The Republican-led House of Representatives moved forward on Tuesday with two pieces of legislation aimed at overhauling how juvenile crime is handled in Washington, D.C. Lawmakers are set to consider two additional bills on Wednesday, forming part of a broader GOP effort to impose stricter criminal justice measures on the nation’s capital.

The first bill approved Tuesday—the D.C. CRIMES Act—makes several significant changes to the District’s juvenile justice system. Among the most notable provisions, the legislation reduces the maximum age for adjudicating individuals as juveniles from 24 down to 18. It also requires that sentencing for offenders aligns with mandatory minimums applied to adults. In addition, the act obligates the District to release publicly accessible data on youth crime, a transparency step Republicans say is necessary for restoring confidence in the system.

The second measure, known as the Juvenile Sentencing Reform Act, allows prosecutors to charge minors as young as 14 as adults when they are accused of serious and violent offenses. While this bill did garner a handful of Democratic votes, its margin of passage was narrower than that of the CRIMES Act, reflecting internal divisions over how far Congress should go in reshaping D.C.’s local justice policies.

Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida, the sponsor of the CRIMES Act, defended the need for such reforms. “Fully grown legal adults in the District of Columbia can receive sentences meant for children. That is simply insane,” he said, according to reporting from Just the News.

These bills are part of a larger package—roughly a dozen measures in total—advanced by House Republicans as former President Donald Trump intensifies efforts to combat violent crime and illegal immigration within the District. Trump has deployed units of the D.C. National Guard and instructed federal agencies, including the Drug Enforcement Administration and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, to take a more active role in security operations within Washington, D.C.

Any bill that clears the House will move to the Senate, where Republicans hold a narrow majority. Whether the measures have sufficient support to secure passage remains uncertain. Still, there is precedent: in 2023, the Senate joined the House in approving a measure that blocked the D.C. Council from reducing criminal penalties. That legislation was eventually signed by then-President Joe Biden, despite his longstanding support for D.C. statehood.

“I support D.C. Statehood and home-rule, but I don’t support some of the changes D.C. Council put forward over the Mayor’s objections, such as lowering penalties for carjackings,” Biden said at the time.

Although D.C. residents elect their own city government, Congress retains broad authority over local affairs under the 1973 Home Rule Act. This authority allows lawmakers to overturn District laws and impose new ones, a recurring point of tension between congressional Republicans and city leadership.

According to various reports, the two additional House bills scheduled for debate on Wednesday would authorize police to pursue suspects more aggressively in specific situations and reduce the District’s involvement in choosing local judicial nominees. These proposals have intensified debates over how much autonomy D.C. should maintain over its criminal justice system, particularly in an era of rising political scrutiny over crime.

Meanwhile, the White House’s expanded federal role in public safety is already producing measurable, though uneven, changes. After Trump ordered federal authorities to assume broader control over policing operations in early August, crime patterns shifted sharply in the first full week of the new strategy.

Based on a CNN analysis of the Metropolitan Police Department’s data, property crime dropped by about 19 percent during the week beginning August 12 compared to the week prior. Violent crime fell by approximately 17 percent. Some categories, such as robberies and car break-ins, saw declines of more than 40 percent. However, other crimes rose—burglaries increased by 6 percent, and assaults involving dangerous weapons were up 14 percent. Two homicides occurred during the week, consistent with recent averages, though none have been reported since August 13.

Federal agents have been working directly alongside local police, conducting joint arrests, searches, and warrant operations. Many of these activities have taken place using unmarked vehicles, according to CNN’s reporting.

At the same time, immigration enforcement has surged dramatically. Since August 7, approximately 300 individuals without legal immigration status have been arrested in the District—more than ten times the number of typical weekly ICE arrests in the area. The sharp increase has fueled debate over whether immigration crackdowns should be integrated into broader crime-reduction efforts.

White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson criticized CNN’s framing of the early results, arguing that the media had downplayed the significance of the improvements. “The drops in crime are not ‘moderate,’ they are life-changing for countless DC residents and visitors who have not been murdered, robbed, carjacked, or victims of overall violent crime in the last week,” she said. Jackson emphasized that the administration’s priority is removing violent offenders from the streets, regardless of immigration status.