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After announcing the federal takeover of law enforcement in D.C. in the White House briefing room, President Trump painted a grim picture of the capital — including “roving mobs of wild youth” — that contrasts with crime figures showing D.C. reached a 30-year low in violent crime last January. Khalil Gibran Muhammad, professor of African American studies and public affairs at Princeton University, says the move is an extension of Trump’s “use of racist rhetoric, racist ideas, and the use of policing to enact a domestic policy agenda.”

“This is a man who has consistently scapegoated Black and Brown people to either gain celebrity or political capital. And now as president the second time, he is enacting an authoritarian agenda,” says Muhammad.

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

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JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I’d like to bring in Khalil Gibran Muhammad, professor of African American studies and public affairs at Princeton University. Professor, your reaction to this, this latest move of President Trump? And also, if you could talk somewhat about why the District of Columbia is in this special status of, essentially, a territory within the United States, not even a — and why D.C. statehood has been stalled for so long?

KHALIL GIBRAN MUHAMMAD: Good morning, everyone.

So, I think that we are seeing a consistent pattern from Donald Trump. We can start with the calls for the return of the death penalty in 1989 in reference to the rape of a white woman in Central Park, which ultimately led to the conviction of five innocent young Black boys. Donald Trump has never apologized for that moment, placing a full-page ad in The New York Times. So, if we start with the man that we’ve known as a public for the better part of seven decades, this is a man who has consistently scapegoated Black and Brown people to either gain celebrity or political capital. And now as........

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