New Tang Dynasty (NTD) White House reporter Iris Tao recently spoke to The Gateway Pundit about her horrific experience being attacked and robbed in the nation’s capital one Saturday morning just steps from her apartment amid President Trump’s efforts to purge crime from Washington, DC.
Earlier this month, President Trump declared a “public safety emergency,” citing high crime and unsafe streets in the District, and federalized the DC police force. He further authorized the use of National Guard troops and deployed federal agents across the city to tackle the rampant crime, homelessness, and illegal immigration crises.
Since taking these actions, crime in DC has been reduced significantly. According to White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, as of Thursday, there had been more than 1,283 arrests, contributing to a 19% reduction in all crime, a 30% reduction in violent crime, a 57% reduction in homicides, a 23% reduction in assaults involving deadly weapons, and a 67% reduction in carjackings.
The previous robbery came to light after Iris penned an op-ed recounting the incident and emphasizing the importance of Trump’s crackdown on crime in the capital.
As The Gateway Pundit reported, President Trump took notice of the story and invited Iris to tell her story during a cabinet meeting on Tuesday.
WATCH: President Trump Invites NTD Correspondent Iris Tao to Tell Her Story of Horrifying, Violent Broad-Daylight Robbery in Washington, DC During Cabinet Meeting – “Mr. President, Thank You for Now Making DC Safer for Us”
Iris told The Gateway Pundit that since Trump took the capital over, she has become “very hopeful” that the streets will be safe again, but she is still traumatized by the incident and “wouldn’t dare walk in the street alone” at night. “I’m still Ubering home every single night, despite actually not living too far from where I work,” she said.
In response to leftists peddling likely falsified crime data that shows a 30-year low in DC crime, Iris points to the “real human toll” behind the data and notes that there have still been thousands of violent crimes and robberies each year. She further highlights the over 100 homicides this year alone, including “a three-year-old girl, a 21-year-old Capitol Hill intern, and a 33-year-old man who was just shot in the street hours after President Trump announced his latest crackdown action.”
Iris also explained that as an expecting new mother, she does not plan to stay in the city for much longer “for the sake of my family,” adding “who doesn’t want their kid to grow up in an environment where they can freely play, walk in the street and hang out without the threat of being, you know, threatened, or being attacked, or being shot in the street without, you know, their parents, even knowing?”
Watch the full interview below:
Conradson: You were violently mugged and robbed in the street right outside of your apartment in broad daylight. Can you tell us a little bit about that and the trauma you’ve experienced as a result?
Tao: So, it was a normal Saturday morning more than two years ago, just steps outside of my apartment building. And, as was walking out, this random guy with a black ski mask covering everything but his eyes, popped out and pointed a gun in my face and asked me to give him my phone, my wallet, my laptop, even a password to my phone, and well, when I refused to give him most of that, he pistol whipped me, using the butt of his gun to, like, kind of just like, whack me in my cheek, and ran away. That’s before, of course, I called a neighbor, who later called the police out. My cheek was numb for the rest of the day. Fortunately, I was relatively okay, like he didn’t actually open fire. But after that, like thinking back, it was a lot more traumatizing because just thinking like a million ways that it could have gone a lot worse if he had opened fire, or shot me, or even just killed me right there and then, when my friend’s family were so far away. I was alone by myself as a young female reporter who kind of just started her career at the White House. So, for me, looking back, it was much more traumatizing afterwards, actually.
Conradson: Now they’re trying to say that crime is at a 30-year low, but you don’t think that’s what we should be looking at, whether it’s true or not. Talk about the families of the hundreds of victims of violent crime, the 100-plus murder victims have died this year. Do you think it’s fair to them to be touting crime, apparently, at a 30-year low?
Tao: I feel like it’s reasonable for people to look at the data, but it’s also important, I think, for us to remind people—for us who have actually lived through, you know, crime in DC—to remind people that behind each data point, there’s a real living being, a real resident in DC who have experienced something as traumatizing as I did, because after that incident, for example, for the past almost three years, I’m still Ubering home every single night, despite actually not living too far from where I work, and I still wouldn’t dare to walk in the street alone by myself at night, especially. So, and to my family as well, I didn’t dare to tell my grandparents, actually, what happened for like, almost two years, because I feel like they could be so devastated that they would just ask me to leave DC and stop working here. So, for me and for my family, it’s a big deal. It’s not just one data point of someone who pulled out his gun, but didn’t actually open fire. It’s much more severe than that. And looking at the data, we know that while city officials are saying that crime in DC is at a 30-year low, but also, if you look at the data more closely, there’s still been over 30,000 crimes just in the last year. And among those, there were over 3,000 violent offenses and over 2,000 robberies, and that means thousands of others lived through something like I did, and their families had to go through the same experience as my family did as well. And what you mentioned as well, homicide— there’s been over 100 homicides in DC, in just this year alone. And that includes, for example, a three-year-old girl, a 21-year-old Capitol Hill intern, and a 33-year-old man who was just shot in the street hours after President Trump announced his latest crackdown action, you know, just a few blocks away from the White House. He was just shot and killed right there. So, it’s important for us to not just look at the data, but really remind ourselves of the real human toll behind it.
Conradson: Do you feel safer now that President Trump has taken the actions that he did, putting hundreds of National Guard troops on the street, hundreds of federal agents, and taking over the police force?
Tao: Well, as someone who has experienced crime like me, feeling safer, for example, also depends on the real data, right? Of course, we’re seeing National Guard troops patrolling the streets. We’re seeing military trucks parked right outside of Union Station. That does make me feel safer, but also just seeing the data trend as well, we know that in the week past President Trump’s announcement, there has been a huge, actually, reduction in crime already, at least in that week, right? We’re seeing, for example, over 50% reduction in robberies and over 80% reduction in carjacking. So, hopefully that trend will continue. That remains to be seen. But again, for victims, including me, we’re very hopeful just seeing that trend starting right now.
Conradson: So I know you’re an expecting mother. If it weren’t for these actions that President Trump is taking, you said that you wouldn’t want to raise your kid here. Tell us more about that.
Tao: That’s actually a large part of the reason why I wrote the op-ed in the Epoch Times describing my experience, which later got shared by the White House press secretary, because as a new mom right now, expecting my own child, that really made me reflect on my expectations for my own child and my child’s own safety and living experience as well. I don’t want my child to live in a city that’s as dangerous as I experienced it to be. So, you’re right as a parent right now, I’m not considering staying and living inside the city, just for the sake of my family, but also, I think that would be something agreeable to parents nationwide. Like, who doesn’t want their kid to grow up in an environment where they can freely play, walk in the street and hang out without the threat of being, you know, threatened, or being attacked, or being shot in the street without, you know, their parents, even knowing? So, we’ve got to look at it from a more human perspective and that’s what being a new parent right now, I think, gave me.
The post (VIDEO) “I Don’t Want my Child to Live in a City That’s as Dangerous as I Experienced” – NTD White House Correspondent Discusses DC Assault and Robbery in Broad Daylight, Says She Can’t Even Walk Home Anymore appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.