Returning to the Alaska meeting, Leavitt is asked if there has been a shift in expectations on making a deal with Russia to end the war in Ukraine.

Leavitt says there hasn't been a change, but says a deal requires both countries at the table to agree, and that the Friday meeting will include Trump and Putin but not Zelensky.

Image source, Getty Images

Next, Leavitt is asked about a timeline for the crackdown currently happening in DC. She says the administration will revaluate and reassess the plan after 30 days.

Trump announced yesterday that the federal government would be taking over the capital's Metropolitan Police Department in a move heavily criticised by the city's mayor.

Washington, DC's Home Rule Act stops the president from federalising the city's police for longer than 30 days, but Congress could then extend the takeover for longer.

Leavitt was just asked about remarks made by the newly appointed head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), who said he may not continue to publish job reports.

She says it's the "plan and hope" of the administration to continue to put out BLS statistics.

Trump fired the former chief of the department Erika McEntarfer earlier this month after statistics showed lagging job growth, saying - without providing evidence - that she had politicised data coming from the department. He announced that he had appointed conservative economist EJ Antoni as her replacement yesterday.

The mechanics and the scheduling for the Trump-Putin Alaska summit on Friday are still "being ironed out", Leavitt says.

When Leavitt is asked about Trump seemingly accidentally saying he will be visiting Russia soon, Leavitt says "perhaps there are plans" for a future trip to Russia but that he is meeting Putin in Alaska, a US state.

Asked how Trump will measure the success of his meeting with Putin, Leavitt says she won't give hypotheticals and that Trump will speak to the media after the meeting.

She says it is a "listening exercise" for the president.

The discussion in the White House briefing room has now returned to the Alaskan summit between Trump and Putin set to take place on Friday.

A reporter asks Leavitt why Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has not been invited.

She says Trump hopes at some point in the future a trilateral meeting can happen, but that having the US president sit down in the room with the president of Russia will give Trump "the best indication on how to end this war".

Image source, Getty Images

Leavitt says there is "rampant violence on our streets" and that Trump will not be swayed by media coverage or Democrats who say otherwise.

As we've reported, data shows that violent crime is down in the US capital.

BBC Verify has reported that official crime statistics - published by Washington’s Metropolitan Police , external, external- show violent offences fell between 2023 and 2024, and are continuing to fall, according to preliminary data for 2025.

The data for this year to date suggests that robbery has fallen by more than a quarter and homicides by 12%, compared with the same time last year.

Leavitt is now talking about the DC "crime emergency," as Trump called it on Monday when he announced federal law enforcement deployments in Washington, DC.

She says approximately 850 officers and agents were sent across the city, and 23 arrests were made throughout the US capital last night.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt starts by talking about Donald Trump's trip to Alaska. The president will head to Anchorage on Friday morning to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin.

She says Trump is determined to end the war in Ukraine and "stop the killing".

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt has stepped up to the podium to begin her briefing to reporters.

We'll bring you the top lines here, or you can click watch live at the top of this page. Stick with us.

Image source, Getty Images

Courtney Subramanian
Reporting from the White House

Reporters packed into the White House briefing room, with every seat taken and the aisles flooded with journalists standing shoulder to shoulder as they await Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.

It’s the second day in a row where the briefing has seen more reporters usual, with yesterday’s briefing featuring a very special guest - the president himself.

Today, Leavitt will have to field all the lingering questions from Trump’s nearly two-hour briefing, including details on his much anticipated meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday, the US response to Israel’s plans in Gaza and Trump’s own federal takeover of Washington, DC.

We’ve just received a two-minute warning.

The White House press briefing is expected to begin soon. You can follow along here, and click watch live at the top of the page to stream it.

Residents of Washington DC have mixed opinions on Trump moving to deploy the National Guard, and to federalise the city's police force.

Some say they like the idea of cracking down on crime, but their support depends on how it plays out.

Others say Trump's actions are making people anxious and that his plans to get unhoused people out of the city won't work.

"He's not providing a solution to what the actual problem is, which is high cost of living, not enough mental health resources," said Melissa Velasquez, a DC commuter.

You can watch more reactions from locals in the video above.

Madeline Halpert
US Reporter

Local groups working with homeless people in the capital told the BBC they had actually seen progress in recent years.

