President Trump signed a Presidential Memorandum on Monday to establish a “Memphis Safe Task Force” aimed at stopping crime in Memphis, Tennessee. He said the move will follow the same approach they used in Washington, DC, where he claims they dramatically reduced crime.
“The effort will include the National Guard, as well as the FBI, ATF, DEA, ICE, Homeland Security Investigations, and the US Marshals, and more along the prosecutors. Trump added that the Justice Department will be coordinated by the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Tennessee.
“We did send FBI in about four months ago to work, and it brought some of the numbers down, and they did a great job,” Trump revealed. He said the initial FBI work helped but that a larger force is now being sent to Memphis to tackle the problem more aggressively.
He also described the task force as a “replica” of the crime-fighting operation they ran in Washington, DC. That’s the model the administration is using as they roll this out in Tennessee.
The President was joined by Tennessee Governor Bill Lee, FBI Director Kash Patel, Attorney General Pam Bondi, Deputy AG Todd Blanche, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, War Secretary Pete Hegseth, GOP Senators Marsha Blackburn and Bill Hagerty, and other officials during the Oval Office signing. Several state and federal leaders spoke in support of the initiative at the event.
As The Gateway Pundit reported on Sunday, President Trump announced plans to deploy the National Guard to Nashville as part of broader efforts to curb crime. That commitment from Tennessee leaders is part of the federal-state coordination he referenced.
Trump Deploys National Guard to Memphis, U.S. Military Lawyer Weighs in on Legality
Watch the embedded post below to see more details and context from the original report. The clip and accompanying material offer background on the deployment and legal questions raised.
Previously, Governor Lee pledged Tennessee National Guard troops to assist with the administration’s crime efforts in Washington, DC. That pledge helped set the stage for deeper cooperation between the state and federal teams.
This announcement also comes as President Trump fights local officials in Illinois over a crime initiative aimed at Chicago. Earlier this month, hundreds of DHS and ICE agents were sent to Chicago for a large immigration enforcement operation, and Trump said the operation helped reduce crime there somewhat, with plans to do more.
But first, he said, the priority is fixing Memphis, where, he said, “there were 249 murders, 429 rapes, 5,616 burglaries, and 12,522 violent assaults,” in parts of 2024 and 2025. Trump argued those numbers show how urgently federal intervention is needed in the city.
Tennessee Governor Bill Lee, FBI Director Kash Patel, Attorney General Pam Bondi, Deputy AG Todd Blanche, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, War Secretary Pete Hegseth, GOP Senators Marsha Blackburn and Bill Hagerty, and other White House officials also delivered remarks on the initiative. They each voiced support for the task force and emphasized the need for coordinated action.
WATCH: You can view the president’s remarks and the rollout of the task force in the embedded video and the quoted transcript below. The clips and statements are intended to show how the administration plans to move forward.
Trump: Today, at the request of Governor Bill Lee of Tennessee, who is standing with us, as you know, I’m signing a presidential memorandum to establish the Memphis Safe Task Force, and it’s very important because of the crime that’s going on, not only in Memphis, in many cities, we’re going to take care of all of them step by step, just like we did in DC. We have virtually no crime in DC right now, and we’re going to keep it that way. It’s our nation’s capital. We’re going to keep it that keep it that way, or we’re going to federalize it, if we had to. But we don’t have to anymore, because it’s in such great shape. This task force will be a replica of our extraordinarily successful efforts here, and you’ll see it’s a lot of the same thing, although the numbers here are really something. They’re really bad. Now, we did send FBI in about four months ago to work, and it brought some of the numbers down, and they did a great job, but we’re sending in the big force now.
We also sent them into Chicago on a sort of a moderate basis, and we brought down crime a little bit in Chicago, but we’re now going to bring it down very big. We’re going to be doing Chicago probably next. I was with a great businessman, a man who was involved in all cities through his business. And I say, “Who do you think should be next after Memphis? And he said, “Sir, you’ve got to save Chicago.” We’re going to wait a little while. But he said, “You’ve got to save Chicago. You can’t let it go.” And this is a very prominent man that everybody knows in this room. Another man in Memphis was saying, Bill, he was saying— very interesting he’s on the board of FedEx, and his hotel is about a block away— and he said, when I walk there, I said, you know, I don’t want to do this again. I never want to do it again, and they won’t let me walk there. They take him in armored vehicles. They take the board members of FedEx in armored vehicles, like a block away, to the hotel. This shouldn’t be the US. This shouldn’t be the United States of America.
The effort will include the National Guard, as well as the FBI, ATF, DEA, ICE, Homeland Security Investigations, and the US Marshals, and more along the prosecutors. We’re going to have DOJ, led by US attorney for the Western District of Tennessee, who is here or not here. Is that person here? That person is going to be very busy, so we’re going to use the attorney for the Western District of Tennessee, and most importantly, Pam Bondi is here. She’s heading it up, and she’s doing an unbelievable job in every respect beyond this, also worked with some of the members of the team right here on DC, and we’re very proud of that effort. We essentially had the crime down to a very low rate in 12 days, and within another 10 days after that, it was so incredible, and it continues at that level. And we’re going to continue. We have to, because it’s our capital. This team will deploy the full powers of federal law enforcement agencies and enforcement generally to restore public safety and get dangerous career criminals off of our streets. We’re going to get them off.
In 2024 Memphis had the highest violent crime rate, the highest property crime rate, and the third highest murder rate of any city in the nation. Other than that, they’re doing quite well. Thank you. A person is four times more likely to be murdered in Memphis, Tennessee, today than in Mexico City. It’s been— and you know, Mexico City is not a cake walk. It’s been overrun with carjackings, robberies, shootings, and killings. There were 249 murders, 429 rapes, 5,616 burglaries, and 12,522 violent assaults in just the last little while, in 2024 and in pieces of 2025, where it’s actually gotten worse, until recently, when we sent the FBI down to see what the hell is going on. Last month, a vicious thug carjacked an elderly woman parked at the movie theater, dragged her out of the car and body slammed her into the pavement where she is still trying to recover, probably won’t be successful. So, we’re not going to allow this kind of savagery to destroy our society anymore. We’re stopping it, doing it one by one, but we want to go quickly. We don’t want to lose Chicago. We’re going to lose Chicago. We’re going to lose places like— you go to St. Louis, St. Louis. We’re going to lose St. Louis. We’re not going to lose; we want to save these places. You’re going to to lose them. The way the man said, a very high quality man, I said, “Who would you do next?” He said, “Sir, do Chicago. You don’t want to lose Chicago.” We’re not going to lose Chicago. So, we’re going to have to go very big. And we’re going to go probably we’re thinking about it for next, Pam. We were going to hold it off. We were going to do some of these smaller ones, and the truth is, our people are so good. Gaddy, you’re doing a great job. Wherever you may be when we’re doing so good that with I don’t think we need too much practice, right? We can hang, but we got to go and save our big cities, our great cities. Chicago is a great city, and we’re going to make it great again very soon. And I think we can do that despite the tremendous size. I think we can do a real job, but we’re going to give you the resources that you need.
This embed follows the quoted remarks and provides additional media. The material above and below is intended to give readers the full context of the announcement and reactions.
The content above includes the official statements and supporting embeds. The section below continues with site components and comment-related elements as in the original layout.
