https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/08/15/us/trump-administration-dc-news?campaign
LiveUpdated
August 15, 2025, 9:29 a.m. ET2m ago
LiveUpdated
August 15, 2025, 9:29 a.m. ET2m ago
Trump Administration Live Updates: D.C. Files Lawsuit Challenging Administration’s Police Takeover
PHOTO: The District of Columbia filed a lawsuit on Friday challenging the Trump administration’s attempt to take over the city’s police department. Credit: Tierney L. Cross/The New York Times
Where Things Stand:
Aug. 15, 2025, 9:29 a.m. ET2m ago
Aishvarya Kavi
The morning after scores of National Guardsmen arrived in Washington, D.C., the streets were filled only with the usual influx of commuters driving into city. The National Mall was sunny and tranquil, with joggers, grounds workers and a few tourists, giving little indication of the tension between residents and the federal agents who have been assigned to patrol the city.
Aug. 15, 2025, 9:14 a.m. ET17 minutes ago
Campbell Robertson
The District of Columbia sues the Trump administration over its policing takeover.
Amtrak police officers and National Guard troops patrolling at Union Station in Washington on Thursday. Credit: Eric Lee for The New York Times
The District of Columbia government filed a federal lawsuit on Friday morning challenging the Trump administration’s attempt to take over the city’s Police Department.
The suit argues that both the president’s executive order on Monday federalizing the Police Department and a follow-up order by the U.S. attorney general were a “brazen usurpation of the district’s authority” and that they “far exceed” the president’s authority under the Home Rule Act of 1973, which granted D.C. its limited degree of self-government.
The lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court, comes after the Trump administration moved on Thursday to expand its control of the city’s Police Department by installing an “emergency commissioner” and revoking policies that limited officers’ cooperation with immigration enforcement.
The D.C. attorney general, Brian Schwalb, a Democrat who was elected in 2022, has been outspoken from the outset in criticizing the federal takeover of the D.C. police and the deployment of the National Guard, calling the moves “unnecessary and unlawful.”
In a statement on Friday morning, Mr. Schwalb said that the administration was “abusing its limited, temporary authority under the Home Rule Act, infringing on the district’s right to self-governance and putting the safety of D.C. residents and visitors at risk.”
“This is the gravest threat to Home Rule that the district has ever faced, and we are fighting to stop it,” he said.
Aug. 15, 2025, 8:59 a.m. ET45 minutes ago
Campbell Robertson
The D.C. government has filed a federal lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s attempt to take over the city’s police department. The city attorney general’s office said it was seeking a temporary restraining order in federal court against the administration’s takeover.
In a statement, D.C.’s attorney general, Brian Schwalb, said that the Trump administration “is abusing its limited, temporary authority under the Home Rule Act, infringing on the District’s right to self-governance and putting the safety of D.C. residents and visitors at risk.”
Aug. 15, 2025, 5:03 a.m. ET5 hours ago
Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs
Reporting from Washington
Trump’s D.C. surge turns federal agents into beat cops.
Federal agents detained a man in Washington, D.C., on Thursday night. Credit: Eric Lee for The New York Times
When a police dispatcher relayed that a man had walked into Howard University Hospital in Washington with a gunshot wound one night this week, it was not just the local police who showed up to investigate. A group of U.S. Border Patrol and other federal agents descended on the brown-brick hospital two miles from the White House, parking their S.U.V.s in front of the main entrance.
A few blocks away, a team of F.B.I. agents was helping to conduct a traffic stop on a Mercedes on the side of a busy street; a few hours later, agents who ordinarily investigate federal weapons violations stood watch as local police officers tried to subdue a disturbed man at a bus stop.
President Trump’s announcement on Monday that the federal government was assuming law enforcement responsibility in the nation’s capital has begun to quietly transform the day-to-day business of policing. Routine calls that might have been handled solely by the Metropolitan Police Department now attract an alphabet soup of federal agencies, including agents from Homeland Security Investigations, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, as well as the F.B.I.
In a city where federal law enforcement officials regularly go to work in offices, they are suddenly out on the street, visible almost everywhere — except for those hidden behind the tinted glass of unmarked cars.
Each evening this week, federal agents have rolled out of a vast federal Park Police station south of the Anacostia River to ride through the District until the early morning hours.
Agents have appeared at a range of locations, strolling by bars and restaurants in the trendy U Street Corridor, patrolling a near-empty National Mall after dark and winding through apartment complexes.
Robyn Swirling, who lives in Northwest D.C., said that she returned to her home in Manor Park one night this week and soon saw dozens of federal agents on the other side of the quiet residential street. They told her when she asked that they had a warrant, and she watched as they took a man from her neighbor’s home into a police car.
Early in the week, a group of F.B.I. agents stood in the bleachers of a high school athletic field in the Petworth neighborhood, looking on as adult recreation league soccer games were played. It did not appear that any crimes were taking place, and afterward, the soccer league emailed its members a link to an American Civil Liberties Union website about the public’s rights when stopped by the F.B.I.
“Everyone was just uneasy about it,” said Elena Lensink, who was among those playing that evening. “All that was happening at the field was, like, three soccer games.”
