Trump denies he’s going to war in Chicago after threatening majority-Black city in jarring social media post

Trump on Sunday was defiant when asked why he is focusing his threat of military action in Chicago and not other cities with higher rates of crime in red states like Memphis.

President Donald Trump said on Sunday that he is not going to war in Chicago after seemingly threatening to send his newly renamed Department of War to the majority-Black city in a Truth Social post over the weekend.

TheGrio was on the ground at the White House as Trump was boarding Marine One to attend the U.S. Open men’s championship final in New York City. While taking questions from reporters, the president denied that he is going to war in Chicago after writing on Saturday, “Chicago about to find out why it’s called the Department of WAR” along with a graphic that read “Chipocalypse Now.”

“We’re not going to war. We’re going to clean up our cities. We’re gonna clean them up so they don’t kill five people every weekend. That’s not war. That’s common sense,” said Trump, who has for weeks threatened to send military troops to the nation’s third-largest city to bring down crime.

Mayor Brandon Johnson and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker have touted decades-low crime in Chicago, citing investments in community violence intervention as a major driver for reducing violent crime–investments that the Trump administration has since cut on the federal level.

President Trump has erroneously declared Chicago the “murder capital of the world” and called the city of 2.7 million a “hellhole.” However, the U.S. cities with the top homicide rates are actually Memphis, New Orleans, and St. Louis, followed by Baltimore, Cleveland, Detroit, and Washington, D.C., according to a 2023 study by the Council on Criminal Justice. Internationally, that distinction belongs to cities in Ecuador, South Africa, Brazil, and Mexico.

Trump on Sunday was defiant when asked why he is focusing his threat of military action in Chicago and not other cities with higher rates of crime in red states like Memphis.

“Do you know how many people were killed in Chicago last weekend? Eight. Do you know many people who were killed in Chicago the week before? Seven. Do you know how many people are wounded? 74 people were wounded. Do you think there’s worse than that? I don’t think so,” said Trump.

Leaders in Chicago and the state of Illinois have forcefully condemned Trump’s rhetoric and threats against Chicago and vowed to do everything in their power to fight against his threat of sending troops on the ground. On Saturday, thousands of anti-Trump marchers took to the streets of Chicago to protest his threat of military occupation.

U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth told CBS News that Trump “essentially just declared war on a major city in his own nation,” adding, “This is not normal…This is not acceptable behavior.”

TheGrio recently spoke with Illinois Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton about Trump’s threat of military action in Chicago. The Illinois leader told theGrio, “We do not want your circus here. We do not want federalized troops here, marching up and down the streets…he needs to do his job and keep his chaos out of the city of Chicago.”

In response to Trump’s Truth Social post threatening Chicago with the Department of War, formerly known as the Department of Defense, Mayor Johnson wrote on X, “The President’s threats are beneath the honor of our nation, but the reality is that he wants to occupy our city and break our Constitution.”

He added, “We must defend our democracy from this authoritarianism by protecting each other and protecting Chicago from Donald Trump.”