The Attack on Washington: When Invented Numbers Become a Seizure of Power and Trump’s Mental State Needs to Be Examined

There are moments in history that burn themselves into the collective memory because they show how thin the veneer of civilization really is. August 11, 2025, was such a moment. On that Monday, Donald Trump stood in the White House briefing room, surrounded by his entourage of cabinet members, and carried out something unprecedented in American history: the de facto disempowerment of a democratically elected city government based on demonstrably false claims, underscored by a stack of colorful statistics that, upon closer inspection, looked like the homework of an overwhelmed intern. What happened in those 78 minutes was no normal press conference.

It was a frontal assault on reality itself. With waving arms and a stack of papers showing numbers that partly dated back to 2016, others simply invented, Trump painted the picture of a capital in the grip of crime. “Bloodthirsty criminals,” “roaming hordes of wild youth,” “drugged lunatics” - the language sounded more like a dystopian B-movie than a presidential address. The reality? Washington is currently experiencing its lowest level of violent crime in three decades. The murder rate has dropped by 32 percent, armed car thefts by 53 percent, and violent crime overall by 35 percent since 2023. Karoline Leavitt, the radical-right brown chicken stranded in Trump’s orbit, long trapped in the hermetically sealed fantasy world of her Project 2025, circulates papers at which any mentally healthy person involuntarily shakes their head. Washington, meanwhile, looks like a besieged city - ruled by an unleashed mob of political gamblers, led by a president whose capacity to hold office and to judge should only be confirmed by an independent medical-psychological examination to officially acknowledge what any sober observer can already see.

The absurdity of the situation became fully clear when we journalists began to fact-check Trump’s colorful graphics. A table supposedly showing Washington’s murder rate in international comparison confused the flags of Mexico and Ethiopia. Lagos was named as the capital of Nigeria - an error that has been embarrassing since 1991, when Abuja took over that role. The UN data cited? Some almost a decade old. It was as if someone had hastily copied Wikipedia articles at the last minute and cobbled them together into a presentation without bothering to check even the most basic facts. But the sloppy workmanship was only the surface of a much deeper problem. By activating Section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act, Trump carried out an act whose scope can hardly be overstated. For the first time in modern history, a president took control of a city’s police not in response to an actual emergency, but as a demonstration of power based on an invented crisis. 800 National Guard troops were mobilized, 120 FBI agents pulled from their actual duties and assigned to night patrols. The cost? Millions of dollars a day. The reason? A phantom.

The constitutional implications are dizzying. While the Home Rule Act theoretically grants the president this power, the spirit of this 1973 law was aimed at real emergencies, not political theater. Brian Schwalb, the district’s attorney general, called the move “unlawful” - a remarkably sharp formulation for an official who normally speaks in legal shades of gray. Human Rights Watch, an organization that usually deals with dictatorships in distant countries, felt compelled to issue a warning normally reserved for military juntas: “The military takeover of local law enforcement is a harbinger of authoritarianism.”

The historical irony is hard to bear. The same man who in January pardoned hundreds of violent Capitol rioters - people who had tried to prevent the certification of a democratic election - the same man who called these rioters “heroes” and “patriots,” now stands there declaring Washington a war zone because of a crime wave that exists only in his imagination. The press conference itself was a study in presidential chaos. Between rambling remarks about his real estate experience (“I know about buildings, believe me”) and a confusing passage in which he announced he would travel to “Russia” - he meant Alaska, where he was to meet Vladimir Putin - Trump threatened the newly sworn-in U.S. Marshal Gadyaces Serralta directly to his face: “If you are soft, weak, and pathetic, like so many people, I will fire you so fast.” It was a moment of such crude power play that even hardened journalists in the room visibly flinched. Mayor Muriel Bowser, a woman who in her third term has learned to deal with the whims of federal politics, later stood before the press, visibly struggling to maintain composure. She called Trump’s action “disturbing and unprecedented,” but added with the resignation of someone who knows her powerlessness: “I cannot say that we are entirely surprised given the rhetoric of the past.” Her words about the “shaky democracy” and the need for statehood for D.C. sounded like the cry for help of a hostage who knows no one will come.