The week’s work has included a range of law enforcement activities that ordinarily would have been handled by local police officers, who have continued to do their work, but now federal agents were often collaborating or looking on. Federal agents have hunted for guns and stolen vehicles, conducted drug busts and chased down members of the public who ran when approached. Some agents could be seen pulling over cars for minor infractions, or reminding people at a sobriety checkpoint to wear their seatbelts.
A typical action played out early on Friday morning, when a D.C. police officer pulled over a Toyota in the Carver Langston neighborhood in the city’s Northeast quadrant. The traffic stop was initiated in front of a discount clothing store, where a brigade of federal agents was sitting in the parking lot in about a dozen unmarked cars.
As soon as the car was pulled over, the federal officers — from Immigration and Customs Enforcement and several other agencies — gathered around it, blocking off two lanes of traffic and a streetcar track for about 10 minutes before telling the driver that he was free to leave.
In another part of town, earlier in the week, F.B.I. officers descended when other officers conducting a traffic stop in the Brentwood neighborhood reported that the man driving had an open warrant and a gun. Residents who were outside enjoying the summer night eyed the scene warily as the man was arrested and the agents returned to their cars.
The deployment of federal law enforcement has galvanized the city’s liberal activists, some of whom gathered around a sobriety checkpoint operated in part by federal officers and jeered until the officers left.
Late Thursday night, F.B.I. agents retreated from an effort to take down a handful of tents housing homeless people at Washington Circle when a woman who lived in one, accompanied by members of a homeless advocacy group, showed them a notice the city had given her allowing her to stay a few more days.
Federal officials have said they have made more than 150 arrests and seized 27 guns since the operation began, but have offered few details about the specific police work being done or the charges being brought.
The White House and the office of Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for D.C., did not provide the names of those arrested but did highlight charges filed against a man who was accused of throwing a sandwich at a Border Patrol officer after condemning the presence of federal agents on the streets.
Yet simply being present appears to be one of the goals.
A video taken in the Bellevue neighborhood this week showed a phalanx of federal agents, including the A.T.F. and Homeland Security, walking between brick apartment buildings and stopping to speak with a few people on a stoop.
“You got your I.D. on you, champ?” a U.S. Park Police officer asked the man taking the video, initially thinking he was holding a joint before realizing it was a cigarette. The man who recorded the encounter said later that he had been disturbed to see so many federal officers arrive at his house, but said he did not want to discuss it further to avoid drawing more attention.
Mr. Trump’s approach has been applauded by some residents who view Washington as increasingly unsafe (the city recorded its highest murder rate in 20 years in 2023 but has since seen a significant reduction). But some also said they worried that Mr. Trump, who has frequently spoken of “unleashing” the police, has given law enforcement a green light to return to harsh tactics that in the past have disrupted poorer neighborhoods and led to injustices, particularly for Black and Hispanic residents.
Nathan Salminen, a cybersecurity lawyer, said he was alarmed when he drove through the city on a recent night and saw traffic stop after traffic stop in poorer areas, reminding him of what policing was like in the 1990s.
“Since then, a string of good police chiefs and a lot of community outreach has made the relationship between the M.P.D. and the community dramatically better,” he said, referring to the city police. “But the last few nights, I’ve seen a return to the sorts of tactics that I’ve seen in the 1990s in those same neighborhoods.”
As Kyvin Battle waited for a bus in Anacostia earlier this week, he said he feared that Black men like him would be unfairly targeted.
“A lot of us who are innocent are going to get caught in the middle of all this,” said Mr. Battle, 57, a military veteran.
As he spoke, a group of federal officers — several in unmarked cars — made a U-turn and rushed down Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
“I’ve been here six years,” he said. “I’ve never seen that.”
Darren Sands contributed reporting. Susan C. Beachy and Kirsten Noyes contributed research.
Aug. 14, 2025, 7:17 p.m. ETAug. 14, 2025
Campbell Robertson and Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs
Campbell Robertson is the Mid-Atlantic bureau chief for The New York Times, covering seven states and Washington, D.C. Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs reported from Washington.
- Washington, D.C.: The District of Columbia filed a lawsuit on Friday challenging the Trump administration’s attempt to take over the city’s police department. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court, comes after the Trump administration moved on Thursday to expand its control of the city’s police department by installing an “emergency commissioner” and revoking policies that limited officers’ cooperation with immigration enforcement. Federal officials began sweeping homeless encampments in Washington on Thursday night, after city officials and advocates urged homeless people to leave or risk arrest.
- Redistricting fight: The governor of California, Gavin Newsom, kicked off his campaign for a proposition asking the state’s voters to approve a new congressional map. It was an extraordinary move meant to help Democrats win more U.S. House seats to counter Mr. Trump’s request that Texas gerrymander five more seats for Republicans. More than a dozen Border Patrol agents turned up at the rally Mr. Newsom was holding in what local elected officials called an unacceptable show of force.
- Trump and Putin: Mr. Trump was scheduled to meet with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Friday in Alaska to discuss the war in Ukraine. Mr. Trump set low expectations for the encounter, portraying it as the first of multiple meetings that would eventually include President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. Follow live coverage ›
Aug. 15, 2025, 9:29 a.m. ET2m ago
Aishvarya Kavi
The morning after scores of National Guardsmen arrived in Washington, D.C., the streets were filled only with the usual influx of commuters driving into city. The National Mall was sunny and tranquil, with joggers, grounds workers and a few tourists, giving little indication of the tension between residents and the federal agents who have been assigned to patrol the city.
