Officials in the Trump administration tried and failed to deliver speeches to the National Guard, as their latest political stunt was overshadowed by protesters.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and White House advisor Stephen Miller attempted to deliver speeches honoring the National Guard members, whom Trump deployed to the city last year and has yet to withdraw, much to the dismay of residents.
The Daily Beast was at the public park as protesters, blaring sirens, horns, and whistles, descended on the site to drown out the officials.
“Two groups of people, builders and destroyers, between the people who do the work to build, sustain, and nurture civilization, the people who serve, who sacrifice, who give, who care for others, who protect others, who defend others, and those who only destroy, who litter, who rob, and graffiti, who to face, who degrade,” Miller tried to say at the D.C. Safe and Beautiful Task Force ceremony.
“Civilization only exists because of people like you,” he added to the tune of loud sirens and blaring horns.
Demonstrators jeered through the secretary’s remarks, their chants echoing across Meridian Hill Park—or Malcolm X Park as D.C. residents prefer to call it—as Hegseth tried to claim protesters are people who apparently love crime.
“This background noise is perfect,” Hegseth proclaimed. “It’s the sound of ingrates, of ingratitude, of people who are so blinded by ideology they can’t see law and order and common sense in front of them.”
“There is nothing political about this exercise,” he continued.
On 15th Street, a woman with a megaphone confronted a team of National Guardsmen and U.S. Marshals who were blocking the entry.
“You work for a pedophile! Are you proud of that?” she yelled.
Behind her, a black car drove past with a woman holding up a sign that said: “#EpsteinFiles: Believe the victims! We are being silenced!”
And at the 16th Street entrance of the park, a group of protesters had set up DJ equipment, with music blaring as they chanted “Free D.C.”
“You’re a war criminal, Hegseth!” one woman screamed.
Their speeches took place in front of the park’s iconic 13-basin cascading fountain, one of the longest in North America.
The historic landmark, long a symbol of the park’s decline after years without running water, was restored earlier this year following an extensive rehabilitation project that Trump is now taking credit for.
But the protests highlighted the ongoing political backlash in D.C. to the Trump administration’s deployment of the National Guard in the nation’s capital.
District leaders and many residents have argued the federal presence is unnecessary and politically motivated, accusing the administration of using Washington as a testing ground for its tough-on-crime agenda.
National Guardsmen have also looked largely bored on their deployment, with many pictured on their phones or even vaping, as they aimlessly walk around D.C. They are also often seen in D.C.’s upscale neighborhoods, such as Cleveland Park and Georgetown, where crime is already significantly lower than in the rest of the city.
The administration, meanwhile, has defended the deployment as part of a broader effort to restore public safety and improve public spaces, with Malcolm X Park becoming an early symbol of that campaign.
