On Sunday, September 1, 2025, the streets of Washington, D.C. took on a new, more militarized look. National Guard members—more than 2,200 strong, drawn from D.C. and six other states—began openly carrying M4 carbine rifles and M17 pistols as they patrolled high-traffic areas like Union Station and Metro stops. This marked a stark escalation in the federal response to what President Donald Trump has called a “crime emergency” in the nation’s capital. The Pentagon’s decision, announced just days earlier, reversed its initial orders that Guard members would not be armed, and signaled a deepening of federal involvement in local policing, an issue that has sparked intense debate and concern across the country.
According to The Washington Post, these Guard members now operate under strict rules: they are authorized to use force only as a last resort, and solely in response to “an imminent threat of death or serious bodily harm.” While their primary mission remains to deter crime and support law enforcement, they are also empowered to temporarily detain suspects until police arrive. The statement from Joint Task Force-D.C. emphasized, “The National Guard is committed to public safety.” Yet, under the federal Title 32 orders—invoked by President Trump when he declared the emergency on August 11—Guard members could be called upon to conduct law enforcement actions if requested, a move that edges close to the boundaries set by the Posse Comitatus Act, which prohibits U.S. troops from carrying out civilian law enforcement duties.
The White House, in a statement provided to The Washington Post, maintained that the Guard “will continue protecting federal assets—including officers—providing a safe environment for officers to make arrests if needed, and providing a visible law enforcement presence to deter crime, as they have been since the operation began.” The shift has not gone unnoticed. Eight out of ten Washingtonians oppose the federal takeover and deployment of the National Guard, according to a recent Post-Schar School poll.
Supporters of the deployment point to incidents where Guard members have assisted law enforcement, such as helping a U.S. Park Police officer who was allegedly assaulted on the National Mall, and alerting police about a man brandishing a knife at the Waterfront Metro station. The Pentagon has framed the mission as a visible deterrent, but the sight of armed troops on city streets has only heightened tensions in a city already wary of federal overreach.
The debate over the use of federal force is not confined to the nation’s capital. In Chicago, President Trump’s threats to deploy the National Guard amid a broader federal crackdown on crime have ignited fierce pushback from city officials and residents alike. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson responded by signing an executive order on August 30, 2025, instructing city agencies not to collaborate with the federal government on any National Guard deployment. “We have not called for this. Our people have not asked for this, but nevertheless, we find ourselves having to respond to this,” Johnson said before signing the order, as reported by CNN.
Chicago’s story is a complicated one. The city has seen a more than 30% decrease in murders and almost 40% decrease in shootings in 2025 compared to the previous year. That’s a remarkable turnaround for a city long plagued by gun violence. Still, the numbers remain sobering: at least 274 homicides have been reported so far this year, and over Labor Day weekend alone, shootings left at least seven people dead and 49 injured, with victims ranging in age from 14 to 48. In some neighborhoods, like West Garfield Park, residents say the official statistics don’t capture the daily reality. “There’s a lot of things that go unreported, and these are things that us living in the neighborhood, see every day,” Rochelle Sykes, a lifelong resident, told CNN. Sykes, who lost her 15-year-old nephew to violence in 2016, insists that “the National Guard is not the solution.”
For many Chicagoans, the prospect of military intervention feels less like protection and more like an occupation. Cedric Hawkins, a violence mediator with the anti-gun violence group Chicago CRED, has lost nine relatives to gun violence. Now 44, he’s one of the few in his family to reach his forties. Hawkins has witnessed a decrease in murders in his Pullman neighborhood this year, and he worries that a National Guard deployment would undo hard-won progress. “The presence of military for me, would put our communities in a situation where they feel like they are incarcerated,” he said. “We’re already in a situation in Chicago where the trust with (local) law enforcement is very, very low.”
Hawkins is not alone. Kendall Reed, another violence mediator on the city’s southside, argues that what Chicago really needs is more investment in mental health resources, job opportunities, and school support—not soldiers. “Send those people in. Don’t send the military in. What is that gonna do for us?” Reed asked. “If the numbers are down, then why are you bringing them in? If what we’re doing is working, it may not be working as fast as you would like it to work, (but) none of this all happened overnight.”
Yet not all voices are opposed. Ameenah Haque, a resident of Hyde Park, believes the National Guard could help restore order. “The residents deserve more. The crime shouldn’t take over the city. The crime should not make residents feel like they can’t live everyday life,” she told CNN. Haque’s view echoes the frustration of those who feel that, despite improvements, the city is still not safe enough.
Chicago Police Superintendent Larry Snelling is cautiously optimistic about the city’s progress. He credits targeted strategies—boots-on-the-ground intelligence, technological enhancements, and specialized task forces—for the drop in violence. “If we brought our homicide rate down to one homicide, we can celebrate that,” Snelling said. “It would be absolutely great, except for the one family who lost a loved one to a homicide.” The superintendent also highlighted the importance of cooperation between federal, state, and local agencies, particularly through initiatives like the Crime Gun Intelligence Center.
Health professionals are also seeing the impact of declining violence. Dr. Michael Casner, assistant medical director at Mount Sinai Hospital, told CNN that gunshot wound admissions are down by about a third this year. Dr. Lauren Smith, chief medical officer at Cook County Health, said the system “probably had the slowest summer” in five or six years for trauma cases. She attributes part of that success to hospital-based violence intervention programs, which aim to address the social factors that lead to violence in the first place.
Still, the debate over the National Guard’s role in urban policing is far from settled. For Hawkins, the solution lies not in military might but in community-driven peace efforts. “Last year we had four individuals murdered in the Pullman area at this time this year, 2025, we haven’t had one individual murdered this year,” he said. “This is a calling. I’m helping to save lives.”
As Washington, D.C. and Chicago grapple with the delicate balance between public safety and civil liberties, the question remains: can armed troops on city streets ever truly foster the trust and security that residents need, or will they only deepen the divides they aim to heal?
