What Is the Home Rule Act, the Law Trump Invoked in His D.C. Takeover?

To take control of the police force of Washington, D.C., President Donald Trump on Monday invoked part of the law that has given the nation’s capital a greater degree of self-governance over the past five decades.

Citing “violent crime,” Trump declared a public safety emergency in D.C. and invoked section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act of 1973.

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The law “is the result of the ongoing push by District residents for control of their own local affairs,” according to the Council of the District of Columbia. D.C. was previously directly governed by Congress—which the Constitution grants authority to “exercise exclusive Legislation in all cases whatsoever” over the district—and federal appointees. The Home Rule Act allowed city residents to elect a mayor and council starting in the fall of 1974, though it maintained a congressional oversight over D.C. Congress reviews all legislation that the Council passes before it can be enacted into law, and maintains authority over the city’s budget. D.C. still doesn’t have a voting member of Congress. 

Section 740 of the law allows the President to take control of D.C.’s police force in “conditions of an emergency nature”—with certain limitations. The President can federalize the city’s law enforcement agency for a period of up to 30 days under the Act, after which point both chambers of Congress must enact into law a joint resolution to extend the emergency control. 

The Executive Order that Trump signed on Monday says that the federal government shall maintain control of the city’s police force “for the maximum period permitted under section 740 of the Home Rule Act.”

Read More: Trump Threatens to Federalize D.C. After Beating of ‘Big Balls’

Trump threatened to federalize D.C., decrying crime in the city, after the reported assault of a Trump Administration staffer—though data show that violent crime in the city is down significantly. 

For the federal government to fully take control of the city’s governance, the Home Rule Act would have to be suspended or repealed. Some GOP politicians have expressed support for federalizing D.C., a heavily Democratic city, and pushed to repeal the law.

Democrats, meanwhile, slammed Trump’s move on Monday. D.C.’s Democratic non-voting representative in Congress, Eleanor Holmes Norton, called it “an historic assault on D.C. home rule” and “a counterproductive, escalatory seizure of D.C.’s resources to use for purposes not supported by D.C. residents.” 

Norton and Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland announced the same day that they plan to reintroduce legislation that would give the district full control over the D.C. National Guard and the city’s police department when Congress convenes next month, saying those actions “are needed more urgently than ever.” The bills, the lawmakers said, would repeal the section in the Home Rule Act that allows the President to federalize the city’s police force. 

Norton and other Democratic lawmakers previously introduced similar legislation in 2021, soon after the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. In announcing her intention to introduce the legislation at the time, Norton said that the attack on the Capitol “highlighted more starkly than ever the risk to local D.C. public safety from the president’s control over the D.C. National Guard and ultimate authority over the D.C. police department,” adding that “the mayor should not be reliant on the president to deploy the National Guard to protect public safety in D.C., and D.C. should never have to worry that a president will take over its police force and use it how he or she sees fit.”