D.C. Police Union: Yes, Crime Really Is Out of Control

While Washington, D.C. officials are pretending that the District is as safe as Mayberry was back when Andy Griffith was the town’s top lawman, the head of the D.C. police union says he supports the move by Donald Trump to federalize the D.C. police force to address “spiraling” crime rates. 

D.C. Police Union president Greg Pemberton released a statement on Monday afternoon hailing the president’s move, while arguing that in order to truly deal with violent crime in the District several structural reforms are necessary. 

The Union agrees that crime is spiraling out of control, and immediate action is necessary to restore public safety. However, we emphasize that federal intervention must be a temporary measure, with the ultimate goal of empowering a fully staffed and supported MPD to protect our city effectively. To achieve this, misguided legislation passed by the DC City Council must be repealed, and we call on Congress and the White House to assist in overturning these detrimental laws. The Union has long warned of the catastrophic consequences of chronic mismanagement, staffing shortages, and radical policies that have crippled the MPD. The President’s recognition of this crisis validates our ongoing concerns. The current state of affairs, marked by violent crime surges, historic officer shortages, and eroded morale, requires urgent action. The temporary federal takeover is a necessary step to stabilize the situation, but it is not a long-term solution. The real path forward lies in addressing the root causes of the MPD’s challenges, particularly the need for adequate staffing and the reversal of harmful legislation.

Union Chairman Gregg Pemberton stated, “We stand with the President in recognizingthat Washington, DC, cannot continue on this trajectory. Crime is out of control, and our officers are stretched beyond their limits. The federal intervention is a critical stopgap, but the MPD needs proper staffing and support to thrive. This can only happen by repealing the disastrous policies that have driven out our best officers and hindered recruitment.”

What about the claims by D.C. officials have violent crime has fallen dramatically since 2023? Well, it’s worth noting that D.C. Police Union has also accused the MPD of cooking the books when it comes to crime stats, and a commander in the department is now reportedly under investigation for falsifying crime data. 

As NBC Washington reported last month:

“When our members respond to the scene of a felony offense where there is a victim reporting that a felony occurred, inevitably there will be a lieutenant or a captain that will show up on that scene and direct those members to take a report for a lesser offense,” Fraternal Order of Police Chairman Gregg Pemberton said. “So, instead of taking a report for a shooting or a stabbing or a carjacking, they will order that officer to take a report for a theft or an injured person to the hospital or a felony assault, which is not the same type of classification.”

The police department’s command staff is focusing on two categories in order to get the numbers to fall, Pemberton said: armed with a dangerous weapon and injured person to the hospital.

“When management officials are directing officers to take reports for felony assault, or if they’re going back into police databases and changing offenses to felony assault, felony assault is not a category of crime that’s listed on the department’s daily crime stats,” Pemberton said. “It’s also not something that’s a requirement of the FBI’s uniform crime reporting program. So, by changing criminal offenses from, for example, ADW bat or ADW gun to felony assault, that would avoid both the MPD and the FBI from reporting that as a part one or a felony offense.”

Crime analyst Jeff Asher also says that DC’s open data is “likely overstating the degree of the city’s decline in violent crime right now,” though he didn’t delve specifically into the union’s allegations that reported crimes are being downgraded.  Instead, he notes that Washington D.C. publishes crime categories “loosely based” around the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report Part I offenses, but they’re not an exact match, which gives the District some wiggle room. 

So instead of publishing data on aggravated assaults, we get assaults with a deadly weapon. Instead of data on rapes, we get sex abuse offenses. That’s not inherently problematic, but comparing what is being published by DC to the numbers being reported to the FBI suggests that the department’s website is overstating the decline in violent crime over the last two years. Violent crime is still declining, but probably not as much as is being reported.

That’s about the rosiest scenario for D.C.; crime is declining, but not as much as the city is touting. But according to Pemberton, the data is being manipulated to the point that a rise in crime is being hidden by manipulating the classification of violent crimes. 

It’s tough (though not impossible) to twist murder statistics, so the District’s decline in homicides appears to be real. Still, as the White House notes, D.C’s homicide rate was about five times the national average last year, and has increased from 13.9 per 100,000 residents in 2012 to 27.3 per 100,000 in 2024. 

There’s no doubt that crime in Washington, D.C. is a significant problem, even if it’s not as bad as it’s been for most of the past forty years. My biggest concern is whether the federalized police force will be strictly enforcing the District’s draconian gun laws dealing with simple possession of a firearm instead of focusing on violent offenders. If this is truly about going after repeat, violent felons who’ve been the beneficiaries of D.C.’s soft-on-crime policies, great. If the crackdown includes more arrests of people who are merely exercising their right to carry without first obtaining their D.C.-issued permission slip, though, that’s a problem of its own. 

I’d love to see President Trump or Pam Bondi direct the Metropolitan Police Department to, at the very least, not arrest or charge anyone with illegal gun possession if they can produce a valid concealed carry license issued by any state. I doubt that will happen, but it would be great way to signal to lawful gun owners that the administration understands that we’re not the problem.. and that D.C.’s gun laws are actually making people less safe by making it nearly impossible for visitors to defend themselves. 

Editor’s Note: President Trump is putting criminals on notice in Washington, D.C. and the crackdown on violent offenders has already begun. 

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