Moore, Scott don't want federal troops in Baltimore; Trump says 'there's no reason to be stupid'

Sam Janesch, Carson Swick and Jeff Barker, Baltimore Sun on Sep 3, 2025

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

BALTIMORE — Maryland Gov. Wes Moore responded Wednesday to President Donald Trump’s comments a day earlier calling Baltimoreans “criminals” and saying that he would send troops to deal with crime in the city.

At an event focused on housing development, Moore turned to “speak directly to our children,” who he said he believed were the subject of Trump’s comments.

“Please hear me loud and clear,” Moore said. “Do not listen to what Donald Trump called you yesterday. When the president from the Oval Office calls you natural born killers, children who are born to be violent, I say this, ‘I respect the office, but I will never honor ignorance.’”

The governor’s response was the latest in a weekslong back-and-forth between him and the president, and appeared to be referring to Trump’s claim that Moore was not doing enough about “hardcore criminals” in Baltimore.

“I would love to have, I would say, Gov. Moore call. Because I watched him over the weekend trying to explain that Baltimore, ‘What they need is housing,’” Trump said Tuesday in the Oval Office. “No, they don’t need housing. They need to get rid of the criminals. These are hardcore criminals.”

Trump added on Tuesday that he had the “right to” send federal troops to the city as he had done in Washington, D.C., and was preparing to do in Chicago.

Trump also followed up on his comments Wednesday, again from the Oval Office and an hour after Moore spoke. He claimed people in Baltimore want an increased federal presence in the city to deter crime.

“Gov. Moore, wanted me to go and walk through Baltimore with him. And I said, ‘You know, I think I’m a brave guy, but there’s no reason to be stupid,’ ” Trump said. “They have crime that’s at levels that nobody’s ever seen before in Baltimore. They’ve done a terrible job.”

The White House said it had no comment about the president’s plans to send troops to Baltimore.

In a war of words that has now stretched on for weeks, Moore has batted down all notions that he would support federal troops in the city. The Democratic governor reiterated that thought Wednesday in Howard County, calling the deployment an example of “theatrical exercises.”

Asked about Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser ordering the city to fully cooperate with the troops on Tuesday, Moore said he couldn’t comment on Bowser’s decision.

“I’m not the mayor of D.C. I can’t speak for Mayor Bowser or her decision making process,” Moore said. “What I know as someone who has actually worn the uniform, someone who’s actually deployed overseas, and someone who takes very seriously the fact that I’m the commander in chief of the Maryland National Guard, is I will never authorize the usage of the guard for something that is performative.”

Before signing an executive order aimed at boosting housing development, Moore also responded to Trump’s comments about housing in Maryland.

“I know that just yesterday, the president was once again mocking me from the Oval Office, saying that, ‘Oh, the governor was talking about housing. We don’t need new housing,’” Moore said. “Which is so sad. And it’s so sad because not only as president, he should applaud the fact that we are moving forward fast on building new housing. As a developer, he should know that.”

Baltimore says, ‘We’re good’

At a news conference Wednesday, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott was also clear about his stance on Trump deploying federal troops to his city.

“To be very clear, we’re good. We don’t need or want the National Guard here in Baltimore,” Scott said. “The best way to help us continue to make this historic progress that we are already making is to restore funding for public safety programs, pass a federal ban on both ghost guns and Glock switches, and repeal the Tiahrt Amendment — allowing local governments to fully track down where the weapons used in the commitment of crime on the streets come from.”

In the wake of clashes between federal troops and residents on the streets of Washington, D.C., the mayor added that Baltimore residents should remain peaceful if troops are deployed and not give the Trump administration a further reason to escalate the situation.

“We have to be very careful that we don’t give them what they want, because it seems they want chaos. It seems that they want certain images and certain types of people, especially people that look like me, to be easily depicted as violent or ‘born criminals,’ so to speak,” said Scott, who is Black.

Baltimore City Council President Zeke Cohen highlighted the progress that Baltimore has made in reducing violent crime. The city recorded seven homicides in August and has seen 91 total homicides so far this year, which Mayor Brandon Scott said is the fewest at this point in more than 50 years.

While City Comptroller Bill Henry said that he wasn’t sure the president could carry about the threat, he added that he looks forward to discussing the issue further with the Baltimore City Law Department and other city agencies.

_____