Minnesota Representative and Democratic Senate candidate Angie Craig recently condemned President Donald Trump’s crackdown on crime in Washington, D.C.
But just two years ago, she was assaulted randomly by a strange man inside her D.C. apartment. Her attacker, Kendrid Hamlin, is set to be released in just 3 more months.
Referring to Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to the nation’s capital, Craig posted on X Tuesday that “President Trump’s actions are totally unjustified and a waste of taxpayer dollars.”
But Craig was not opposed to cleaning up the city streets when she was assaulted in an elevator of her own apartment complex by a homeless man who was reportedly on drugs.
In February 2023, Craig reported that Hamlin was seen in the lobby area of her apartment building “acting erratic.”
The congresswoman told police that after she told Hamlin “good morning,” he followed her into the elevator and “began to randomly do push ups.” Craig told police that he then punched her on the chin area of her face, and later grabbed her neck.
After defending herself, Craig escaped with no major injuries and called for the man to be brought to justice.
Hamlin was soon arrested, and he assaulted the two officers who apprehended him. It then came out that Craig was Hamlin’s “assault number 13” on the repeat offender’s record, which made Craig promise “to do everything in my power to make sure there is not a 14, a 15, a 20.”
Hamlin is currently serving the last 3 months of his meager 27-month sentence on assault charges.
According to Craig, it bothered her that Hamlin had previously attacked 12 people and had never served more than 30 days in jail.
While announcing her Senate bid for the 2026 election year, Craig said in an interview that her harrowing experience just two years prior was “a pivotal moment in my life” and that “it took about six months to build up the mental health strength … to be able to evaluate whether I was going to move forward or not.”
“Understanding that the man who assaulted me was homeless and was an addict and that we failed him as a country — all of those things can be true at the same time– in addition to [the fact that] I was his thirteenth count of assault,” she said.
Now, she’s condemning the crackdown on crime in Washington, D.C… because it is being led by the Republican administration.
“It’s hypocritical and shameful for Congresswoman Craig, a DC crime victim who experienced a traumatic assault, to oppose efforts to ensure what happened to her doesn’t happen to anyone else,” National Republican Senate Committee Press Secretary Nick Puglia said in a statement. “All Americans deserve to be safe, regardless of their job title, but Craig claims efforts to make the nation’s capital safe are ‘unjustified.'”
Trump’s crackdown on D.C. crime has also faced opposition from anti-police groups like Free DC, whose leaders have their own criminal records in the district.
Free DC advisory council member Darrell Gaston served sentences of community service for two cases involving violence and threats in the past nine years, while the group’s executive director Keya Chatterjee and campaign director Alex Dodds both have misdemeanors on their records that were dismissed after they paid bond, court records show.
Free DC organized a protest downtown on Monday and encouraged residents to “get visible,” “get loud” and “bang pots and pans” at night in response to Trump’s law enforcement agenda in the nation’s capital.
Free DC Project Instagram account urging residents to “get loud” in opposition to Trump’s “occupation” of DC by going outside at 8pm to “bang pots and pans, sing, chant, or make noise for five minutes.” pic.twitter.com/OSqkKffc8m
— Audrey Fahlberg (@AudreyFahlberg) August 12, 2025
Authorities had charged Gaston, formerly a local politician, with assault and attempted threats to do bodily harm in 2016, according to court records. He later pleaded guilty to the second charge and received no jail time under a D.C. deferred sentencing program. He wound up in court on another assault charge in 2018 and was again sentenced to community service after pleading guilty.
Gaston also faced a civil complaint of harassment in 2012 and one of assault and battery in 2019 while he served as an Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner in D.C., documents show. The first complaint involved a woman who accused him of trying to break into her home, and the second came from an individual alleging that he threatened assault over a disagreement.
“The court should grant my request because I fear for my safety,” the second plaintiff wrote in May 2019. “The defendant has threatened to bring harm to me. I believe him because he has been found guilty of physical harm to others in the past.”
Dodds, Free DC’s campaign director, faced a charge of crowding, obstructing, or incommoding four times from July 2018 to July 2025, and the latest case is ongoing, court records show. The first three incidents are listed as “post and forfeit” cases, meaning that Dodds allowed the court to keep bond money she posted in exchange for no conviction.
Chatterjee, the group’s executive director, also has two “post and forfeit” cases of unlawful assembly or disorderly conduct and crowding, obstructing, or incommoding since 2016, court documents show.
Trump mobilized the National Guard and more federal law enforcement agents into D.C.’s streets following the Aug. 3 assault of a former Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) staffer in the district and the president’s long-held complaints about violent crime. Trump also authorized Attorney General Pam Bondi to initiate a federal takeover of D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department.
Although many Democrats have criticized Trump’s move to crack down on crime in the nation’s capital, the president is swiftly moving forward with plans to extend his takeover of the city by calling on Congress to pass a resolution enabling him to do so.
“We think the Democrats will not do anything to stop crime, but we think the Republicans will do it almost unanimously,” Trump said.
Free DC is a “fiscally hosted special project” of two nonprofits that have received funding from large left-wing groups such as George Soros’s Open Society Foundations and the Tides Foundation.
Free DC bills itself as a force for “racial justice” and against “attempts to further police or militarize our schools and communities,” its website says. The group traces its movement’s political roots to former Democratic D.C. mayor and convicted drug offender Marion Barry.