To hear President Trump tell it, the nation’s capital is something akin to a blighted property in need of repair.
Washington, he says, is “unsafe” and “dirty” and “disgusting.” It is menaced by “bloodthirsty criminals” and marred by homelessness. It needs to be cleaned up and made “beautiful again.”
Mr. Trump’s bleak description of Washington is consistent with his view of American cities as dangerous and violent, dating to his time in New York City in the 1970s and ’80s during a period of rampant crime. On Monday, as he announced a temporary federal takeover of Washington’s police, Mr. Trump suggested that his background as a New York real estate developer made him more suited than the local authorities to blot out crime and homelessness in the nation’s capital.
“It’s a natural instinct as a real estate person,” Mr. Trump told reporters as he compared his envisioned makeover of Washington to his recent gold-trimmed makeover of the White House. “I was very good at that, and I was very good at fixing things up. I like fixing things up.”
He promised to rid Washington of trash, graffiti, potholes, homeless people and more, even as he ignored the fact that violent crime has fallen recently to a 30-year low. While Washington has struggled with youth crime, particularly robberies and carjackings, overall crime has fallen sharply in recent years.
In 2024, Washington had a violent crime rate of about 1,005 per 100,000 residents, according to data reported to the F.B.I. That is far less than cities with similar population sizes like Memphis and Detroit but also more than cities like Denver, Seattle and Louisville, Ky.
“We’re going to make it beautiful again,” Mr. Trump said. “We’re going to fix it with crime, and we’re going to also, as we’re doing that, we’re going to start doing things that we know how to do, that I know how to do better than anybody, I guess, because of my experience from previous life.”
In that previous life of real estate and business deals, Mr. Trump was known to invoke crime in a way that stoked racial tension. In 1989, he bought newspaper advertisements, including in The New York Times, calling for New York State to adopt the death penalty after five Black and Latino men were arrested and later wrongfully convicted of the rape of a jogger. Even after the men, known as the Central Park Five, were exonerated, Mr. Trump never apologized.
And while he has long denied any discrimination on his Trump properties, his family’s business for years faced accusations of discriminating against Black tenants. Mr. Trump opened a $100 million countersuit accusing the Justice Department of defamation after the federal government in 1973 sued Trump Management for discriminating against Black people.
As president, Mr. Trump has continued to stir up fears over violent crime and disorder, particularly in diverse metropolitan areas led by Democrats. And critics point out that he has done little to address underlying causes of poverty, crime and homelessness, noting that his policies have undercut safety net programs and added to inequality with tax cuts tilted toward the wealthy.
Beyond Mr. Trump’s actions, the federal government has significant sway over Washington. Mr. Trump can nominate judges and the U.S. attorney, who serves as the chief prosecutor in most criminal cases. Laws passed by the D.C. Council, as well as the city’s budget, are subject to congressional approval.
The police union in D.C., which represents more than 3,000 officers, said in a statement that it supported the president’s decision to take over the city’s police force, insisting that it was needed to address “violent crime surges, historic officer shortages and eroded morale.” But, the statement said, the takeover “must be a temporary measure, with the ultimate goal of empowering a fully staffed and supported” police department.
In his remarks on Monday, Mr. Trump appeared to be espousing the widely debated “broken windows” theory of policing — adopted by city officials during his time in New York — which is based on the idea that cracking down on low-level offenses can prevent serious crime.
Mr. Trump recalled a lesson from his father, Fred Trump, who mentored him as a real estate developer.
“He used to say, ‘Son, when you walk into a restaurant and you see a dirty front door, don’t go in because if the front door is dirty, the kitchen’s dirty also,’” Mr. Trump said. “Same thing with the capital. If our capital’s dirty, our whole country is dirty, and they don’t respect us.”
Mr. Trump has often seen the world through the lens of real estate and property values. On Monday, he said Russia had taken over “very prime territory” from Ukraine. “You know, in real estate we call it oceanfront property,” he said. “That’s always the most valuable property.”
He characterized the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza as a potential real estate opportunity. Days after entering office, Mr. Trump proposed seizing control of the territory and forcibly displacing the entire Palestinian population to revamp the land into “the Riviera of the Middle East” for tourists from around the world.
When it comes to Washington, critics say Mr. Trump is misrepresenting a city he barely knows.
“The District is a vibrant city with a rich history, and strong and diverse communities,” said Skye Perryman, the president of Democracy Forward, a left-leaning nonprofit based in Washington.
“The president is again overreaching and engaging in draconian tactics that do not make anyone safer and threaten the civil liberties and freedom of the American people,” Ms. Perryman said. “If this can happen in one city, it can happen in any city or community.”
Maya Wiley, the president and chief executive of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and a city official in New York, said she saw a through line between Mr. Trump’s remarks as a real estate developer in New York City and his approach to diverse cities as president.
“He has definitely shown that he hasn’t changed much from those days,” Ms. Wiley said. “What we’re seeing in this rhetoric is not just about cities and them being dirty and crime ridden. They’re always coded to people of color.”
Monday was not the first time Mr. Trump tried to assert control over Washington. During his first term, Mr. Trump deployed a hodgepodge of federal agents and National Guard troops to Washington in response to racial justice protests that were mostly peaceful but included some acts of vandalism.
His administration also dispatched military helicopters to conduct low-altitude maneuvers to disperse protesters that are usually reserved for combat zones.
But those measures stand in stark contrast to his response to one of the most violent days in the city’s recent history. Soon after taking office for his second term, Mr. Trump pardoned thousands of people who had committed crimes in Washington when they rioted at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Ashley Wu and Campbell Robertson contributed reporting.