The reactions from the public painted a picture of confusion and disbelief. On the streets of the city that Trump described as an apocalyptic battlefield, people went about their normal lives. Cafes were full, joggers ran through the parks, tourists took photos of the monuments. Sarah Struble, 37, from Capitol Hill, put it bluntly: “I am not a particularly pro-police person. I would much rather see resources go to community support and services.” The gap between Trump’s portrayal and lived reality could not be greater. Particularly perfidious is Trump’s claim that the “cashless bail system” is to blame for the alleged crime wave. This system was reformed in Washington back in the 1990s - it has worked for almost 30 years and even served as a model for bipartisan reforms in New Jersey and New Mexico. Professor Kellen Funk of Columbia Law School called Trump’s claim “demonstrably false and inflammatory.” The studies Trump supposedly relies on? A single study from a California county during the COVID pandemic, methodologically disputed and scientifically isolated. The economic waste of this action is breathtaking. Conservative estimates put the cost at several million dollars a day. 800 National Guard troops pulled from their regular duties. 120 FBI agents who, instead of fighting terrorism or pursuing white-collar crime, now patrol Washington at night. And for what? To fight a crisis that does not exist, in a city that is experiencing its safest years in decades. The international dimension should not be overlooked. What does it signal to the world when the president of the United States calls his own capital a war zone and sends in the military? Diplomats report incredulous reactions from their capitals. “Is this still the democracy that wants to lecture us?” asked a European ambassador who wished to remain anonymous. The parallels to authoritarian power grabs in history are unmistakable. The invention of a crisis, the discrediting of local authorities, the mobilization of security forces, the staging as a strongman who restores order - it is the script used again and again from Mussolini to Erdoğan. That it is now being performed in Washington, in the capital of the world’s oldest continuous democracy, is a moment of world-historical significance.

Ankit Jain, one of the district’s “shadow senators” - a title that underscores the democratic farce that 700,000 Americans have no real representation in Congress - pointed out a particularly bitter irony: Trump himself is contributing to crime by failing to nominate judges. The D.C. Court of Appeals has two of nine judicial seats vacant. “What happens when you do not have enough judges?” Jain asked. “Trials are delayed, crime goes up.” The 30-day limit that the law provides for this takeover may seem like a restriction. But precedents, once set, tend to take on a life of their own. If a president can take over a city’s police based on invented statistics and colorful graphics, what prevents the next from doing it for 60 days? Or permanently? Trump himself has already hinted that Chicago, Los Angeles, and other cities could follow - all, unsurprisingly, Democratic-run metropolises. The scene in the briefing room, as Trump waved his papers - some observers compared it to a child presenting their crayon drawing - will go down in history as an iconic moment. Not because it demonstrated strength, but because it exposed the fragility of democratic norms. A man with a stack of false statistics can take control of the police of a capital. The checks and balances that America is so proud of? They proved to be a paper tiger. What we witnessed on August 11, 2025, was not just an attack on Washington. It was an attack on the idea that facts matter, that elections have consequences, that local democracy deserves respect. It was the moment when a president, waving colorful sheets, declared reality null and void and imposed his own version - backed by 800 rifles and the power of office. The question that remains is not whether this was a turning point in American history. It undoubtedly was. The question is whether it was the point at which American democracy began to turn into something its founders would not recognize. If a president can invent a crisis with impunity in order to gain military control over the capital, then the republic is in a danger that no statistical games in the world can conceal. Washington may be safer today than it has been in decades - at least in terms of crime statistics. But democracy? It is more insecure than ever since the Civil War. And that is the real crisis that no colorful kindergarten graphics can show.

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