Retiring Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) said he would have a “problem” with Donald Trump sending federal troops to Charlotte, North Carolina.
The Trump administration has deployed troops to Washington D.C, under the guise of fighting crime in the nation’s capital — despite D.C.’s crime rate being at a 30-year low. Violent crime in Charlotte is also down 24 percent.
However, the Trump administration has taken an interest in the fatal stabbing of 23-year-old Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska, leading to concerns that Charlotte could be the next city Trump militarizes.
Zarutska was stabbed to death on a train by Decarlos Brown Jr,34. Brown is a diagnosed schizophrenic and had a long criminal history. The Trump administration has seized on the random crime to argue for the militarization of “Democrat run cities” due to out of control crime.
Asked about Trump potentially militarizing a city in his state, Tillis said he is against the idea.
“We do have challenges, but there are far more major metropolitan areas that we could focus our attention before you go to Charlotte,” Tillis told NOTUS. “I hope that people don’t amplify this into something.”
Tillis said that while he hasn’t seen any evidence that the Trump administration was “going to focus on Charlotte” next, he added that “if they do, it’ll be a problem for me.”
