Federal officials announced on Friday that a “summer surge” of law enforcement agents was beginning in Washington, D.C., adding to the hundreds who have been deployed in the city since August.
Declaring a need to secure the city in advance of the nation’s 250th birthday celebration, Gadyaces Serralta, the director of the United States Marshals Service, said in a news conference that additional officers would be deployed from a variety of federal agencies, including the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
The number of agents from Homeland Security Investigations, a division of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, would double, he said, possibly reigniting concerns among residents that local police are cooperating with immigration enforcement. Mr. Serralta said that H.S.I. agents would be focused on fraud investigations.
He also said that officials have requested an additional 1,500 members of the National Guard, which would bring the total in the city to around 5,000.
A spokesman for the Marshals Service said that the eventual number of additional new agents, officers and troops was still being determined.
At the news conference, Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney in Washington, said that almost 13,000 arrests had been made since last summer’s surge began, and that “almost 1,500 illegal firearms” had been seized. According to local police statistics, homicides are down around 36 percent year-to-date, and crime overall is down 26 percent.
The city had reported a significant decline in crime before the surge of federal officers last summer, though this progress has been clouded by revelations that some local police officials had been changing certain crime statistics to make parts of the city look better.
Ms. Pirro also raised the topic of “teen takeovers,” sudden and at times rowdy youth gatherings, which have recently been a major point of debate among local officials in D.C. and elsewhere. Ms. Pirro said that her office would begin “aggressively” prosecuting parents who allow their children to stay out past the citywide 11 p.m. curfew, warning parents that they could “face fines, court-ordered classes and possible jail time.”
Ms. Pirro also announced that her office would be pursuing the death penalty against Elias Rodriguez, who is facing numerous charges, including federal hate crimes and murder, for the killing of two Israeli Embassy aides outside a Jewish museum in Washington in May 2025.
There is currently no death penalty in Washington by local law. The last execution in the city was in 1957. Residents overwhelmingly rejected the use of the death penalty in a 1992 referendum.
But President Trump has directed federal prosecutors to revive capital punishment in D.C., and Ms. Pirro has said she is also considering seeking the death penalty for Rahmanullah Lakanwal, the man suspected of shooting two National Guard members in Washington on Nov. 26.
Campbell Robertson reports for The Times on Delaware, the District of Columbia, Kentucky, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia.
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