Trump warns he’s ready to ‘send in the Feds’ to Chicago
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel answers questions during a news conference in Chicago after the the U.S. Justice Department issued a report on civil rights abuses by the Chicago Police Department.
CHICAGO >> President Donald Trump says he’s ready to “send in the Feds” if Chicago can’t reduce its homicide problem, and the city’s police superintendent says he is “more than willing” to work with the federal government to combat the violence.
Trump tweeted Tuesday night: “If Chicago doesn’t fix the horrible ‘carnage’ going on, 228 shootings in 2017 with 42 killings (up 24% from 2016), I will send in the Feds!”
In response to the president’s tweet, Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson reiterated that the city is receptive to assistance from the Department of Justice, the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms. He also repeated that city officials have sought a “boost” in federal prosecution rates for gun crimes in Chicago since homicide figures spiked.
Trump offered no details on what federal intervention would look like, though many of the conceivable options would pose practical and constitutional obstacles.
The most direct — and most extreme — intervention would be sending National Guard troops. But a federal statute dating to 1878 prohibits the deployment of federal troops to do the jobs of domestic police, with some narrow, rarely invoked exceptions.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel, in an interview with WTTW’s “Chicago Tonight” on Tuesday, said he welcomed government help in the form of more money to hire officers and more resources to track the flow of illegal guns into Chicago.
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Emanuel, a Democrat who once worked as former President Barack Obama’s White House chief of staff, also mentioned support for after-school and other social programs.
“The federal government can be a partner, and to be honest they haven’t been for decades,” he said.
Trump’s tweet came a day after Emanuel criticized Trump for worrying about the size of the crowd at his inauguration. Emanuel has acknowledged his own frustration with Chicago’s crime rate.
The figures cited by Trump are the same as those published Monday in the Chicago Tribune. The tweet was posted about the time Tuesday evening that the figures were cited on Fox television’s “O’Reilly Factor.”
The numbers were slightly different from the latest tally by the Chicago Police Department. As of Tuesday, police said, 234 people have been shot in 2017, including 38 who died. At this point last year, 227 people had been shot, including 33 deaths.
Department spokesman Anthony Guglielmi explained that the department’s numbers are slightly different because they do not include officer-involved shootings, shootings that were considered “justified,” such as those that were in self-defense, and shootings that were investigated by state police because they occurred on expressways.
It appears that the president’s numbers for homicides came from the county’s medical examiner’s office, Guglielmi said.
Earlier this month, before he took office, Trump tweeted that Emanuel should ask for federal help if he isn’t able to bring down the number of homicides. Last year, the death toll soared to 762 — the most killings in the city in nearly two decades and more than New York and Los Angeles combined.
In Tuesday’s tweet, Trump did not offer specifics about how the federal government could help. The White House website says: “Our country needs more law enforcement, more community engagement and more effective policing.”
Rep. Luis Gutierrez, a Chicago Democrat, criticized Trump, suggesting in a statement that the president, whom he called the “tweeter-in-chief,” would “rather spend his time on Twitter” than look for ways to reduce gun violence.
“The president wants publicity and to be seen beating up on Democratic elected officials and appearing hostile to a big city like Chicago in the eyes of his suburban and rural voters,” Gutierrez said, adding that he does not believe the president “will do anything constructive to get cheap handguns off the streets of American cities.”
Another Chicago Democrat, Rep. Mike Quigley, called Trump’s threat “reckless and misguided” and a “gross overreach of federal power.” He called on the president to increase funding for federal programs that he said were cut by Republicans but would help local law enforcement. He also called on Trump to support “commonsense, pragmatic gun laws.”
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Associated Press Writer Michael Tarm contributed to this report.
30 responses to “Trump warns he’s ready to ‘send in the Feds’ to Chicago”
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Lol. Cut federal jobs then send in the feds. Most federal arm of LE and Justice is already thin. Let’s send vacant slots.
the boss makes sense!