Aug. 15, 2025, 9:14 a.m. ET17 minutes ago
Campbell Robertson
The District of Columbia sues the Trump administration over its policing takeover.
Amtrak police officers and National Guard troops patrolling at Union Station in Washington on Thursday. Credit: Eric Lee for The New York Times
The District of Columbia government filed a federal lawsuit on Friday morning challenging the Trump administration’s attempt to take over the city’s Police Department.
The suit argues that both the president’s executive order on Monday federalizing the Police Department and a follow-up order by the U.S. attorney general were a “brazen usurpation of the district’s authority” and that they “far exceed” the president’s authority under the Home Rule Act of 1973, which granted D.C. its limited degree of self-government.
The lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court, comes after the Trump administration moved on Thursday to expand its control of the city’s Police Department by installing an “emergency commissioner” and revoking policies that limited officers’ cooperation with immigration enforcement.
The D.C. attorney general, Brian Schwalb, a Democrat who was elected in 2022, has been outspoken from the outset in criticizing the federal takeover of the D.C. police and the deployment of the National Guard, calling the moves “unnecessary and unlawful.”
In a statement on Friday morning, Mr. Schwalb said that the administration was “abusing its limited, temporary authority under the Home Rule Act, infringing on the district’s right to self-governance and putting the safety of D.C. residents and visitors at risk.”
“This is the gravest threat to Home Rule that the district has ever faced, and we are fighting to stop it,” he said.
Aug. 15, 2025, 8:59 a.m. ET45 minutes ago
Campbell Robertson
The D.C. government has filed a federal lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s attempt to take over the city’s police department. The city attorney general’s office said it was seeking a temporary restraining order in federal court against the administration’s takeover.
In a statement, D.C.’s attorney general, Brian Schwalb, said that the Trump administration “is abusing its limited, temporary authority under the Home Rule Act, infringing on the District’s right to self-governance and putting the safety of D.C. residents and visitors at risk.”
Aug. 15, 2025, 5:03 a.m. ET5 hours ago
Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs
Reporting from Washington
Trump’s D.C. surge turns federal agents into beat cops.
Federal agents detained a man in Washington, D.C., on Thursday night. Credit: Eric Lee for The New York Times
When a police dispatcher relayed that a man had walked into Howard University Hospital in Washington with a gunshot wound one night this week, it was not just the local police who showed up to investigate. A group of U.S. Border Patrol and other federal agents descended on the brown-brick hospital two miles from the White House, parking their S.U.V.s in front of the main entrance.
A few blocks away, a team of F.B.I. agents was helping to conduct a traffic stop on a Mercedes on the side of a busy street; a few hours later, agents who ordinarily investigate federal weapons violations stood watch as local police officers tried to subdue a disturbed man at a bus stop.
President Trump’s announcement on Monday that the federal government was assuming law enforcement responsibility in the nation’s capital has begun to quietly transform the day-to-day business of policing. Routine calls that might have been handled solely by the Metropolitan Police Department now attract an alphabet soup of federal agencies, including agents from Homeland Security Investigations, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, as well as the F.B.I.
In a city where federal law enforcement officials regularly go to work in offices, they are suddenly out on the street, visible almost everywhere — except for those hidden behind the tinted glass of unmarked cars.
Each evening this week, federal agents have rolled out of a vast federal Park Police station south of the Anacostia River to ride through the District until the early morning hours.
Agents have appeared at a range of locations, strolling by bars and restaurants in the trendy U Street Corridor, patrolling a near-empty National Mall after dark and winding through apartment complexes.
Robyn Swirling, who lives in Northwest D.C., said that she returned to her home in Manor Park one night this week and soon saw dozens of federal agents on the other side of the quiet residential street. They told her when she asked that they had a warrant, and she watched as they took a man from her neighbor’s home into a police car.
Early in the week, a group of F.B.I. agents stood in the bleachers of a high school athletic field in the Petworth neighborhood, looking on as adult recreation league soccer games were played. It did not appear that any crimes were taking place, and afterward, the soccer league emailed its members a link to an American Civil Liberties Union website about the public’s rights when stopped by the F.B.I.
“Everyone was just uneasy about it,” said Elena Lensink, who was among those playing that evening. “All that was happening at the field was, like, three soccer games.”
The week’s work has included a range of law enforcement activities that ordinarily would have been handled by local police officers, who have continued to do their work, but now federal agents were often collaborating or looking on. Federal agents have hunted for guns and stolen vehicles, conducted drug busts and chased down members of the public who ran when approached. Some agents could be seen pulling over cars for minor infractions, or reminding people at a sobriety checkpoint to wear their seatbelts.
A typical action played out early on Friday morning, when a D.C. police officer pulled over a Toyota in the Carver Langston neighborhood in the city’s Northeast quadrant. The traffic stop was initiated in front of a discount clothing store, where a brigade of federal agents was sitting in the parking lot in about a dozen unmarked cars.
As soon as the car was pulled over, the federal officers — from Immigration and Customs Enforcement and several other agencies — gathered around it, blocking off two lanes of traffic and a streetcar track for about 10 minutes before telling the driver that he was free to leave.
