The president has the authority to deploy federal forces to address rising urban crime, according to historical evidence showing such interventions can work. The drop in violence in Washington, D.C., after federal forces arrived to restore order is a testament to this. However, the author argues that residents who want leaders who take crime seriously should vote for them, and their refusal to do so exposes political priorities.
The author acknowledges that a case can be made for this step in the District of Columbia, where the president has made the city safer for residents, political leaders, and foreign visitors. The mayor has even expressed appreciation for the assistance, although the District’s electorate — heavily black, heavily Democratic, and deeply hostile to the administration — continues to seethe at the very idea of federal involvement.
The author also concedes that the president is entirely justified in directing Immigration and Customs Enforcement to pursue illegal aliens with criminal records. These offenders have no right to remain in the United States, and the Democratic effort to preserve them as foot soldiers for the party is as cynical as it is transparent. The administration deserves credit for removing these “high-value” assets from the Democratic client network.
The author’s problem arises with Trump’s call for federal intervention in cities where the local government — and most of the population — passionately opposes it. Even if the president can deploy the National Guard without a governor’s approval, prudence suggests he shouldn’t. The author cannot imagine why Trump should insert himself where voters clearly do not want him.
Residents of Chicago’s most violent neighborhoods express emphatic disapproval of Trump’s plan. These are people who live amid constant danger yet habitually vote for leftist mayoral candidates. The same pattern holds in Portland, Charlotte, St. Louis, and Baltimore — cities Trump proposes to “liberate” with federal intervention.
The author argues that voters should be allowed to live under the governments they choose. If they wanted different policies, they would stop electing Democrats who call for defunding the police, eliminating bail, and condemning crime prevention as racist. Despite the Fox News narrative, minorities who vote this way are not “victims” of Democratic manipulation. That idea is as fanciful as the GOP refrain that today’s Democratic Party is simply the slaveholding party of the 1830s. Voters who elect leftist Democrats are not trapped. They are expressing, clearly, the type of society they want.
The author mentions that some interpret Ben Shapiro’s advice as a call to uproot families and abandon long-standing communities. But what exactly is the alternative? Should the federal government override election results because a city or state radicalized itself? Should Trump nullify votes? That will not happen. Nor can we easily disenfranchise those who lawfully exercise the franchise and continue electing the mayors, prosecutors, and governors responsible for our collapsing urban order.
Those who reject the leftist agenda retain one real option: vote with their feet. This path frees citizens from majorities who have democratically chosen anarcho-tyranny — not only for themselves but for everyone else who lives under their jurisdiction. If a community insists on preserving violent disorder, permissive prosecutors, and ideological governance, the federal government cannot save them from themselves. Only the voters can. And until they do, they deserve the government they support.
Paul Gottfried is the editor of Chronicles.