Lol, Rob states the Feds did nothing helping Chicago with the gun crimes. Like we said many times, Barry did squat for his City. Thank God for Donald
Hallelujah, Rob just threw Barry under the bus. Lol, if TheDonalds is able to step in them why couldn’t Barry. You Libertad and Democrats have jaded eyes and minds. Sad
Why didn’t the Republican governor step in first? Why didn’t Trumpf discuss with said Repugnant governor first? Because this makes the most headlines. So who has the jaded eyes now?
This is the legacy of the war on cops so relentlessly waged by Trump’s predecessor using the Ferguson Effect like a bludgeon.
IRT el_burro, TheDonald is not even a week old into office so where was Barry(Waldo) on this for 8 years and that’s not even mentioning his ties with Rob and Chicago being home to boot? Playing golf while his home town constituents were being gunned down? “sigh”
Yeah, let’s keep sending hundreds of millions of dollars to places like Palestine instead of taking care of our own people. The birds are singing and the sun is shining bright…There’s no problems in America!
We have more Americans dying in Chicago than the Mideast! Hoe sad
I don’t like politicians throwing taxpayer money around without a plan or a reasonable expectation of solving the problem. It’s not as if random upstanding Chicago citizens are getting randomly killed in public places – what’s going on is thugs and low-lifes killing each other over petty disputes.
Agreed, latenightroach.
Obama’s Mideast policy was a JOKE. No more $billions and $billions for Israel.
American taxpayers gave Israel $3.6 billion per in Military aid ($9.8 million per day) in 2016. By all accounts the United States has given more money to Israel than to any other country. The Congressional Research Service’s conservative estimate of total cumulative US aid to Israel from 1949 through 2015 is $127.4 billion (not adjusted for inflation). The inflation-adjusted total is much much higher.
Contrary to ordinary U.S. policy, Israel has been and continues to be allowed to use approximately 26% of U.S. military aid to purchase equipment from Israeli Arms manufacturers.
No other recipient of U.S. military assistance has been granted this benefit, and this has allowed the Israel’s arms industry to become one of the strongest in the world. In 2015, Israel sold $5.7 billion in military goods to other countries. This is killing American jobs.
For example, US Arms makers are competing against the Israelis in the Indian defense procurement market at the same time we are subsidizing the Israeli defense industry. Does this make any sense?
The U.S. government estimates that Israel is using approximately $1.2 billion each year (38.7% of the aid it receives from the U.S.) to “directly support its domestic budget rather than to build on its arsenal of advanced US equipment.” Israel has used American tax dollars to pay for its state of the art infrastructure, excellent education system, and massive border-security walls. They built themselves a beautiful wall but WE PAID FOR IT!
Trump is going to fix this injustice, revoke Obama’s obsolete giveaway to Israel, negotiate for America, and MAKE THEM PAY just like he’s going to do for NATO and the UN.
Heck, even NATO allies joined the US in its post-9-11 military response in the region. These allies shed blood for us with boots on the ground in Afghanistan, but where was Israel? Crickets…
If Israel wants American military support, they are going to have to pay instead of just whining and fomenting conflict while they profit off of selling military equipment to the combatants.
Enough pampering of Israel while the American people suffer.
Trump is so right. America First!
or deputize police officers put them under a Federal Agency and take your criminal cases directly to a Federal Court where the rules of evidence are different. DEA does this all the time. Started at HNL-Airport expanded into Chinatown during the 90s under weed and seed. This was how HPD got the current Chinatown Police Station. What we really got was guys squealing on everybody because they did not want to got to a Federal Prison. This would only be a temporary operations. Here in Honolulu, program is still here at the airport.
FINALLY, someone with the common sense and Guts that is willing to do something about the CARNAGE that’s taking place in Chicago.
Let alone a POTUS that’s willing to admit it, unlike the previous one who did nothing.
Barry only went back to Chicago to fundraise.
https://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20170109/kenwood/barack-obama-visit-chicago-how-many-times-19-kenwood-as-president
Hossana is right.
