On September 9, 2025, President Donald Trump ignited a storm of outrage after making remarks at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C., that downplayed the severity of domestic violence. Speaking to an audience at the Christian museum, Trump boasted about his administration’s efforts to reduce crime in the nation’s capital, claiming that the deployment of the National Guard had “eliminated crime.” But his comments took a controversial turn when he expressed annoyance that crime statistics did not reflect a near 100% drop, citing domestic violence cases as the reason. “If a man has a little fight with his wife, they say this was a crime,” Trump said, dismissing incidents of intimate partner violence as minor and suggesting they should not be counted as crimes at all, according to the BBC and The Independent.
The response was immediate and fierce. Survivors of domestic violence, advocacy groups, and lawmakers from both sides of the aisle condemned the president’s remarks as not only insensitive but also dangerously dismissive of an issue that affects millions of Americans each year. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, at least four in ten women and one in four men in the United States have experienced physical or sexual violence or stalking by an intimate partner. The National Domestic Violence Hotline, cited by The Independent, receives up to 3,000 calls and messages daily from people seeking help.
Democratic Representative Debbie Dingell, herself a survivor of childhood domestic abuse, was among the first to speak out. “This position from the president directly opposes decades of efforts to remove stigma around domestic violence,” Dingell told The Independent. “Let me tell you, as someone who hid in a closet many times as a child, being tough on crime means keeping women and children safe in their own homes.” Her words echoed the sentiments of many who saw Trump’s remarks as a step backward in the fight to protect vulnerable populations.
Representative Gwen Moore, another survivor, called Trump’s comments “deeply offensive and disturbing.” She pointed out the president’s long history of allegations of violence against women, saying, “Trump has a long history of violence against women that makes his dismissiveness unsurprising.” Trump has consistently denied these allegations, but the shadow of past accusations, including a 1989 deposition in which his ex-wife Ivana Trump testified under oath that he had sexually assaulted her, loomed over the controversy, as noted by The Independent and BBC.
Advocates warn that minimizing domestic violence has real-world consequences. Cindy J. Kanusher, director of the Pace Women’s Justice Center, told The Independent, “It is abuse. It is a crime. And it must be treated with the seriousness it demands.” She added, “For survivors, being believed and taken seriously can mean the difference between safety and continued harm. When abuse is normalized or trivialized, it creates a climate where victims are silenced and justice is denied.”
Statistics paint a grim picture of the prevalence and impact of domestic violence. In Washington, D.C., approximately 47 percent of women and 43 percent of men have experienced intimate partner physical violence, sexual violence, or stalking in their lifetimes, according to the D.C. Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Women facing domestic violence are five times more likely to be killed by their abusers if the abuser has access to a firearm. Nearly 60 percent of all domestic violence homicides in D.C. within the last four years involved guns, The Independent reported.
The timing of Trump’s remarks was particularly jarring, coming just weeks before the 25th annual Domestic Violence Awareness Month and the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, a landmark piece of bipartisan legislation first passed in 1994. The act has been credited with building shelters, funding hotlines, and putting survivors’ safety at the center of federal policy. According to The Independent, Trump’s administration has not only made dismissive comments but has also taken concrete actions to undermine protections for survivors. Since taking office, his administration has cut millions of dollars in grants to domestic violence advocacy groups and imposed new restrictions that, according to a lawsuit filed by the National Women’s Law Center, illegally interfere with the Violence Against Women Act.
Ann Johnson, a former chief human trafficking prosecutor for Harris County, Texas, and now a state representative, expressed her outrage in an editorial. “Nothing about domestic violence is ‘little.’ It devastates families. In 2023 in Texas, intimate partner homicides claimed 205 lives, including four children. Two hundred eighteen adults and children lost a parent to domestic violence,” Johnson wrote. She also highlighted that more than $800 million in Department of Justice grants—crucial for victim services, trauma counseling, and legal aid—have been slashed under Trump’s administration, threatening the survival of organizations that support survivors.
Johnson’s critique went further, connecting the president’s rhetoric to policy decisions: “When the president minimizes abuse, he signals to victims that their pain doesn’t count, and worse, that he stands with their abusers. He sends survivors back into the shadows, into the very arms of those who harm them. That is not leadership. That is cowardice.”
National Domestic Violence Hotline CEO Katie Ray-Jones weighed in as well, telling The Independent, “No matter what it looks like or where it happens, all forms of abuse are harmful whether they are considered a crime or not.” She emphasized that domestic violence is not limited to physical abuse; it can include patterns of controlling behavior, financial manipulation, stalking, and emotional abuse.
Pressed for clarification, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt insisted Trump “wasn’t referring to crimes” but rather to incidents “made up and reported” to undermine the administration’s crime-fighting record. However, this explanation did little to quell the uproar, especially given that, as The Independent noted, D.C. police reported a homicide, multiple assaults, robberies, and over 30 thefts in the city the day before Trump’s remarks—hardly evidence of crime being “virtually nothing.”
Advocates and lawmakers argue that words matter, and so do the policies that follow. Downplaying domestic violence, they say, not only discourages victims from seeking help but also undermines decades of progress in holding abusers accountable and supporting survivors. Programs built on the foundation of the Violence Against Women Act now face existential threats from funding cuts and shifting federal priorities.
For many, the president’s comments were a painful reminder of a not-so-distant past when abuse within the home was considered a private matter, not a crime. As Ann Johnson put it, “We’ve come this far only because courageous people and smart policy said ‘enough.’ No person—married or single, rich or poor, young or old—should be a victim of abuse. We are better than the shameful history that Trump wishes to bring back.”
As the nation approaches Domestic Violence Awareness Month, survivors and advocates are doubling down on their message: every life matters, every story counts, and the fight for justice and safety in the home is far from over.
