Trump and J.D. Vance attack 2028 rivals in National Guard push

WASHINGTON - US President Donald Trump said that his federal crime crackdown will sully the records of contenders for the 2028 Democratic presidential nomination, drawing an explicit link between his deployment of National Guard troops and boosting the Republican Party’s political prospects. 

Mr Trump and Vice-President J.D. Vance lambasted California’s Gavin Newsom, Illinois’ JB Pritzker and Maryland’s Wes Moore on Aug 25 as governors who are weak on crime, defending plans to possibly

expand the Guard’s presence from Washington, DC to cities and states run by Democrats nationwide. 

“All of their potential candidates are doing a bad job,” Mr Trump told reporters.

Mr Moore “doesn’t have what it takes,” he said, adding that he “can’t imagine Pritzker even being a candidate” because “he’s not temperamentally suited” and is a “slob”. Mr Newsom, the president continued, is a “disaster”.

The Oval Office appearance, during which Mr Trump signed executive orders targeting cashless bail and flag burning, offered Mr Vance a chance to burnish his credentials as the president’s successor-in-waiting by hammering home his law-and-order message. 

“They are angrier about the fact that the president of the United States is offering to help them get their crime under control than they are about the fact that murderers are running roughshod over their cities and have been for decades,” Mr Vance said, standing behind Mr Trump. “We want people to welcome us, to ask us.”

Mr Trump has pushed the boundaries of his powers with his effort to rid Democratic-run cities of what he says is rampant crime and blight, drawing accusations that he is politicising the military by involving it in domestic law enforcement. All three governors have vocally resisted Mr Trump’s plans. 

The president, however, has shown no signs of backing down; one of the orders he signed on Aug 25 would establish “specialised units” in the National Guard to be trained to deal with public order issues. Mr Trump said he sees the topic as a political winner. 

“I think this is another men-in-women’s-sports thing. I think this is one of those, you know, they call them 80-20 issues. I call them 97-3,” he said. “I think the Democrats better get smart. And, you know, politically, I hope they don’t, but actually, in terms of love for the country, I hope they do.”

He has ramped up his threats to use his powers to hit back at Democrat-run states and cities that rebuff his crime message. After Mr Moore took umbrage last weekend at Mr Trump’s swipes over crime in Baltimore, the president suggested a federal takeover there as well as in Chicago.

Mr Moore suggested Mr Trump visit Maryland’s largest city and see for himself that crime is under control. Mr Trump called him “nasty” in response. Mr Trump also floated the possibility of withholding funds for rebuilding Maryland’s Key Bridge, which was damaged in a shipping accident in March 2024. 

At a downtown Chicago press conference on Aug 25, Mr Pritzker rebutted the president, saying that there was no need for Mr Trump to deploy similar measures in the city. 

“Donald Trump wants to use the military to occupy a US city, punish his dissidents and score political points. If this were happening in any other country, we would have no trouble calling it what it is, a dangerous power grab,” Mr Pritzker said. 

Mr Newsom, who had mocked Mr Trump on social media for weeks by replicating his bombastic, all-caps messages, also posted on X a video of the president’s news conference, calling it “super normal stuff”.

Crime message

Mr Trump has frequently bashed urban crime in public appearances since seizing control of Washington, DC’s police department and putting the Guard on the city’s streets earlier this month. That has had the effect of diverting the public’s attention away from issues that have plagued his White House and caused tension with his Make America Great Again (Maga) base.

Mr Trump, with Mr Vance and Cabinet members arrayed behind him, spent more than an hour with reporters, cutting into the time scheduled for a meeting with South Korean President Lee Jae Myung.

The moves on Washington are taking place against the backdrop of one of the more challenging periods of Mr Trump’s second term. The summer saw fractures between the president and his base over the administration’s handling of files related to the late, disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Historically, addressing crime has been one of Mr Trump’s strongest issues among voters. And the president has often leaned on it to navigate moments of political duress.

In addition to the Epstein flap, Mr Trump’s efforts to broker a quick peace agreement between Russian’s Vladimir Putin and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskiy have faltered after a round of shuttle diplomacy initially raised hopes for talks between the two leaders. 

Mr Trump has also sparked a redistricting fight between Republican and Democratic governors around the US after he successfully pushed Texas to redraw congressional maps to increase the number of GOP seats. Mr Newsom has responded with his own redistricting plan, portending a tit-for-tat fight that could last months. 

The outcome could determine the course of Mr Trump’s final two years in the White House; after Democrats took control of Congress during his first term, Mr Trump was impeached twice.

Political pitfalls

During the 2024 presidential election, Mr Trump hung his campaign on the economy, immigration and social issues. On the economy, he forced Democrats onto the defensive on post-pandemic inflation, the influx of migrants at the southern border and the debate around what teams transgender athletes should play on. 

Polls show his grip on the electorate slipping, including on some of those core issues. 

An Economist/YouGov poll conducted between Aug 15 and Aug 18 found that 53 per cent of Americans disapprove of Mr Trump’s handling of the economy compared to 39 per cent who approve, a gap that is larger than at any time during Mr Trump’s first term. Overall, 40 per cent approve of his job performance.

Mr Trump is betting a tough-on-crime message can win back Americans. He has said his moves have dramatically reduced crime in the nation’s capital, despite local data painting a mixed picture, and said that statistics showing violent crime there being at a 30-year-year low did not adequately capture the sense of danger people sensed in the city. 

The president has painted a dystopian picture of Washington – one that is at odds with that of many local residents. On Aug 25, without evidence, he claimed that tourists from places including Iowa, Indiana and Idaho were increasingly feeling unsafe visiting the capital.  

“You come here,” he said, “because you’re so proud of your country, you love your country, and then you get murdered. Your son gets murdered. Your daughter gets murdered. You get murdered.” BLOOMBERG