Tumika Alston, a storeowner in Washington, D.C., was robbed by a group of teenagers during President Donald Trump's federal takeover of law enforcement throughout the city, and was quoted in local media saying she'd like the president to move patrols to her neighborhood.
“I’m telling Trump, yeah, send the boys to Benning Road," she said.
But what happened next left her furious.
The Washington Post reported Monday she found herself the subject of a White House propaganda video — and now she's enraged that rather than actually sending help, the president used her to score political points.
Shortly after she gave her speech, the Post reported, she got a call from the White House, which "told Alston that the administration was concerned about what had happened at her store.
"... She agreed to a visit. Maybe that would get her some extra security, she thought, or direct all those cops to someplace they might do some good."
However, she said, instead of sending security, the White House team brought cameras.
The day after that visit, in which she told the camera crews, “people work hard for their business. They’re tired of kids looting; they’re stealing every day," Allston's name and her story were plastered on White House accounts on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram, with captions like “Tumika’s story is just one of the many the Fake News isn’t reporting.”
"Alston said she watched in horror as the number of people sharing and commenting on the video grew," according to the report. "She didn’t like the dramatic music laid under her voice or the way the clip made her seem muted and frightened. 'They make me sound dramatic, like I was crying,' she said recently. 'Like, what the hell? They trying to make a Tubi TV movie?'"
Trump has cited a crime epidemic as the reason for his federal takeover of D.C., even though crime in the city has actually been falling for years, the administration itself was bragging about how low it was months before, and many Republican-led states that sent National Guard troops to help Trump's efforts have higher crime rates in their own major cities.
Regardless, Trump has threatened to send the National Guard to other cities, focusing threats on places like Chicago that have seen extensive protests of his mass deportation policies. "Washington, D.C. IS A SAFE ZONE IN JUST A MATTER OF WEEKS. Thank you, President Trump. Who’s Next???" the president wrote on his Truth Social platform Monday morning.