President Donald Trump said Tuesday he would seek the death penalty for murders in Washington, as part of a crackdown on what he calls out-of-control crime in the US capital.

"If somebody kills somebody in the capital, Washington DC, we're going to be seeking the death penalty," Trump said at a cabinet meeting in the White House.

"It's a very strong preventative and everybody that's heard it agrees with it," Trump said at a cabinet meeting.

The death penalty move comes after Republican Trump deployed the National Guard to Democrat-run Washington and took federal control of the city's police department earlier this month.

Washington -- formally known as the District of Columbia -- abolished the death penalty in 1981.

The US capital has a unique legal status as it is not a state and ope

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