On Monday, President Donald Trump released an executive order invoking a rarely used federal law that allows him to temporarily seize control over Washington, DC’s police force. Later the same day, DC’s Democratic Mayor Muriel Bowser seemed to concede that there’s nothing she can do about it.

“What I would point you to is the Home Rule Charter that gives the president the ability to determine the conditions of an emergency,” Bowser said Monday afternoon. “We could contest that, but the authority is pretty broad.”

Bowser is almost certainly correct that Trump can seize control of her city’s police force, at least for a little while.

The District of Columbia is not a state, and does not enjoy the same control over its internal affairs that, say, nearby Virginia or Maryland does. The Const

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