Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered that National Guard troops patrolling the streets of Washington for President Donald Trump’s law enforcement crackdown will be armed, the Pentagon said Friday.
The Defense Department didn’t offer any other details about the new development or why it was needed.
The step is a escalation in Trump's intervention into policing in the nation's capital and comes as nearly 2,000 National Guard members have been stationed in the city, with the arrival this week of hundreds of troops from several Republican-led states.
Trump initially called up 800 members of the District of Columbia National Guard to assist federal law enforcement in his bid to crack down on crime and homelessness in the capital. Since then, six states have sent troops to the city, growing the military presence.
It was unclear if the guard's role in the federal intervention would be changing. The guard has so far not taken part in law enforcement but largely have been protecting landmarks like the National Mall and Union Station and helping with crowd control.
The Pentagon and the Army said last week that troops would not carry guns. The new guidance is that they will carry their service-issued weapons.
The city had been informed about the intent for the National Guard to be armed, a person familiar with the conversations said earlier this week. The person was not authorized to disclose the plans and spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Spokespeople for the District of Columbia National Guard and a military task force overseeing all the guard troops in Washington did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.
