Maryland Gov. Wes Moore defended his rhetoric towards President Donald Trump over crime in his house metropolis of Baltimore amid an escalating feud between the 2 leaders.
“I’ve no real interest in combating with the president, however I’ve an curiosity in combating for my communities and combating for our individuals,” Moore informed ABC Information’ “This Week” co-anchor Martha Raddatz in an interview that aired Sunday.
Earlier this month, Trump supplied to ship the Nationwide Guard into different cities throughout the nation after his regulation enforcement surge into Washington, D.C., calling Baltimore “up to now gone.” Moore responded by formally inviting the president to hitch him and Baltimore officers on a public security stroll.
After the 2 continued to commerce barbs on social media, Trump rebuked the invitation and renewed his menace to ship the Nationwide Guard into Baltimore, calling town a “hellhole” within the Oval Workplace on Tuesday.
ABC Information’ Martha Raddatz walks the streets of Baltimore with Maryland Governor Wes Moore.
Julia Cherner/ABC Information
“Wes Moore was telling me he desires — ‘I wish to stroll with the president.’ Effectively, I stated, ‘I wish to stroll with you, too, sometime. However first you have to clear up your crime,” Trump stated.
Baltimore, like a lot of the U.S., has seen a drop in crime and homicides in recent times, however stays one of many nation’s most violent cities. It had the fifth highest price of violent crime and fourth highest homicide price per capita in cities with no less than 100,000 individuals final yr, in response to latest FBI information.
Whereas Moore acknowledged there’s nonetheless “work to do there,” he touted the progress the state has made and known as out the president’s feedback.
ABC Information’ Martha Raddatz sits down with Maryland Governor Wes Moore in Baltimore.
Julia Cherner/ABC Information
“It will simply be nice if we might have a president of the US to really perceive that this is among the nice American turnaround tales that is occurring proper now, and we’d love the assistance to have the ability to proceed to try this work as a substitute of this — boastful criticism and cynicism that he continues to introduce into the dialog,” Moore stated.
Moore stated whereas he “would love extra federal help,” he known as the Nationwide Guard deployment in Washington, D.C. “performative.”
Raddatz pressed Moore on the discount in crime in Washington because the elevated federal presence that D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser cited this week.
“You’ve got heard Mayor Bowser say [they’ve seen an] 87% discount in carjackings, robberies lower by half. Why would not you need that right here, if that’s really serving to?” Raddatz requested.
ABC Information’ Martha Raddatz speaks with Maryland Governor Wes Moore in Baltimore.
Nathan Luna/ABC Information
“If the president of the US had been to have a severe dialog with me and say, what can we do — significantly once you take a look at the price of the Nationwide Guard of nicely over one million {dollars} a day?” Moore responded. “I might inform him issues like, we want to ensure we’re growing funding for native regulation enforcement.”
“Asking me to deploy my Nationwide Guard, people who find themselves not educated for municipal policing, is simply not a severe strategy,” Moore added.
In posts on his social media platform, Trump has additionally resurfaced an issue over Moore’s navy file. The New York Instances reported final yr that Moore falsely claimed to have been awarded a Bronze Star in a 2006 White Home utility. Throughout his 2022 marketing campaign, clips of Moore being launched as a Bronze Star recipient and never correcting the interviewers in 2008 and 2010 surfaced.
Moore had been really helpful for the medal however didn’t obtain it till final yr and has known as it an “trustworthy mistake.”
Governor Wes Moore formally receives the Bronze Star Medal in a ceremony on the Governors Mansion in Annapolis, Maryland, on Dec. 20, 2024. Lt. Common Michael Fenzel, United States Coordinator to Israel and Palestinian Authority pins the bronze star medal on Governor Wes Moore.
Marvin Joseph/The Washington Put up by way of Getty Photographs, FILE
In response, Moore known as Trump “President Bone Spurs” in a publish on X, referencing Trump’s medical deferment from the Vietnam draft.
Moore stated about his publish: “When the president desires to assault my navy file as somebody who’s really a adorned fight veteran, as somebody who really has served abroad, as somebody who has defended the nation, I simply suppose that if the president desires to have an actual debate about public service and in regards to the sacrifice for this nation, he ought to actually sit that debate out. I am not the one he desires to have it with.”
Requested why he put the Bronze Star on his 2006 utility, Moore informed Raddatz he “did not give it some thought” since his commanding officers informed him to incorporate it.
“I feel it is fairly frequent data or frequent perception that when your, when your commanding officers, and your superior officers inform you, ‘Pay attention, we put you in, and we have gone by all the pieces, in order you are going by your utility, embrace it.'” Moore stated. “I included it, and I did not give it some thought.”
Pressed on why he did not appropriate the interviewers after they wrongly launched him, Moore stated “Even on the time of these interviews, it wasn’t one thing I thought of.”
“Now I am grateful that the navy, after they discovered that the paperwork was misplaced and did not course of [it], that they got here again and awarded me the Bronze Star,” Moore stated. “So I do have a Bronze Star that I earned in Afghanistan and a Fight Motion Badge that I earned in Afghanistan. So I am happy with that, however that is not why I served.”
“However do you remorse not correcting once you had been launched that manner?” Raddatz requested.
“I do not remorse not going again and constantly trying over my service data. I do not. I am grateful for the service I did. I am grateful for the truth that I had the chance to steer troopers in fight, what a small fraction of this individuals of this nation will ever perceive,” Moore responded.
Governor of Maryland Wes Moore speaks onstage through the 2025 ESSENCE Pageant Of Tradition at Ernest N. Morial Conference Middle in New Orleans.
Arturo Holmes/Getty Photographs for ESSENCE, FILE
Moore’s nationwide profile has risen from his public conflict with the president and a few have drawn comparisons to California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s brash type.
Requested how Democrats ought to strategy taking over Trump, Moore stated the social gathering ought to “transfer with the sort of aggression that’s vital.”
“The Democrats do not have a messaging drawback, there is a outcomes drawback. The Democrats need to ship outcomes and cease being the social gathering of no and sluggish and begin being the social gathering of sure and now as a result of the frustration that individuals have, it’s actual,” Moore stated.
Whereas hypothesis mounts about his future presidential ambitions, Moore stated he is centered on delivering outcomes for Marylanders.
“You have to concentrate on defending your individuals proper now and the problems that the individuals in our states are going through, and that is the place I do know my focus is,” Moore stated.
