It’s official: Donald Trump has deployed the National Guard to Washington, D.C.—a dramatic escalation in a city where violent crime has actually fallen year-over-year from 2024 to 2025. I’ve called D.C. home for over eight years, and I’m not going anywhere. I’m ready to bring you relentless, on-the-ground coverage as events unfold. The streets are quiet now, but that could change in an instant.

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With that, here’s the news you missed this morning and overnight:

  • Donald Trump has announced that several hundred members of the Washington, D.C. National Guard will be deployed in Washington, D.C. This is the first deployment of the National Guard in Washington, D.C. in recent history and comes as senior Trump advisors compare Washington, D.C. to war torn countries. I have lived in D.C. for eight years now. I have felt unsafe only a handful of times, no different than any other major city in the country.
  • Trump has also announced that he is placing the D.C. Metropolitan Police under federal control.
  • The Trump administration plans to temporarily reassign 120 FBI agents from the Washington field office to nighttime patrol duties as part of a crackdown on street crime, with uncertainty over whether additional agents from nearby cities will be needed, according to anonymous sources.
  • Donald Trump has declared that Washington, D.C. will be “liberated” today:
  • Washington DC Mayor Muriel Bowser disputed Trump’s claim of a city crime spike, citing a 26% drop in violent crime and a 7% overall crime decrease in 2025 to a 30-year low, while Trump maintained criticism, linked the issue to homelessness, and suggested a potential federal takeover of the city.
  • DC Mayor Muriel Bowser dismissed Trump’s claims of rampant violent crime in the capital, voiced concerns over inefficient National Guard deployment, and criticized deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller’s remark likening DC to Baghdad as “hyperbolic and false.”
  • A federal judge denied the Trump DOJ’s motion to unseal Ghislaine Maxwell’s grand jury records.
  • Under the Trump administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs has lost thousands of “mission-critical” healthcare staff—including nurses, doctors, and other providers—worsening already severe shortages, prompting unsafe care conditions, fueling union and veteran fears of privatization, and coinciding with policy shifts toward private healthcare funding, union contract terminations, and prolonged patient wait times despite VA claims of minimal impact.
  • In Vietnam, thousands of farmers are set to lose their land to a $1.5 billion Trump Organization–backed golf resort and have reportedly been offered compensation as low as $12 per square meter plus rice, prompting fears over lost livelihoods despite government promises of reimbursement, job creation, and economic benefits from the luxury development.
  • Las Vegas tourism dropped sharply in June 2025—overall visits down 11.3% and international visitors down 13%—with Nevada’s largest labor union and hospitality workers citing the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration policies, ICE raids, and trade tensions as driving factors behind job losses, reduced flights from key markets like Canada, and what they call a “Trump slump.”
  • Nvidia and AMD will give the US government 15% of revenue from sales of advanced H20 AI chips to China, following the Trump administration’s earlier halt on such sales in April and subsequent approval to resume shipments under new Commerce Department licensing.
  • Ahead of the 15 August Trump–Putin summit in Alaska on the war in Ukraine, Poland’s prime minister expressed both fear and hope, noting Washington’s pledge to consult European partners, while European leaders welcomed US efforts toward peace but stressed maintaining pressure on Russia and securing guarantees for Kyiv.
  • UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s spokesperson said Putin should “never” be trusted, affirmed support for Ukraine, Trump, and European allies in ceasefire negotiations, stressed the need for strong security guarantees, and insisted Ukraine must determine its own borders and be directly involved in any peace deal.
  • Texas Governor Greg Abbott escalated his standoff with Democratic lawmakers who fled the state to block a redistricting plan favoring Republicans, warning the battle “could literally last years.”
  • At the UN Security Council, the US defended Israel, accused some nations of “actively prolonging the war by spreading lies,” and affirmed Israel’s right to determine security measures against Hamas, according to US envoy Dorothy Shea.
  • The US and China have yet to extend their tariff truce, with tensions rising as the deadline nears, though July talks in Stockholm concluded with both sides aiming for a 90-day extension.
  • A federal judge in Hawaii ruled that commercial fishing is illegal in the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument, a protected area in the central Pacific.
  • Lawsuits allege Perdue Farms’ Salisbury, Maryland, soybean operation has contaminated local drinking water with dangerous Pfas “forever chemicals,” with plaintiffs citing illnesses, regulatory findings of pollution up to 350 times federal limits, and the company’s slow response, while Perdue denies wrongdoing and claims it has installed hundreds of water treatment systems.
  • Colombian senator and presidential hopeful Miguel Uribe, 39, died after being shot in the head at a June 7 campaign rally in Bogotá, an attack linked to four suspects including a 14-year-old gunman, reviving fears of political violence in the country.

    • See you this evening.

    — Aaron