Washington Whispers: Capital Crimes

By Jessie Seigel / Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C. has been taken over by a criminal element. A gangster and his associates, working out of the White House and other government buildings, are engaged in ongoing theft, extortion, bribery, assault, kidnapping, and false imprisonment on a national scale. They have managed to install corrupt officials at the U.S. Department of Justice to back their play and go after anyone who opposes them.

And now, the Gangster-in-Chief has seized control of the D.C. Metropolitan Police Dept. and deployed 800 National Guard troops to the capital. Because Washington, D.C. is not a state, we who live here have no legal avenue to stop him for at least 30 days, perhaps longer.

After 99 years of direct rule by Congress, the Home Rule Act permitted D.C. citizens to govern themselves, to elect a mayor, a district council, and advisory neighborhood commissioners. But Congress kept its power to control the District’s budget and key parts of its justice system and overturn any local law it doesn’t like. Furthermore, in extraordinary times of emergency, the Act permits a president to take over D.C. law enforcement for up to 30 days, extendable by Congress.

Congress has often threatened to take away the little self-governance we have. And by his takeover of law enforcement, the Don is trying to beat Congress to that punch.

We who live in the District of Columbia have no senator or voting congressperson to represent our interests. Since we are not a state, we have no governor like California’s Gavin Newsom, Illinois’ J. B. Pritzker or New York’s Kathy Hochul to stand up for us.

So, when these right-wing thugs find themselves not yet able to fully impose their will on states nationwide, they impose it on Washington, D.C., making an example of us for others to follow or fear.

Thus, the head mobster, Donald J. Trump, has claimed that a crime wave warranting emergency action supports his takeover of law enforcement in D.C. This is simply a brazen pretext for expanding his illegitimate power.

Violent crime in D.C. is at a 30-year low. It has no more crime than any other big city or rural area. In fact, even in the early years of my time here in D.C., I remember suburbanites asking whether I felt safe in the city. I responded by asking whether they felt safe in the suburbs because I was constantly hearing of kidnappings at isolated bus stops or dead bodies being found in car trunks at suburban shopping malls.

The chief criminal's White House further gave his game away when it issued a statement on August 12 that homeless people here have only two choices: go to a homeless shelter or go to jail. Never mind that there aren’t sufficient homeless shelters for them. Or that they’re homeless, not criminals. Or that this stance has nothing to do with stopping violent crime, but with a contempt for the vulnerable, and the sadistic pleasure the Boss and his cohorts take in abusing them. Existence can be made against the law. And under this regime, it probably will be.

The 34-count felon holed up in the White House has loudly brayed: “This is Liberation Day in D.C. and we’re going to take our Capital back.”

I’ve lived in D.C. for 47 years. This is my town—not his.  It’s also the town of the homeless people living on the street in my neighborhood who’ve never bothered anybody. It’s not the town of that racketeer, with his gold toilets and insurrectionist followers.

What we need is liberation from the likes of him.

Instead, we’ve got a mayor who’s not sufficiently fighting for us. And we’ve got D.C.’s Chief of Police stating that our police will assist ICE in its masked raids and kidnappings by supplying information about people not in custody.

It is only the citizens themselves who are fighting back.

In August, one local citizen called the federal intruders fascists and threw a Subway sandwich at them. The representatives of the true Deep State Swamp—Attorney General Pam Bondi and Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jean Pirro—had him charged with felony assault, with a possible eight-year sentence. For throwing a sandwich. As could have been predicted, they could not find a D.C. jury to indict him.

While the nation's head hoodlum lies about the dangers of D.C., he simultaneously encourages tourists to come here.

My advice to tourists: Don’t come to the Capital until the National Guard stands down and the D.C. police are no longer controlled by the criminals in power. Go to other historic cities instead. Try Philadelphia. Or Boston.

To the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department and the National Guard, I say: you have two choices.

You can follow orders like German Nazis followed their murderous leader.  But “I was just following orders” did not work out well for them when his vicious dictatorship ended.

On the other hand, you can decide that it’s time for a little quiet mutiny in defense of democracy. Stand with the people. Fail en masse to follow illegitimate orders. When you’re told to detain individuals who have done nothing wrong—be they immigrants or homeless residents—fail to find them.  It’s time to decide: which side are you on?

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Jessie Seigel’s journalistic career began with the political Washington Whispers column, written for The Insider. Since The Insider ended its run in 2023, Seigel has continued the column as My Washington Whispers,

www.mywashingtonwhispers.com. In addition, Seigel has had a long career as a government attorney, has received two Artist’s Fellowships from the Washington, D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities for her fiction, has been a finalist for several literary awards, and has had two professional staged readings of her play Tinker's Damn, with another play, The Three Jessies, forthcoming in September. More on Seigel can be found at https://www.jessieseigel.com.