Donald Trump spouted off again Monday about how big cities run by Democrats in blue states have big problems.
This time, the president claimed that violence in Chicago was “probably worse than almost any city in the world.”
“It’s like a war zone, and I listen to the governor and the mayor get up and say how they have it under control. They don’t,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, focusing on gun violence in particular. “It’s probably worse than almost any city in the world. You can go to Afghanistan. You can go to a lot of different places, and they probably marvel at how much crime we have.”
Afghanistan ranks 9th on the Global Organized Crime Index. Among U.S. cities with the highest murder rate in 2024, Chicago isn’t in the top 20, FBI data shows. Thirteen of the 20 cities with the most murders are in Republican-led states.
In any event, Trump then claimed that Gov. JB Pritzker “can’t handle” the situation in his state and that he’s “incompetent.” Pritzker filed a lawsuit Monday claiming the White House’s order to federalize 300 Illinois National Guard troops was “illegal, dangerous and unconstitutional.”
“He should say, ‘We’d love to have a safer place. Chicago is a great city, potentially.’ You, I told you the head of the Union Pacific Railroad said, ‘Sir, save Chicago. It’s going to be lost if you don’t do it,’” Trump continued.
Trump’s gripe came a day after his Homeland Security Secretary, Kristi Noem, groaned to Fox News about Immigration and Customs agents having trouble finding places to sit on their lunch break and restrooms to use. Noem herself had been denied entry into a government building on Saturday, when anti-ICE protesters made themselves known.
Noem told Fox & Friends of Chicago residents: “They don’t even let our ICE officers and our border patrol officers use restrooms and facilities… Those men and women were telling us that they have to figure out even where they can go sit down for five minutes to have lunch or to use the restroom throughout their shift or their break.”
Hours before Trump compared Chicago’s violent crime to Afghanistan’s, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was grilled about the president’s plans for National Guard troops in Chicago and Portland, Oregon. In the latter city, a federal judge temporarily blocked Trump’s efforts, calling his justification “simply untethered to the facts.”
“With all due respect to that judge, I think that her opinion is untethered to reality and the law,” Leavitt said.
“The president is using his authority as commander in chief, US code 12404, which clearly says the president has the right to call up the national guard in cases where he deems it appropriate,” she claimed.
The Trump administration is appealing the ruling.
When asked Monday about the possibility of invoking the Insurrection Act, the president said there has not been a reason to do so—yet.
“We have an Insurrection Act for a reason,” Trump told reporters. “If I had to enact it, I’d do that.”
“If people were being killed and courts were holding us up, or governors or mayors were holding us up, sure I’d do that… We have to make sure our cities are safe.”
Trump told generals last week that U.S. cities should be used as training grounds because the country faces an “invasion from within.”
The post Trump Compares Chicago Crime to Afghanistan’s After Pritzker Sues appeared first on The Daily Beast.
