Washington, D.C., Democrats have given juvenile criminals a pass for so long that the district has been forced to take embarrassing steps to try to rein them in. Relying on the National Guard to maintain order is unsustainable; the district needs a full attitude shift toward crime.
The district reimplemented a curfew for juveniles in special curfew zones after hundreds of teenagers gathered in the Navy Yard area on Friday night, with several fights breaking out. Police made five arrests that night, with one teenager being arrested while carrying a knife and a sergeant being assaulted as police broke up the crowd. On Saturday night, another 18 teenagers were stopped for violating the curfew, which lasts from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser also imposed an emergency curfew from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m.
BOWSER SHREDS DC COUNCIL FOR REJECTING JUVENILE CURFEW BILL
This is the result of years of Washington, D.C., Democrats effectively telling juvenile criminals that they can do what they like and face little to no consequences. Carjackings surged in the district because those carjackings were being committed by teenagers who discovered that the city’s justice system would do nothing to them. Washington, D.C., Attorney General Brian Schwalb famously said in 2023, amid the surge in juvenile crime, “I don’t think kids should be treated as adults. Kids are kids, and when you’re talking about teenagers in particular, their brains are developing, their minds are developing, and they’re biologically prone to make mistakes. That’s what we’ve all done as we’ve grown up.”
That infantilizing worldview, that teenagers are too mentally underdeveloped to know that stealing cars or shooting other teenagers is wrong, has infected the district’s justice system. Teenage criminals have become emboldened, knowing that people like Schwalb will let them off the hook for their crimes.
PROGRESSIVES THINK JAILING CRIMINALS DOESN’T AFFECT CRIME
The result is an unsustainable reliance on the National Guard to maintain order in the district, while the Democrats in charge resort to embarrassing measures such as imposing curfews for teenagers to try to keep a lid on things. A functioning city should not require curfews to maintain order or rely on the federal government to do the city’s job of policing the streets. The fact that Democrats want Washington, D.C., to become a state makes it all the more embarrassing.
The district needs a full attitude shift on crime. Teenage (and adult) criminals must be arrested and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. It must be made clear that lawless behavior will no longer be tolerated in the capital. Anything less than that is the district choosing to allow a culture of criminality to fester, and half-measures like curfews are not going to solve that problem.