A pair of CNN panelists clashed Wednesday morning over President Donald Trump's deployments of National Guard troops in Democratic-led cities — and the debacle ended with the conservative cornered and the liberal laughing.
Troops will continue patrolling in Washington, D.C., through the end of the 80-year-old president's second term, as Brig. Gen. Leland Blanchard said they were working toward a goal of "zero crime" in the nation's capital, and anti-trans activist Terry Schilling told "CNN This Morning" he agreed with the mission.
"I think it wouldbe a totally different questionif D.C. wasn't a failed city," Schilling said. "They want statehood ... [but] there are hundredsof shootings in the city. It'sdown since the National Guardwas deployed."
Host Audie Cornish presented crime data from the year to date showing homicides were down 35 percent, motor vehicle theft down 53 percent, robbery down 16 percent, but violent crime was up 3 percent, and Cornish wondered at what point the National Guard could consider its mission complete.
"I don't know what'sincluded in the violent crime,but murder being down by 30 percent,car thefts being down by 52 percent – sounds great to me," Schilling said, and Cornish repeated her question. "I don't – as soon as D.C. canshow that they can operatewithout the National Guard, Ithink that would be great."
"Butlet's be honest, it was adangerous city," Schilling added. "Union Stationwas an absolute mess. You'd getapproached by homeless personafter homeless person, [it] reeked ofweed. I just got back from New York last week. It was clean, itwas open. I didn't get harassedby anyone."
Democratic strategist Antjuan Seawright pounced on those claims.
"So you're saying [Mayor Zohran] Mamdani is doing a good job?" Seawright said, chuckling. "Is that what you're trying to say?"
"No, no, no," Schilling protested, as Seawright burst into laughter — then set the record straight as he saw it.
"What thepresident has done has beenintentional about trying toidentify cities, predominantly with higher African Americanpopulations or cities run by Black mayors, as if they're crime-infested, they're bad, andthey're the worst in America," he said.
"That's the wrongnarrative to project."
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