President Donald Trump announced the deployment of officers from a wide array of federal law enforcement agencies to Memphis, Tennessee, at the request of Gov. Bill Lee (R-TN) to crack down on crime in what was the most dangerous city in the United States last year.
Speaking at the White House on Monday, Trump said agents and officers from the FBI; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives; Drug Enforcement Administration; Immigration and Customs Enforcement; Homeland Security Investigations; and U.S. Marshals Service, along with federal prosecutors, would head to West Tennessee. National Guard members will not yet be part of the deployment but could be, if needed, Trump said.
“Today, at the request of Gov. Bill Lee of Tennessee, who’s standing with us, as you know, I’m signing a presidential memorandum to establish the Memphis Safe Task Force, and it’s very important because of the crime that’s going on not only in Memphis, in many cities, and we’re going to take care of all of them,” Trump told reporters Monday evening in the Oval Office.
Lee, a Republican, celebrated the announcement alongside Trump.
“We are very hopeful and excited about the prospect of moving that city forward. I’ve been in office seven years. I’m tired of crime holding the great city of Memphis back,” said Lee, who added that state and local police will work alongside their federal partners not only to lower crime quickly but to keep it down over time.
“This will be your proudest moment,” Trump said.
“When we see you in four or five weeks, maybe sooner, you’re going to see numbers that will drop and plummet like you have,” Trump added. “It’s just like we did in D.C. They plummeted.”
Trump’s decision to send federal resources to Memphis comes days after he walked back his intention of moving into Chicago. Trump administration officials advised the president that sending troops to help local police without getting a sign-off from Gov. JB Pritzker (D-IL) could lead to legal problems, according to CNN.
In Tennessee, Lee is expected to be friendlier to the White House than Democratic leaders, such as those in Illinois and the District of Columbia.
Violent crime in Memphis is 597% higher than the national average, according to data pulled by Security.org from the 2024 Crime in the United States report produced by the FBI.
White House officials made the case late last week that Memphis was in worse shape than Chicago and Washington, where it had already sent in federal police and soldiers in August and September, respectively.
“In 2024, Memphis had the highest violent crime rate, highest property crime rate, and the third-highest murder rate in the U.S.,” reads a White House statement issued Friday, citing FBI data. “Violent crime increased in 2024, bucking the national trend.”
When Memphis Mayor Paul Young, a Democrat, addressed the topic on Friday, he was not flat-out opposed to the assistance from Washington, just the possible deployment of the National Guard.
“FBI, DEA, ATF, those are the things that I believe will truly help us be able to support law enforcement and reduce violent crime,” Young said. “I do not support the National Guard. However, they are coming. It’s not the mayor’s call. The mayor doesn’t have a say or the authority to stop them from coming. So my goal is to make sure that as they come, that I have an opportunity to work with them to strategize at how they engage in this community.”
Over the weekend, Young wrote in a post to X that he “did not ask for the National Guard and I don’t think it is the way to drive down crime.”
Trump signed a proclamation to create the task office alongside leaders of the FBI and the departments of Homeland Security, Justice, and War — the president recently renamed the Department of Defense as the latter via executive order — among others.
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The president first federalized police and deployed the National Guard in Washington in mid-August as part of a 30-day takeover. The monthlong emergency expired last week.
Since the crackdown, White House officials have touted that Washington has been transformed into “one of the safest” cities worldwide after statistics showed a decline in violent crimes committed compared to before the infusion of federal police and military.
