Washington officials and the Justice Department negotiated a deal at a judge’s urging Friday that prevented full federal control of the city’s police department over the weekend, but left underlying legal disputes unresolved.
Justice Department officials agreed to rewrite a Thursday order from Attorney General Pam Bondi that named Drug Enforcement Administration head Terry Cole as emergency police commissioner, cutting the mayor and existing police chief out of the chain of command. The rewritten order will name Cole as Bondi’s “designee for requesting services” from the police department.
“We think that solves the problem and that’s what we’re planning to do immediately,” Justice Department attorney Yaakov Roth said.
U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes indicated at a hearing Friday she would grant the D.C. attorney general’s request for a temporary restraining order if the Justice Department did not follow through on rewriting the order by Friday evening. The hearing came after city officials sued the Trump administration earlier Friday over the directive to take over control of the Metropolitan Police Department.
“In the interim, Mr. Cole is not going to be able to direct police department individuals to do anything,” Reyes, a Biden appointee, said. “He’s going to have to go through the mayor.”
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Author: Marty Kaufmann
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