crime emergency. There was no coordinated safety plan, no consultation with local officials and no transparency about the goals they hoped to achieve. Instead, we got helicopters, mass arrests, ICE sweeps and a media circus, without a shred of data to suggest that communities are any safer today.

In reality, D.C. had already seen a yearslong decline in violent crime. The Council on Criminal Justice — a respected nonpartisan organization of corrections, law enforcement and public safety leaders — reported an “unmistakable and large drop in reported violence in the District” since the summer of 2023, including homicide, gun assaults, robbery and carjackings. That decline mirrored national trends in major cities across the country, and was not an isolated victory achieved through federal intervention.

When criminologists looked more closely at carjackings, one of the flashpoint justifications for the surge in federal resources, they found no evidence of a causal link. Carjackings were already declining during the August federal attack. In fact, crime is down in most U.S. cities this year, including in those with no federal presence.

So what did the deployment of federal resources accomplish? The clearest impacts are deeply troubling, and backed by data. The Washington Post analyzed more than 1,000 cases from the first weeks of the surge and found that “about 1 in 7 cases accused people of having open containers of alcohol, in cars or parks or curbside. Almost two dozen cases involved public consumption of marijuana, possession of which, in small quantities, is legal in D.C.” The New York Times came to similar conclusions: Deploying new federal agents, like simply increasing the numbers of local police forces, focuses on low-level “quality-of-life” offenses, disproportionately targeting Black residents and eroding trust in law enforcement and the administration of justice.

Trust is central to safety. When people see their neighbors being arrested for behaviors that don’t put anyone at risk, and that local police had rightly deprioritized, it deepens the divide between communities and law enforcement. It also carries real-world consequences that accelerate cycles of harm. An arrest, even without a conviction, can lead to job loss, housing instability, worsened health outcomes, and educational setbacks for young people.

Even the courts have balked. Judges in Washington, D.C., have admonished the U.S. attorney’s office for clogging the docket with flimsy cases. Juries have rejected indictments at record rates. Between D.C. and Los Angeles, more indictments have been thrown out this year than usually occur in an entire year.

What has worked in D.C. to reduce crime are the local investments in violence interruption, community-based reentry support and diversion programs that address the root causes of harm. These are the strategies backed by evidence and supported by communities that are most likely to produce sustainable results.

Communities deserve public safety plans that start with their needs, not federal talking points and partisan politics. Local officials should reject any policy that looks good on camera but falls apart under scrutiny. Kansas City deserves real solutions, not imported political theater.

One lesson from D.C. is clear: What happens after the headlines matters most. Cities that want long-term safety must invest in people and the root causes of crime, not optics and Band-Aids.

Clinique Chapman is chief executive officer of DC Justice Lab, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit researching, organizing and advocating for large-scale changes to the District of Columbia’s criminal legal system. She was previously a program manager with the Washington, D.C, Department of Corrections.