Mighty Teump is going to fix this using free-market tax incentives (like his infrastructure plan) and the 2nd Amendment. Obummer and Mayor Emmanuel have tried to restrict gun ownership and look at the result. Carnage.
To foght the criminals, we need more guns in the hands of law abiding citizens. Ad many as possible. Men, women and children.
All citizens in Chicago should be armed, to the the extent the law allows, so they can fully exert their constitutional right to own a firearm in the home for self protection. Assault weapons are preferable according to the NRA experts. Concealed carry would be even better.
Trump can’t make gun ownership mandatory (though this could change if Republicans in Congress are brave enough to amend the Constitution), but he can use free-market to maximize 2nd Amendment impact.
Trump should give strong tax credits and other incentives for purchasing these amazing weapons and ample ammunition. This will boost the economy and create jobs.
Trump promised to make America Great Again, and what was better about America than the wild West? There’s a new sheriff in town and he should firm the biggest, classiest posse in history. Yee-haw!
#MAGA? (Make America Gun-saturated Again?)
Two murders committed in Chicago on the same day Obama gave his farewell speech there. More murders committed there than LA & NY combined in 2016 with no slowdown in sight. Chicago needs help whether they admit it or not. There’s been more killings there than in Afghanistan in the past year. It’s laughable for anyone to say that there isn’t carnage there yet Trump was criticized for saying the American carnage must stop.
Millions of people dislike Trump but partisan politics and hatred for him need to be put aside. Imagine our city of Honolulu in the same situation as Chicago. Horrible thought. Obviously their city officials are ineffective. Federal intervention and assistance there is the right thing to do whether you like Trump or not.
Trump needs to send money into the inner city for home rehab,community building,college prep,vocational colleges,extra police,more parks and local educational opportunities.
Why didn’t Barry do that for the past 8 years he was President of the US? Instead spending all the time and effort pardoning or commuting sentences for some many convicted felons, why didn’t he spend more of that time and effort in Chicago and helping to create these inner city programs and better relationship with police to the get murder rate of down which is mostly African Americans murdering other African Americans in Chicago? Why spend so much time vacationing in Hawaii with playing golf with Bobby T and eating shave ice when not spend his vacations in Chicago and spend time in the inner city helping to create and further establish the programs you want Trump to fund? That is the epitome of hypocrisy and smoke and mirrors. That would be ironic that ‘racist’ Trump might do more to actually save African American lives in Chicago and elsewhere in the US than Obama.
@ inverse
Spot on!
KaBoom!
Subsidize personal firearms for all citizens, especially in high crime areas.
Great point inverse. Interesting how Dems never complained about all the vacations. I believe the reason the previous administration did not address issues as we see Trump doing every day, is not just the lack of will to do so, but the lack of executive/ management experience. As Trump moves forward with his agenda, his ability to “get things done” should become increasingly obvious. Can you imagine what action would have been taken had Hillary won? Scheduling White House concerts would be high on the list of priorities.
Yes and policing should be community oriented policing, recruits coming from the community-probably have a better understanding of the culture in these areas. Problem is funding dries up after a while then programs fall away. Then it becomes easier for PDs to send rookies into these areas because veterans don’t want to work in these areas. LAPD gives officers hazardous pay for working in some of gang areas in LA.
Saturday Night Live?
About AF. ALT FAC.
Mark my words – robocop will become a reality within just a few years.
President Trump should round up the gang bangers in Chicago and put them to work building the wall.
Rahm “Dead Fish” Emanuel and his cronies can help.
NO! Deport em all! 2 million illegal alien criminals already in the USA. Yikes!
“The federal government can be a partner, and to be honest they haven’t been for decades,” he said…how “deplorable” 🙂 Seriously, maybe now we’ll see some positive action and prevent needless lives from being lost.
I hope the federal agents going to Chitcago are heavily armed with plenty of ammo.