On August 18, DEA agents and other federal officers, deployed to Washington, DC, by the Trump administration, pulled a man over for running a red light. Court records indicate he had mismatched license plates and lacked a valid driver’s license. The agents ordered him out of the car, then noticed what looked like a joint tucked behind his ear and a baggie of marijuana from a dispensary. They seized the marijuana and took him to the station, where they patted him down.
When an officer felt a bulge near his groin, they tried to conduct a strip search. The man apparently broke away and tried to flush a packet down the toilet while officers fought to stop and ultimately restrained him. Testing would allegedly show that the packet contained crack cocaine and MDMA.
He’s now charged with violating federal statute 18 USC § 111(a)(1), which makes it a crime to “forcibly assault, resist, oppose, impede, intimidate, or interfere with any officer or employee” of the federal government—with a penalty of up to 20 years in prison—as well as possession of an illicit substance and tampering with evidence. An initial incident that in most jurisdictions would result in a traffic ticket has snowballed into serious federal charges.
“I’m absolutely flabbergasted at what has happened. A high school student would know this was an illegal search,” said the judge.
For weeks now, federal agents in military gear and National Guard troops armed with handguns and rifles have swarmed the nation’s capital. They’ve been setting up checkpoints and violently arresting people for, say, looking Latino while walking towards their own scooter. Or “suspiciously” tugging their backpack while Black—a case that so shocked the presiding judge that he berated federal prosecutors from the bench.
“I’m absolutely flabbergasted at what has happened. A high school student would know this was an illegal search,” said US Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui.
The Trump administration claims it’s fighting violent crime in DC, though troops seem mostly to be patrolling tourist landmarks like the National Mall. An analysis by the New York Times found low-level misdemeanors that would barely make it to a local judge are now clogging the federal system, including “crimes” as innocuous as having open containers of alcohol in public. More than 1,000 people have been arrested so far—almost half for immigration status.
As even prosecutors and a judge have complained, most of the other arrests are for nonviolent matters like possession of firearms—having a gun, not shooting it—or drugs. Yet as people languish in jail, US Attorney General Jeanine Pirro has ordered prosecutors to pursue the most serious possible charges in federal court.
Trump has threatened to send troops to other big, Democrat-run cities like Chicago, San Francisco and New York. And drug policy experts worry that, as seen many times before, drug arrests erode basic liberties and serve as a pretext to target a city’s most vulnerable residents.
“They’re not here to stop crime, they’re here to pick fights. There’s always been a larger pattern with the drug war used to infringe on civil rights.”
“They’re not here to stop crime, they’re here to pick fights,” Maritza Perez Medina told Filter of the federal presence in the capital. She’s the director of the Drug Policy Alliance’s Office of Federal Affairs, and a DC resident.
“There’s always been a larger pattern with the drug war used to infringe on civil rights,” Perez Medina continued. “Always been like that, but now it’s happening very clearly … People of color and poor people are already overpoliced. When I hear ‘more law enforcement,’ I know we’re going to receive the brunt end.”
Charging low-level incidents as federal offenses has serious ramifications, she explained. “Federal charges mean more time behind bars. We’re not just talking about the potential sentences. There’s collateral consequences like time under supervision, time away from your job, you lose your job. No federal benefits. There are many consequences.”
The federal system is also more likely to incarcerate people far from their families.
“I don’t feel safer,” Perez Medina said of the federal takeover. “Are they going to racially profile me or my husband?”
Like many DC residents, she and her husband are spending a lot more time indoors right now. Restaurants are uncharacteristically empty, she noted.
Incidents recorded as violent crimes have fallen in the city, compared to the same period in 2024. But critics point out they were already in decline, with recorded incidents falling by a larger 35 percent between 2023 and 2024. Even some law enforcement officers have expressed concern that in the long run, the troop takeover will undermine public safety by alienating the population.
Like most opponents of the drug war, Perez Medina wishes that the government would instead invest in building safe communities where residents have their needs met. “Not more policing, but food banks, job programs,” she said. “That’s much more important for public safety than federalized law enforcement.”
Photograph (cropped) by Defense Visual Information Distribution Service via Picryl/Public Domain
