After a robbery, a D.C. store sought help. The White House sent a film crew.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2025/09/08/dc-store-robbery-white-house-video/

Gift link: https://wapo.st/4gdiAQM

After her business was looted by teenagers, Tumika Alston was quoted as telling Trump to “send the boys to Benning Road.” Then her cellphone rang.



At first she thought it was a joke: an unknown number calling her cellphone, a voice on the other end saying it was from the White House.

Tumika Alston’s mind began to race: Was this for real? Did something happen? Was she in trouble? Could this be about the store?

Just a few days earlier, Alston had given an interview to a local television station after a legion of teens forced their way into the 24-hour convenience store she owns in Northeast Washington, broke the door, toppled shelves and made off with thousands of dollars in merchandise. She was mad and desperate. So, she told the reporter from channel 7 the first thing that came to mind: “I’m telling Trump, yeah, send the boys to Benning Road.”

By then, President Donald Trump had declared a crime emergency in D.C. and ordered forces from a long list of federal agencies to patrol the city’s streets. National Guard troops were stationed outside federal buildings and famous monuments. The thrum of helicopters and wail of sirens sounded at all hours.

The White House told Alston that the administration was concerned about what had happened at her store, she later recalled, and that it wanted to know more. She agreed to a visit. Maybe that would get her some extra security, she thought, or direct all those cops to someplace they might do some good.

But when the White House team arrived, she said, all they had were cameras.

The following day, Alston’s face and story were broadcast to the nearly 13 million people who follow the White House on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram. Underneath looping grainy surveillance video of the burglary, the White House wrote on its Instagram page: “Tumika’s story is just one of the many the Fake News isn’t reporting.”

From the "pro-business" president. No assistance for black woman owned small business apparently. Plenty of tax cuts for billionaires though. Lots of officers and national guard visible at tourist areas but nothing in high crime areas.