In another part of town, earlier in the week, F.B.I. officers descended when other officers conducting a traffic stop in the Brentwood neighborhood reported that the man driving had an open warrant and a gun. Residents who were outside enjoying the summer night eyed the scene warily as the man was arrested and the agents returned to their cars.
The deployment of federal law enforcement has galvanized the city’s liberal activists, some of whom gathered around a sobriety checkpoint operated in part by federal officers and jeered until the officers left.
Late Thursday night, F.B.I. agents retreated from an effort to take down a handful of tents housing homeless people at Washington Circle when a woman who lived in one, accompanied by members of a homeless advocacy group, showed them a notice the city had given her allowing her to stay a few more days.
Federal officials have said they have made more than 150 arrests and seized 27 guns since the operation began, but have offered few details about the specific police work being done or the charges being brought.
The White House and the office of Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for D.C., did not provide the names of those arrested but did highlight charges filed against a man who was accused of throwing a sandwich at a Border Patrol officer after condemning the presence of federal agents on the streets.
Yet simply being present appears to be one of the goals.
A video taken in the Bellevue neighborhood this week showed a phalanx of federal agents, including the A.T.F. and Homeland Security, walking between brick apartment buildings and stopping to speak with a few people on a stoop.
“You got your I.D. on you, champ?” a U.S. Park Police officer asked the man taking the video, initially thinking he was holding a joint before realizing it was a cigarette. The man who recorded the encounter said later that he had been disturbed to see so many federal officers arrive at his house, but said he did not want to discuss it further to avoid drawing more attention.
Mr. Trump’s approach has been applauded by some residents who view Washington as increasingly unsafe (the city recorded its highest murder rate in 20 years in 2023 but has since seen a significant reduction). But some also said they worried that Mr. Trump, who has frequently spoken of “unleashing” the police, has given law enforcement a green light to return to harsh tactics that in the past have disrupted poorer neighborhoods and led to injustices, particularly for Black and Hispanic residents.
Nathan Salminen, a cybersecurity lawyer, said he was alarmed when he drove through the city on a recent night and saw traffic stop after traffic stop in poorer areas, reminding him of what policing was like in the 1990s.
“Since then, a string of good police chiefs and a lot of community outreach has made the relationship between the M.P.D. and the community dramatically better,” he said, referring to the city police. “But the last few nights, I’ve seen a return to the sorts of tactics that I’ve seen in the 1990s in those same neighborhoods.”
As Kyvin Battle waited for a bus in Anacostia earlier this week, he said he feared that Black men like him would be unfairly targeted.
“A lot of us who are innocent are going to get caught in the middle of all this,” said Mr. Battle, 57, a military veteran.
As he spoke, a group of federal officers — several in unmarked cars — made a U-turn and rushed down Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
“I’ve been here six years,” he said. “I’ve never seen that.”
Darren Sands contributed reporting. Susan C. Beachy and Kirsten Noyes contributed research.
Aug. 14, 2025, 7:17 p.m. ETAug. 14, 2025
Campbell Robertson and Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs
Campbell Robertson is the Mid-Atlantic bureau chief for The New York Times, covering seven states and Washington, D.C. Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs reported from Washington.
Federal authorities target homeless camps in D.C. as Trump’s takeover continues.
Metropolitan Police Department personnel stood by as a shelter hotline van arrived near the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library in Washington on Thursday. Credit: Kenny Holston/The New York Times
The federal authorities were attempting to clear homeless encampments in northwestern Washington on Thursday night as part of President Trump’s sprawling takeover of the city’s law enforcement apparatus, after city officials and advocates had spent much of the day urging unhoused people to go to shelters or risk arrest.
A federal operation that had been expected to start at 6:30 p.m. seemed to get underway only after dark. At around 9 p.m., federal agents from the F.B.I. and the U.S. Secret Service arrived at Washington Circle in the Foggy Bottom area to remove a few tents where homeless people had long stayed, according to Wes Heppler of the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless. They retreated after a woman presented a city notice saying she had until Monday to leave.
“We were told that there would be a list of sites that would receive closure activity from the National Park Service and other law enforcement officials, and we would support that effort by providing a connection to homeless services for those who are adversely impacted,” Wayne Turnage, Washington’s deputy mayor for health and human services, told reporters at the site of the clearing at Washington Circle.
As the night unfolded and the city braced for raids, it was unclear how widespread or effective the raids were, with federal agents showing up in groups at sites and confronting the small numbers of homeless people they encountered.
“The District has worked proactively with homeless residents ahead these actions to provide services and offers of shelter,” read a statement from the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services. “D.C. will support the engagements with wraparound services and trash pickup, but the planned engagements are otherwise the purview of the federal agencies.”
There were signs that the show of force might run into some obstacles. At Washington Circle, Meghann Abraham, 34, who has been living outside in the area since March, presented agents with a notice that the city had given her earlier in the day, allowing her until Monday to clear out. The agents discussed the matter among themselves and then left soon after.
Earlier, a little after 6 p.m., District of Columbia police officers arrived at an area outside the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library, where homeless people often spend the night. Most of the homeless people had already departed when the police arrived, leaving behind belongings in piles on the sidewalk.
The local police referred inquiries about the operation to the White House. In a briefing on Tuesday, the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said that the police would be clearing encampments in Washington under “laws that are already on the books.”
