Problem Real, Trump Has No Answers

Aug 18, 2025

President Trump sent in 800 National Guard and many other officers from 12 federal agencies, supposedly to take over Washington, D.C. due to high crime.

Trump carefully chose his words to describe crime in D.C. to conjure up black people, homeless, and undocumented immigrants in people’s minds. While this racist garbage is all lies, Trump was right when he said Washington, D.C. has a lot of crime.

While violence, including murder, has declined, some young people are attacking residents, especially with car-jackings. Crime was even higher during the pandemic when schools were closed. The problems young people face today are the same ones they faced before and during the pandemic; poverty, first and foremost.

What future do people have in this society, especially the young? Poverty makes for unstable homes. Schools lack resources. Young people who are bored, angry, and frustrated act out in ways that hurt everyone around them. Older people feel unsafe if they see groups of young people on the Metro or on the street, fearing a robbery or a beating, which absolutely has happened.

We are living in a society which has a history of total disregard for human life. Young people absorb these messages. A teenage girl was asked why she beat a man. Her response was, “because I was bored,”—but that’s not the whole story.

We are all of us affected by a society constantly at war, with media and politicians that send the message that fighting or killing others makes a person a hero. We see political leaders who treat women as sexual play toys; these same men label all immigrants as criminals.

This society has no answers for the young, for the poor—just more violence directed against them.