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Introduction of the District of Columbia Police Home Rule Act

Floor Speech

Date: Sept. 2, 2025
Location: Washington, DC

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, today, I introduce the District of Columbia Police Home Rule Act, which would repeal section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act (HRA). Section 740 allows the president, in the case of an emergency, to direct the D.C. mayor to provide the president the services of D.C.'s police department, the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD), for federal purposes. Senator Chris Van Hollen is the sponsor of this bill in the Senate.

Under the HRA, ``whenever the President . . . determines that special conditions of an emergency nature exist which require the use of the MPD for Federal purposes, he may direct the Mayor to provide him, and the Mayor shall provide, such services of the MPD as the President may deem necessary and appropriate'' for 30 days, unless Congress terminates or extends the emergency declaration.

On August 11, 2025, President Trump declared a crime emergency in D.C. pursuant to section 740, even though violent crime reached a more than 30-year low in D.C. in 2024 and is down 27 percent this year compared to the same period last year. President Trump is the first president to invoke section 740, but his invocation is unlawful. While one crime is too many, there is no emergency or federal purpose that allowed President Trump to invoke section 740.

Section 740 is inconsistent with the main purpose of the HRA, which is to ``grant to the inhabitants of the District of Columbia powers of local self-government.'' Giving the president the power to direct the services of MPD is a violation of D.C. home rule. MPD's first responsibility is to protect D.C. residents and visitors, and it must always remain under the authority of the D.C. mayor, who knows D.C. better than the president, to accomplish its mission.

Section 740 is also unnecessary. In the case of a true federal emergency in D.C., the president can deploy federal law enforcement officers and the Armed Forces, and can request the support of MPD, as the Capitol Police did during the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, and as the Federal government does on a regular basis.

At my request, the House's fiscal year 2022 and 2023 D.C. appropriations bills blocked the president from carrying out section 740.

I urge my colleagues to support this bill.

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