There was widespread uncertainty about the scope of the sweeps on Thursday, even as there was little surprise that they were coming. In announcing that he was federalizing the District of Columbia police force on Monday and deploying hundreds of federal agents and National Guard soldiers, Mr. Trump had said the city was being taken over by “drugged out maniacs and homeless people,” despite falling crime rates. In an executive order in March, he had demanded the “prompt removal and cleanup of all homeless or vagrant encampments.” The White House says that scores of homeless encampments have been cleared since that order.
Many, but not all, of the encampments are in parks, traffic circles and medians in Washington that are federal government property.
While the president said that the authorities would give homeless people “places to stay, but FAR from the Capital,” Ms. Leavitt said that their options would be “to be taken to a homeless shelter, to be offered addiction or mental health services, and, if they refuse, they will be susceptible to fines or to jail time.”
It was unclear what the charges would be for any arrests. The city’s locally elected attorney general posted legal guidance for people living in homeless encampments who might be confronted by law enforcement.
The city has not been able to expand mental health capacity, in part because of $1.1 billion that Congress prevented the District of Columbia from having access to in the budget this year, Mr. Allen, the councilman, said.
The city set up about 60 extra shelter beds last week, Mr. Turnage said. Thirty beds were still open, he said, adding that “capacity is not an issue.”
But Jesse Rabinowitz of the National Homelessness Law Center, a legal advocacy group, said there were not nearly enough beds to take in the hundreds of people living outside in Washington. “There’s nowhere for people to go,” he said.
He also pointed out, echoing Mr. Allen, that “the federal government has not supplied any additional shelter beds.”
Mr. Turnage, who had said in an interview earlier on WUSA9, the local CBS affiliate, that the Trump administration wanted to “finish the encampment part of this process in a week or so,” said on Thursday night that federal protocol was very different from the district’s.
The city does not conduct encampment closures at night, he said. But he said the city was acting in a support role and would connect homeless people with services and would try to collect belongings and clean up after the clearing.
“We’ve never had the F.B.I. involved,” he said. “It’s never been a federal operation. It’s always been district government. We will do what we can to help them.”
Chris Cameron and Darren Sands contributed reporting from Washington. Ashley Ahn contributed from New York.
Aug. 14, 2025, 4:52 p.m. ETAug. 14, 2025
Laurel RosenhallJesus Jiménez and Hamed Aleaziz
Border Patrol agents show up in force at a Newsom rally in California.
More than a dozen Border Patrol agents turned up in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday outside a museum where Gov. Gavin Newsom of California was holding a rally.CreditCredit...Mike Blake/Reuters
More than a dozen Border Patrol agents turned up in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday at a rally and news conference that Gov. Gavin Newsom was holding on congressional redistricting.
The governor’s event had nothing to do with immigration, and local elected officials expressed outrage that the federal agents decided to stand there in a brazen show of force outside a museum where Mr. Newsom and other leaders were speaking.
As the governor was preparing to speak inside the Japanese American National Museum in the Little Tokyo neighborhood of Los Angeles, the agents assembled outside, many of them masked and armed, and some wearing tactical helmets and carrying rifles.
“This is just completely unacceptable,” Mayor Karen Bass of Los Angeles told reporters. “This is a Customs and Border Patrol that has gone amok. This absolutely has to stop. There was no danger here.”
Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said in a post on social media that Ms. Bass “must be misinformed.”
“Our law enforcement operations are about enforcing the law — not about Gavin Newsom,” Ms. McLaughlin said.
The presence of the agents on Thursday came as Democratic leaders in California, including Mr. Newsom and Ms. Bass, have sparred with the federal government over widespread immigration raids in recent weeks.
Mr. Newsom has repeatedly criticized the Trump administration, and he sued the federal government for deploying National Guard troops to Los Angeles to quell protests this summer. The City of Los Angeles also joined a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security over how the raids have been conducted. In June, dozens of federal agents marched through MacArthur Park, in a neighborhood that is home to many immigrants, an action that drew criticism from local officials.
It was not immediately clear whether the agents who arrived on Thursday were patrolling the neighborhood or were part of a targeted operation.
A video shared on social media by Mr. Newsom’s press office shows the agents gathering outside the museum. In the video, Gregory Bovino, a Border Patrol chief who is leading the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in Southern California, says, “We’re here making Los Angeles a safer place, since we don’t have politicians who can do that. We do that ourselves.”
In the background of the video, people can be heard shouting at the Border Patrol agents. Honking is also heard from vehicles, a tactic that has been used by many residents across Southern California to alert neighbors when immigration agents are in the area.
When Mr. Newsom was asked by reporters about Border Patrol’s appearance outside his event, the governor said, “It’s pretty sick and pathetic.” He added that it said everything people need to know “about Donald Trump’s America.”
Ms. Bass told reporters outside the museum that there was “no way” the presence of federal agents outside Mr. Newsom’s rally was a coincidence, adding that the gathering had been widely publicized.
Mr. Newsom was in Los Angeles on Thursday to kick off a campaign asking California voters to approve a new congressional map. The governor is trying to help Democrats win more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives to counter a proposed Republican gerrymander in Texas, and his event included numerous Democratic leaders.
