Donald Trump has made no secret of his contempt for crime statistics. Indeed, after the president militarized the nation’s capital, prompting observers to note that crime rates are down across the board in Washington, D.C. — violent crime rates, in particular, have reached a 30-year low — Trump didn’t just condemn the data, his Justice Department even launched an investigation into the statistics he doesn’t like.
But that, evidently, wasn’t enough. On Friday morning, the president specifically targeted Muriel Bowser, the Democratic mayor of the District of Columbia, for pointing to official data that conflicts with his perceptions. “Mayor Muriel Bowser must immediately stop giving false and highly inaccurate crime figures, or bad things will happen,” the Republican wrote to his social media platform.
Two days later, after former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie criticized Trump during an appearance on ABC News’ “This Week,” this also generated a related presidential threat. The New York Times reported:
President Trump on Sunday threatened to investigate former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey over a 2013 political scandal, days after the F.B.I. raided the home and office of another former Trump official turned critic. Mr. Trump made the threat on social media after Mr. Christie said during an appearance on ABC News that the president ‘doesn’t care’ about maintaining a separation between his office and criminal investigations.
In case that wasn’t quite enough, the president apparently also saw Maryland Gov. Wes Moore on CBS News’ “Face the Nation,” leading Trump to pitch yet another threat. NBC News reported:
The president on Sunday also threatened to pull federal funding for the replacement of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, which collapsed in 2024. The federal government had previously agreed to pay for the bridge’s replacement. ‘I gave Wes Moore a lot of money to fix his demolished bridge,’ Trump wrote. ‘I will now have to rethink that decision???’
The published threat was accompanied by nonsensical claims about crime rates in Baltimore — a city that’s seen its murder rate drop to a 50-year low — and an attack on the Democratic governor’s military service. (Moore is a decorated combat veteran who served in Afghanistan.)
The specific details are obviously relevant. Not only did Trump lie about Baltimore and about Moore’s service record, the president also claimed he “gave” the governor federal funds to replace the Francis Scott Key Bridge, which (a) is not how the appropriations process works in the United States; and (b) is at odds with the simple fact that the funding was approved by Congress and signed into law by Joe Biden before Trump returned to the White House.
But to the hear the Republican president tell it, he maintains total control over U.S. investments, which he can approve or curtail based on his whims. The common thread isn’t exactly well hidden: Bowser, Christie and Moore told the public facts that Trump didn’t want to hear, and presidential threats soon followed. Indeed, hours after targeting the former Republican governor and incumbent Democratic governor, the president, for good measure, proceeded to threaten ABC and NBC (twice) for airing news coverage that he disapproved of. Brendan Nyhan, a political scientist at Dartmouth College, told The Associated Press the other day, “The picture is pretty clear for anyone who’s read a history book what kind of administration we’re dealing with.” The quote resonates for a reason.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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