America's Talking - Trump Moves to End Cashless Bail in D.C., Nationwide

Episode Date: August 30, 2025

(The Center Square) – Two weeks after declaring “Liberation Day” in Washington, D.C., to combat crime, President Donald Trump signed executive orders to end cashless bail in the nation’s capital, while taking steps to eliminate it throughout the country. The president signed the executive orders on Monday morning in the Oval Office. The moves threaten to withhold federal funding from states and jurisdictions that don’t comply with his executive action, which could have a major impact on states like California and Illinois. Support this podcast: https://secure.anedot.com/franklin-news-foundation/ce052532-b1e4-41c4-945c-d7ce2f52c38a?source_code=xxxxxxRead more: https://www.thecentersquare.com/national/article_75d94d90-a498-4c41-b955-2d38a159ec8b.html Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Greetings, everyone, and welcome to America's Talking, powered by the Center Square. I'm Dan McAulip, Chief Content Officer at Franklin News Foundation, publisher of the Center Square Newswire Service. After deploying the National Guard to Washington, D.C., to fight crime in the nation's capital city, President Donald Trump signed an executive order this week to withhold federal grants from jurisdictions with no-cash-bail policies. Join me to discuss this is the Center Square, Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief Sarah, Sarah, tell us more about this. executive order. Yes. So this is one of his latest things to sort of crack down on sort of crime or his, to sort of get his law and order initiative out there. And so the first

one was to revoke, basically, to rescind the cashless bail policy in D.C., which is very kind of different to the approach on that one from the nationwide, a nationwide rescission of the, of casualty bail. With a cashless bail, one with nationwide with just jurisdictions, what he's trying to do is have Attorney General identify locations and states and whatnot that have cashless bail policies in place and is then going to have department agencies, federal, you know, heads of federal agencies, identify, hey, what grants, what money, contracts and everything like that are going to these jurisdictions or states in some cases and saying, hey, if you don't change this policy,

because obviously the federal government cannot go in and change these policies since these states and cities. However, they can say, hey, then we're going to withhold federal money until you change these policies. So on sort of Republican sides or people who are critical of cashless bail, they believe that sort of it takes away the incentive like that financial incentive, it also sort of becomes a revolving door for criminals, lets them out, pre-trial. I mean, there's different, each jurisdiction, each place that has it, they vary as far as what they would consider casual spail.

I mean, sometimes it's misdemeanors. Well, sometimes, you know, if you've committed felonies, no, you can't get casual spail and whatnot. But it's an interesting thing and seeing how it's going to go. I think it'll be interesting once Congress comes back. because especially with the DC one, really the president's kind of limited on that. There's really going to be a lot of have to really rely on Congress to sort of get some of that stuff through. Sir, let's talk a little bit about cashless bail for a minute for listeners who might not be all that familiar with it.

It's a relatively new phenomenon that's happening in mostly in blue jurisdictions across the country. Advocates for the system say it's a fairness and equity issue. Individuals who have been charged with a crime but have not yet been convicted, these advocates say they shouldn't have to languish, excuse me, in jail just because they don't have the money in their bank account to postpone. While more well-off, criminal suspects who are arrested for a crime, who are able to post-bond, they're able to get out of jail pre-trial until their case is adjudicated. But opponents, as you said, say it's a public safety issue. Accused criminals who are released without posting bonds,

sometimes commit additional crimes while they're out on pretrial release. I'm here in Illinois. Illinois enacted cashless bail for almost all crimes in 2023, the first state to do so statewide. And that includes both misdemeanors and felonies. We have a case, a recent case here in Illinois, for example, where a Mexican national who was in the U.S. illegally, concealed the death of a young woman for two months. He said the woman overdosed in his home, and he was concerned he would be accused of killing her.

So he dumped her body in a trash can, kept it there for two months until authorities got wind of it. and founder. When police discovered the body, he was charged with three crimes, but under what's called in Illinois the Pretrial Fairness Act, he was released without posting bail. Many in the law enforcement community, many Republicans in the state, said that shows an extreme flaw in the system. This person should not have been released pretrial without having to post a bond. He is a foreign national. he could, you know, flee the jurisdiction, not show up for his court dates, etc. So that's essentially what Trump is trying to address with his executive orders. Yes, yes.

And there's been a lot of pushback. I mean, and yes, like places like Illinois, New York, L.A., with this cashless bail, with these, there has been some, you know, serious cases where it's been ongoing, where it's, you know, it's felonies or it's, you know, serious crimes or even some of these people committing maybe lower, lower, you know, cured crimes and then go, they're immediately released and go out and do another one. And there's even been criminals even recently in D.C. that were released and have basically said, well, we know we're just going to get out. We know. So there's really not that consequence. There's no consequence to our crime. So we just, we're going to go out and

do it again. And so Republicans have pointed to that. Obviously, yes, Democrats are or supporters, of cashless bail say, hey, it's an equity stuff. But it's interesting because it does, I mean, vary throughout the country as far as, you know, some of it is just misdemeanors. I mean, it's, and then there's been some, you know, some leniency too with some of that. So it is a very interesting sort of take on it.

Where it has kind of, I don't know the statistics myself, but there has been, I know, quite a bit of pushback. There seems to be, even from sort of the public perspective on it, word is an act. There does show larger crime. I mean, doesn't appear to show any sort of reduction in crime. And as sort of the Republicans should say, hey, it is, it's a revolving door. And so that's what President Trump is trying to tackle here is one of the things he's trying to do is, yeah, like bringing back law and order. But it is kind of interesting, though, with D.C.

I mean, it seems that appears that he's trying to get it done mostly in D.C. Because his exacting order said, we will be taking steps. It will be taking steps to eliminate it throughout the country. So we don't know the timeline really on that, how long that's going to take, what's going to happen. But it'll be interesting to see, at least with D.C., how things shape, you know, sort of shape up and, you know, what happens with it. So, you know, there's been, of course, the crime crackdown, too. So that helps. But I think he also recognizes that you can put police on the streets. He had also mentioned during his announcement of Liberation Day in D.C. was, hey, there are so many police, for instance, using D.C. as an example. So many police in D.C. You can have all these police on the streets. But one of the issues he's trying to tackle is sort of, you know, the judicial side of it. The prosecuting. the judges and all of that other stuff. So he's, I think he's trying to go, he's trying to tackle sort of crime and law and order, both with the policing side and then also, you know,

with judges and prosecutors in this sense. Like with many of President Trump's executive orders, this one will probably be challenged in court if President Trump does go ahead and withhold federal funds from those jurisdictions. Sarah, thank you for joining us today. Listeners can keep up with this story and more at thecenter square.com. I don't know.