See more on: Donald Trump, National Guard
The Latest on the Trump Administration:
Metropolitan Police Department personnel stood by as a shelter hotline van arrived near the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library in Washington on Thursday. Credit: Kenny Holston/The New York Times
The federal authorities were attempting to clear homeless encampments in northwestern Washington on Thursday night as part of President Trump’s sprawling takeover of the city’s law enforcement apparatus, after city officials and advocates had spent much of the day urging unhoused people to go to shelters or risk arrest.
A federal operation that had been expected to start at 6:30 p.m. seemed to get underway only after dark. At around 9 p.m., federal agents from the F.B.I. and the U.S. Secret Service arrived at Washington Circle in the Foggy Bottom area to remove a few tents where homeless people had long stayed, according to Wes Heppler of the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless. They retreated after a woman presented a city notice saying she had until Monday to leave.
“We were told that there would be a list of sites that would receive closure activity from the National Park Service and other law enforcement officials, and we would support that effort by providing a connection to homeless services for those who are adversely impacted,” Wayne Turnage, Washington’s deputy mayor for health and human services, told reporters at the site of the clearing at Washington Circle.
As the night unfolded and the city braced for raids, it was unclear how widespread or effective the raids were, with federal agents showing up in groups at sites and confronting the small numbers of homeless people they encountered.
“The District has worked proactively with homeless residents ahead these actions to provide services and offers of shelter,” read a statement from the Office of the Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services. “D.C. will support the engagements with wraparound services and trash pickup, but the planned engagements are otherwise the purview of the federal agencies.”
There were signs that the show of force might run into some obstacles. At Washington Circle, Meghann Abraham, 34, who has been living outside in the area since March, presented agents with a notice that the city had given her earlier in the day, allowing her until Monday to clear out. The agents discussed the matter among themselves and then left soon after.
Earlier, a little after 6 p.m., District of Columbia police officers arrived at an area outside the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library, where homeless people often spend the night. Most of the homeless people had already departed when the police arrived, leaving behind belongings in piles on the sidewalk.
The local police referred inquiries about the operation to the White House. In a briefing on Tuesday, the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said that the police would be clearing encampments in Washington under “laws that are already on the books.”
There was widespread uncertainty about the scope of the sweeps on Thursday, even as there was little surprise that they were coming. In announcing that he was federalizing the District of Columbia police force on Monday and deploying hundreds of federal agents and National Guard soldiers, Mr. Trump had said the city was being taken over by “drugged out maniacs and homeless people,” despite falling crime rates. In an executive order in March, he had demanded the “prompt removal and cleanup of all homeless or vagrant encampments.” The White House says that scores of homeless encampments have been cleared since that order.
Many, but not all, of the encampments are in parks, traffic circles and medians in Washington that are federal government property.
While the president said that the authorities would give homeless people “places to stay, but FAR from the Capital,” Ms. Leavitt said that their options would be “to be taken to a homeless shelter, to be offered addiction or mental health services, and, if they refuse, they will be susceptible to fines or to jail time.”
It was unclear what the charges would be for any arrests. The city’s locally elected attorney general posted legal guidance for people living in homeless encampments who might be confronted by law enforcement.
The city has not been able to expand mental health capacity, in part because of $1.1 billion that Congress prevented the District of Columbia from having access to in the budget this year, Mr. Allen, the councilman, said.
The city set up about 60 extra shelter beds last week, Mr. Turnage said. Thirty beds were still open, he said, adding that “capacity is not an issue.”
But Jesse Rabinowitz of the National Homelessness Law Center, a legal advocacy group, said there were not nearly enough beds to take in the hundreds of people living outside in Washington. “There’s nowhere for people to go,” he said.
He also pointed out, echoing Mr. Allen, that “the federal government has not supplied any additional shelter beds.”
Mr. Turnage, who had said in an interview earlier on WUSA9, the local CBS affiliate, that the Trump administration wanted to “finish the encampment part of this process in a week or so,” said on Thursday night that federal protocol was very different from the district’s.
The city does not conduct encampment closures at night, he said. But he said the city was acting in a support role and would connect homeless people with services and would try to collect belongings and clean up after the clearing.
“We’ve never had the F.B.I. involved,” he said. “It’s never been a federal operation. It’s always been district government. We will do what we can to help them.”
Chris Cameron and Darren Sands contributed reporting from Washington. Ashley Ahn contributed from New York.
Aug. 14, 2025, 4:52 p.m. ETAug. 14, 2025
Laurel RosenhallJesus Jiménez and Hamed Aleaziz
Border Patrol agents show up in force at a Newsom rally in California.
More than a dozen Border Patrol agents turned up in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday outside a museum where Gov. Gavin Newsom of California was holding a rally.CreditCredit...Mike Blake/Reuters
More than a dozen Border Patrol agents turned up in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday at a rally and news conference that Gov. Gavin Newsom was holding on congressional redistricting.
The governor’s event had nothing to do with immigration, and local elected officials expressed outrage that the federal agents decided to stand there in a brazen show of force outside a museum where Mr. Newsom and other leaders were speaking.
As the governor was preparing to speak inside the Japanese American National Museum in the Little Tokyo neighborhood of Los Angeles, the agents assembled outside, many of them masked and armed, and some wearing tactical helmets and carrying rifles.
“This is just completely unacceptable,” Mayor Karen Bass of Los Angeles told reporters. “This is a Customs and Border Patrol that has gone amok. This absolutely has to stop. There was no danger here.”
Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said in a post on social media that Ms. Bass “must be misinformed.”
“Our law enforcement operations are about enforcing the law — not about Gavin Newsom,” Ms. McLaughlin said.
The presence of the agents on Thursday came as Democratic leaders in California, including Mr. Newsom and Ms. Bass, have sparred with the federal government over widespread immigration raids in recent weeks.
Mr. Newsom has repeatedly criticized the Trump administration, and he sued the federal government for deploying National Guard troops to Los Angeles to quell protests this summer. The City of Los Angeles also joined a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security over how the raids have been conducted. In June, dozens of federal agents marched through MacArthur Park, in a neighborhood that is home to many immigrants, an action that drew criticism from local officials.
It was not immediately clear whether the agents who arrived on Thursday were patrolling the neighborhood or were part of a targeted operation.
A video shared on social media by Mr. Newsom’s press office shows the agents gathering outside the museum. In the video, Gregory Bovino, a Border Patrol chief who is leading the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in Southern California, says, “We’re here making Los Angeles a safer place, since we don’t have politicians who can do that. We do that ourselves.”
In the background of the video, people can be heard shouting at the Border Patrol agents. Honking is also heard from vehicles, a tactic that has been used by many residents across Southern California to alert neighbors when immigration agents are in the area.
When Mr. Newsom was asked by reporters about Border Patrol’s appearance outside his event, the governor said, “It’s pretty sick and pathetic.” He added that it said everything people need to know “about Donald Trump’s America.”
Ms. Bass told reporters outside the museum that there was “no way” the presence of federal agents outside Mr. Newsom’s rally was a coincidence, adding that the gathering had been widely publicized.
Mr. Newsom was in Los Angeles on Thursday to kick off a campaign asking California voters to approve a new congressional map. The governor is trying to help Democrats win more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives to counter a proposed Republican gerrymander in Texas, and his event included numerous Democratic leaders.
See more on: Donald Trump, National Guard
The Latest on the Trump Administration:
- D.C. Police Takeover: The Army expects up to 200 soldiers out on the capital’s streets in support of federal law enforcement. Here's what to know.
- Trump-Putin Meeting: After agreeing to a strategy with European leaders ahead of a planned summit with President Vladimir Putin of Russia, President Trump suggested he had limited power in controlling his actions in Ukraine.
- Scott Bessent: The Treasury secretary has failed to divest his financial assets, a watchdog said, raising ethical concerns as he leads Trump’s economic policy agenda.
- Health Disparities: Under the Trump administration’s campaign against “woke” science, the N.I.H. has closed down studies and programs focused on gaps between racial and socioeconomic groups.
- Nigel Farage: The leader of the anti-immigrant party Reform U.K., which is leading in British polls, confirmed a meeting with Vice President JD Vance. Neither office disclosed details of the conversation.
- Smithsonian Institution: Historians expressed alarm at the White House’s announcement of a wide-ranging review, in which officials will scour exhibitions “to assess tone, historical framing and alignment with American ideals.”
https://www.cnn.com/2025/08/12/politics/smithsonian-exhibits-white-house-review
White House orders review of Smithsonian museums and exhibits to ensure alignment with Trump directive
by Betsy Klein
August 13, 2025
CNN
by Betsy Klein
August 13, 2025
CNN
Anderson Cooper explains the White House's latest directive to vet Smithsonian museums
VIDEO:
The White House is conducting a comprehensive internal review of exhibits and materials at the Smithsonian Institution – the organization that runs the nation’s major public museums – in an effort to comply with President Donald Trump’s directive about what should and shouldn’t be displayed.
The initiative, a trio of top Trump aides wrote in a letter to Smithsonian Institution secretary Lonnie Bunch III, “aims to ensure alignment with the President’s directive to celebrate American exceptionalism, remove divisive or partisan narratives, and restore confidence in our shared cultural institutions.”
It marks the latest move by the Trump administration to impose the president’s views on US cultural and historical institutions and purge materials focused on diversity.
Related article
The White House is conducting a comprehensive internal review of exhibits and materials at the Smithsonian Institution – the organization that runs the nation’s major public museums – in an effort to comply with President Donald Trump’s directive about what should and shouldn’t be displayed.
The initiative, a trio of top Trump aides wrote in a letter to Smithsonian Institution secretary Lonnie Bunch III, “aims to ensure alignment with the President’s directive to celebrate American exceptionalism, remove divisive or partisan narratives, and restore confidence in our shared cultural institutions.”
It marks the latest move by the Trump administration to impose the president’s views on US cultural and historical institutions and purge materials focused on diversity.
Related article
Can you mount an art exhibition about race in the age of Trump?
Earlier this year, Trump signed an executive order accusing the Smithsonian Institution of having “come under the influence of a divisive, race-centered ideology” that has “promoted narratives that portray American and Western values as inherently harmful and oppressive.” Trump’s action put Vice President JD Vance in charge of stopping government spending on “exhibits or programs that degrade shared American values, divide Americans based on race, or promote programs or ideologies inconsistent with Federal law and policy.”
The letter released Tuesday — signed by Trump aides Lindsey Halligan, the senior associate staff secretary; Vince Haley, the Domestic Policy Council director; and Russell Vought, the Office of Management and Budget director — says the review will focus on public-facing content, the curatorial process to understand how work is selected for exhibit, current and future exhibition planning, the use of existing materials and collections, and guidelines for narrative standards.
