We’ve been tracking the abrupt resignation of District of Columbia Police Chief Pamela Smith, and thanks to an investigation by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, the real story is finally coming into focus. Smith didn’t step down out of noble concern or administrative fatigue — she resigned because the truth was catching up with her.
According to sworn testimony from multiple subordinates, Smith allegedly pressured officers to alter crime data to make the District look far safer than it actually was. In other words, instead of confronting spiraling crime, the city’s top cop chose to cook the books.
Those artificially sanitized crime numbers were central to the narrative pushed by D.C. leadership that everything was under control — a claim that collapsed under its own weight. The reality on the ground was so bad that President Trump ultimately had to deploy the National Guard to restore order in the nation’s capital. And now, two of those Guard members have been attacked; one, Army Spc. Sarah Beckstrom, was killed and the other, Air Guard SSG Andrew Wolfe, is fighting to recover:
? BOMBSHELL: Chief Smith resigned in disgrace after MPD commanders told House Oversight she pressured them to cook the books on DC crime.
Our investigation confirms it: She cared more about protecting her image than protecting the public.
Read the damning report below ?? pic.twitter.com/vhmbEp3ffh
— Oversight Committee (@GOPoversight) December 14, 2025
In part, the interim report says:
The interim report, drawn from transcribed interviews with the commanders of all seven D.C. patrol districts, as well as one former commander currently placed on suspended leave, reveals that Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) Chief Pamela A. Smith pressured and at times directed commanders to manipulate crime data in order to maintain the appearance of low crime in the nation’s capital. The testimony from the commanders also describes an environment under Chief Smith marked by fear, intimidation, threats, and retaliation—conditions that contributed directly to declining morale and the loss of experienced officers and commanders.
To put it another way, Chief Smith urged her team to misrepresent the true state of affairs in the District. It’s no surprise that she is stepping down.
Think about what this actually means. The chief of police of the nation’s capital — not just any big city, but Washington, D.C. — allegedly pressured her own officers to lie about the consequences of lax law enforcement and soft-on-crime prosecution. She misled Congress. She misled the American people. Worse, she reportedly coerced subordinates into falsifying records, using intimidation to enforce the deception.
That is not a minor scandal. It is an unforgivable breach of trust — with the public, with the rank-and-file officers tasked with risking their lives on the streets, and most of all with the residents of D.C. who were living every day with the reality of rising crime and didn’t need doctored statistics to tell them something was terribly wrong.
Pamela Smith has now resigned, and rightly so, but resignation alone is not accountability. If these allegations are accurate, they demand serious consequences. You cannot run a police department — let alone the capital’s — like a political operation designed to hide failure.
And here’s the part the city’s leadership doesn’t want emphasized: the crime was real. The danger was real. It was that very rise in crime that forced President Trump to deploy the National Guard to restore order. Now, Smith’s own former subordinates are confirming what the administration said all along — those measures are working.
More from the Oversight report:
On August 14, 2025, President Trump issued Executive Order 14333, Declaring a Crime Emergency in the District of Columbia. The effects were twofold: first, the MPD was placed under the control of the U.S. Attorney General, and second, President Trump deployed D.C. National Guard to supplement the MPD’s efforts to fight crime. MPD Commanders testified that President Trump’s efforts have been effective.
It’s effective. Now the district’s leadership must confront a piper who is insisting on compensation, which is a positive development.
As for the attack on the two National Guard members, here’s hoping Smith will lose a lot of sleep, at a bare minimum, for the rest of her life thinking about how her lies contributed to it.
