Trump tells the homeless to leave Washington, D.C., ‘immediately'
On Sunday, Donald Trump took to social media to demand that Washington DC’s homeless population leave the capital or face eviction, again vowing to deploy federal officers to jail criminals — despite the fact that violent crime was at a three-decade low when he began his second term in January.
“The Homeless have to move out, IMMEDIATELY,” Trump wrote on Truth Social shortly after being driven from the White House to his Virginia golf club. “We will give you places to stay, but FAR from the Capital.”
The post was accompanied by four photographs, apparently snapped from his motorcade en route to Trump National Golf Club in Sterling. Two of them showed a total of ten tents clustered along a grassy highway on-ramp a little over a mile from the White House. Another depicted someone sleeping on the steps of the American Institute of Pharmacy Building on Constitution Avenue. The last showed his motorcade passing a bit of roadside trash along the E Street Expressway near the Kennedy Center.
Trump also used the post to promote a Monday news conference that he claimed would “essentially stop violent crime” in the capital — without offering specifics. In a follow-up, he said the 10 a.m. event would address not only “Crime, Murder, and Death” but also “Cleanliness.”
The advocacy group Free DC, which supports greater local autonomy, quickly announced a protest to coincide with Trump’s remarks.
Official statistics, however, paint a different picture from Trump’s rhetoric. According to the Community Partnership, roughly 800 people sleep outdoors in the District on a typical night, with another 3,275 using emergency shelters and 1,065 in transitional housing. Crime data from the Metropolitan Police Department — released in January by the federal government — shows that violent crime in 2024 fell 35% from the previous year, reaching its lowest point in more than 30 years.
Mayor Muriel Bowser underscored that trend in an MSNBC interview Sunday. “We are not experiencing a crime spike,” she said. “We have spent the last two years driving violent crime down in this city, to a 30-year low.” She added that the downward trend has continued in 2025, with violent crime falling another 26% so far this year.