Eight key, Washington, DC-based Smithsonian museums will be part of the first phase of the review: the National Museum of American History, the National Museum of Natural History, the National Museum of African American History and Culture, the National Museum of the American Indian, the National Air and Space Museum, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the National Portrait Gallery, and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. Additional museums, the letter said, will be announced in a second phase.
The Smithsonian said it was “reviewing” the letter, telling CNN in a statement it planned to work “constructively” with the White House.
Scenes from the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC, on July 16. Tristen Rouse/CNN
“The Smithsonian’s work is grounded in a deep commitment to scholarly excellence, rigorous research, and the accurate, factual presentation of history. We are reviewing the letter with this commitment in mind and will continue to collaborate constructively with the White House, Congress, and our governing Board of Regents,” the statement said.
The Smithsonian Institution is the world’s largest museum complex, including 21 museums and the National Zoo. Nearly 17 million people visited Smithsonian properties last year, according to the museum’s website. Admission at nearly all the museums is free. The Smithsonian began a review of its own in June, and has repeatedly stressed its commitment to being nonpartisan. The institution told CNN in July that it was committed to an “unbiased presentation of facts and history” and that it would “make any necessary changes to ensure our content meets our standards.”
The letter calls on each museum to designate a point of contact to provide details on plans for programming to highlight the country’s 250th anniversary. It also asks for a full catalog of all current and ongoing exhibitions and budgets, a list of all traveling exhibitions and plans for the next three years, and all internal guidelines, including staff manuals, job descriptions, and organizational charts, along with internal communications about exhibition artwork selection and approval. That material is due within 30 days, with “on-site observational visits” and walkthroughs expected.
Can you mount an art exhibition about race in the age of Trump?
Earlier this year, Trump signed an executive order accusing the Smithsonian Institution of having “come under the influence of a divisive, race-centered ideology” that has “promoted narratives that portray American and Western values as inherently harmful and oppressive.” Trump’s action put Vice President JD Vance in charge of stopping government spending on “exhibits or programs that degrade shared American values, divide Americans based on race, or promote programs or ideologies inconsistent with Federal law and policy.”
The letter released Tuesday — signed by Trump aides Lindsey Halligan, the senior associate staff secretary; Vince Haley, the Domestic Policy Council director; and Russell Vought, the Office of Management and Budget director — says the review will focus on public-facing content, the curatorial process to understand how work is selected for exhibit, current and future exhibition planning, the use of existing materials and collections, and guidelines for narrative standards.
The White House is conducting a comprehensive internal review of exhibits and materials at the Smithsonian Institution – the organization that runs the nation’s major public museums – in an effort to comply with President Donald Trump’s directive about what should and shouldn’t be displayed.
The initiative, a trio of top Trump aides wrote in a letter to Smithsonian Institution secretary Lonnie Bunch III, “aims to ensure alignment with the President’s directive to celebrate American exceptionalism, remove divisive or partisan narratives, and restore confidence in our shared cultural institutions.”
It marks the latest move by the Trump administration to impose the president’s views on US cultural and historical institutions and purge materials focused on diversity.
Related article
Scenes from the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC, on July 16. Tristen Rouse/CNN
“The Smithsonian’s work is grounded in a deep commitment to scholarly excellence, rigorous research, and the accurate, factual presentation of history. We are reviewing the letter with this commitment in mind and will continue to collaborate constructively with the White House, Congress, and our governing Board of Regents,” the statement said.
The Smithsonian Institution is the world’s largest museum complex, including 21 museums and the National Zoo. Nearly 17 million people visited Smithsonian properties last year, according to the museum’s website. Admission at nearly all the museums is free. The Smithsonian began a review of its own in June, and has repeatedly stressed its commitment to being nonpartisan. The institution told CNN in July that it was committed to an “unbiased presentation of facts and history” and that it would “make any necessary changes to ensure our content meets our standards.”
The letter calls on each museum to designate a point of contact to provide details on plans for programming to highlight the country’s 250th anniversary. It also asks for a full catalog of all current and ongoing exhibitions and budgets, a list of all traveling exhibitions and plans for the next three years, and all internal guidelines, including staff manuals, job descriptions, and organizational charts, along with internal communications about exhibition artwork selection and approval. That material is due within 30 days, with “on-site observational visits” and walkthroughs expected.
Within 75 days, Trump administration officials will schedule and conduct “voluntary interviews with curators and senior staff.”
And within 120 days, museums “should begin implementing content corrections where necessary, replacing divisive or ideologically driven language with unifying, historically accurate, and constructive descriptions across placards, wall didactics, digital displays, and other public-facing materials.”
Last month, the National Museum of American History removed a temporary placard referencing Trump’s two impeachments from an exhibit related to the presidency, prompting public outcry against the museum and claims it was capitulating to Trump. In follow-up statements, the museum system insisted the placard’s removal was temporary and denied it had been pressured by any government official to make changes to its exhibits. It was reinstalled days ago, with some changes.
The exhibit now is set up in a way that places information about Trump’s two impeachments in a lower spot, with some changes to the placard’s text.
This story has been updated with additional details.
CNN’s Michael Williams contributed to this report.
