Trump Says He’ll Deploy Troops to Memphis Next
President Donald Trump said Friday he plans to send federal agents and deploy the National Guard to Memphis, Tennessee.
A top local official called the idea “anti-democratic and anti-American.”
Trump made the claim in an interview with Fox News in which he doubled down on some of his most troubling and authoritarian claims. He falsely asserted he had the power to remove the mayor of Washington, D.C., said he didn’t care about right-wing extremism, and again made false voter fraud allegations.
Legal experts have warned that the president’s use of the military as part of his efforts to crack down on crime is a threat to both democracy and personal liberty. Federal law generally prohibits the use of soldiers in civil law enforcement under normal circumstances.
The president suggested that both Memphis Mayor Paul Young (D) and Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee (R) supported his plan to send in federal agents and troops to the city.
“We’re going to Memphis,” Trump said. “Memphis is deeply troubled. The mayor is happy, he’s a Democrat, and the governor of Tennessee.”
“We’re going to fix that just like Washington,” the president added, referring to Washington, D.C., where he deployed troops last month, despite a recent drop in crime rates.
In a statement to local news outlets Thursday, Mayor Young said he was aware that Lee and Trump were considering sending agents and troops to the city. While Young said he supported additional resources to curb crime in Memphis, he did not say whether he supported the deployment of National Guard troops.
In an interview with WREG, Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris said he’d welcome help with fighting crime, but warned that “to have individuals with military fatigues, semi-automatic weapons and armored vehicles patrolling our streets is way too far, anti-democratic and anti-American.”
“I think we’re on the brink of something that is going to change all our appreciation for freedoms,” Harris said. “The way you can take away democratic liberties is to make sure people don’t have a way to protest, and the way to do that is to patrol the streets with military vehicles.”
In addition to D.C., Trump also sent soldiers to Los Angeles. A federal judge in California last month found that the president violated federal law by using the military as a police force.
Trump did not clarify what legal statute he would use to justify a deployment of soldiers to another U.S. city. Legal experts noted that Lee, as commander of the Tennessee National Guard, already has the authority to deploy troops to Memphis.
Trump’s plans to deploy troops to Memphis, one of the largest predominately-Black cities in the country, comes after he repeatedly threatened to deploy the military to Chicago over strong objections from state and local leaders.
On Friday, Trump said he would “love to save Chicago” before adding that “we don’t want to go into a hostile — by the way, the people will greet us.”
After being asked about what his administration is doing to combat political extremism, Trump said he did not care about right-wing extremism.
“I’ll tell you something that’s going to get me in trouble, but I couldn’t care less. The radicals on the right are oftentimes radical because they don’t want to see crime,” Trump said.
“The radicals on the left are the problem. They’re vicious, and they’re horrible. And they’re politically savvy.”
Trump’s comment came just days after conservative activist Charlie Kirk was fatally shot while speaking at a college in Utah in a ghastly act of political violence that has been widely condemned by elected officials across the political spectrum.
Even before authorities had a suspect in custody, Trump blamed “the radical left” for Kirk’s murder — a term he routinely uses to refer to his political rivals — and vowed to investigate undefined “organizations” in response to the shooting.
The president’s allies also called for revenge against the political left in response to Kirk’s killing.
During the Fox News interview, Trump also claimed he could “federalize” the nation’s capital. Only Congress can place D.C. under the federal government’s control by overturning the Home Rule Act of 1973, which allows residents to elect their mayor and council members.
Trump went further, falsely asserting he could change the mayor of D.C. “if I want.”
“I can do whatever I want,” the president said.
This story has ben updated with additional details throughout.