Homelessness is down almost 20% for individuals in Washington DC in 2025 compared to five years ago, said Ralph Boyd, the president and chief executive of So Others Might Eat (SOME) - a group that provides people in the city with housing, clothing and other social services.

He also said Trump's proposal to move people out of the city was not a long-term solution.

"All it will do is transfer the problem somewhere else into communities that are perhaps less equipped to deal with it than we are," Boyd said.

US Attorney General Pam Bondi said she met with DC Mayor Muriel Bowser this morning at the Justice Department.

"We agreed that there is nothing more important than keeping residents and tourists in Washington, D.C. safe from deadly crime," Bondi wrote on X.

She said that the Justice Department, the DC city government and DC police will work together to "make Washington, D.C. safe again".

Bowser said Bondi will serve as the president's proxy, bringing requests from the White House to Bowser directly.

"What I’m focused on is the federal surge and how to make the most of the additional officer support that we have," Bowser told reporters.

The mayor added that no matter "how we got here or what we think about the circumstances, right now we have more police and we want to make sure we’re using them".

How high is the murder rate in Washington DC?published at 17:19 British Summer Time 12 August

17:19 BST 12 August

By Jake Horton

During Monday's news conference President Donald Trump said that "murders in 2023 reached the highest rate probably ever" in Washington DC, adding that numbers "just go back 25 years".

The homicide rate did rise in 2023 to about 40 per 100,000 residents - hitting the highest point in 20 years, according to FBI data.

However, that wasn’t the highest rate ever recorded - it was significantly higher in the 1990s and in the early 2000s.

So far this year, the number of homicides is down 12%, external compared with this point last year, according to the DC Metropolitan Police Department.

What do statistics show about violent crime in Washington DC?published at 17:10 British Summer Time 12 August

17:10 BST 12 August

President Trump has made repeated references to rising crime in Washington DC.

On Monday, he pledged to "rescue our nation's capital from crime" and spoke of violent gangs prowling its streets.

Official crime statistics - published by Washington’s Metropolitan Police , external - show violent offences fell between 2023 and 2024, and are continuing to fall, according to preliminary data for 2025.

The data for this year to date suggests that robbery has fallen by more than a quarter and homicides by 12%, compared with the same time last year.

But there’s a difference in how crime figures are published by DC police and by the FBI. In 2024, for example, DC police data shows a 35% fall in violent crime while the FBI’s data shows a 9% drop.

So the figures agree that crime is falling in DC, but differ on the level of that decline.

Nationally, violent crime in the US fell 4.5% between 2023 and 2024, according to the latest FBI estimates, external. These figures only include crimes that are reported to the police.

Image source, Getty Images

As well as the deployment of troops, Trump said he would place the city's police department under direct federal control using the District of Columbia Home Rule Act.

That act was instituted by former President Richard Nixon to allow residents of Washington DC - which is the only US city that is not in any of the 50 states - to elect a city council and a mayor.

But it also has a caveat that allows the president to take control of the city's police force if "special conditions of an emergency nature exist".

If the president intends to take control for longer than 48 hours, they need to provide a written notice to Congress. And even if that notice is provided, they cannot keep control of the police for longer than 30 days - unless Congress approves an extension.

Members of the National Guard have started arriving at the Guard’s headquarters at the DC Armory.

Trump declared a "public safety emergency" on Monday, deploying 800 National Guard troops to bolster hundreds of federal law enforcement officers who were deployed at the weekend.

"It's becoming a situation of complete and total lawlessness," he told reporters at the White House.

The city's Mayor Muriel Bowser has rejected the president's claims about crime, and while there was a spike in 2023, statistics show it has fallen since then. Violent crime in the city is also at a 30-year low.

Image source, Getty Images

Sakshi Venkatraman
US reporter

This has been a week chock-full of headlines from President Donald Trump, and it's only Tuesday.

So welcome to our live coverage of today’s political news.

National Guard troops have started to arrive in Washington DC on Trump's orders, after he announced on Monday that he would launch what he called a massive "clean up" effort to get rid of crime and remove people who are unhoused.

And later today, we are expecting to hear from Trump’s press secretary Karoline Leavitt, who will likely give an update on these efforts.

We’re also hoping Leavitt will speak about the historic meeting between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, scheduled to take place Friday in Alaska. The specific time and location of the meeting have not been announced yet.

Stick with us for the most important lines from Leavitt, and click watch live above to stream the press briefing.