NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
A Memphis mother says President Donald Trump’s federal crime crackdown silenced the gunfire that years of pleas to local leaders could not and finally allowed her children to play outside.
“For once, I’m walking to my mailbox and it’s quiet,” Dalisia Ballinger told Fox News Digital. “I’m hearing the birds chirp. I’m hearing the birds sing. I’m seeing children play in the middle of the street. I’m seeing fathers playing football.”
The striking turnaround turned Ballinger, a former journalist and violent-crime victim, into one of the most outspoken supporters of the Memphis Safe Task Force as the operation marks one year on the ground.
It also put her at the center of a growing clash with Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy, a Democrat whose lawsuit against two new state oversight laws has sparked a petition demanding that he abandon the legal fight and disclose how his office handles cases generated by the task force.
FORMER CHICAGO DETECTIVE SAYS ONE CITY’S MURDER PLUNGE OFFERS WINDY CITY CRIME BLUEPRIN
A Memphis Police Department officer, right, patrols with members of the National Guard, Friday, Oct. 10, 2025, in Memphis, Tenn. (George Walker IV/AP Photo)
“Public safety should not be up for debate,” Ballinger said. “I don’t care if you are a Republican. I don’t care if you are a Democrat.”
Trump established the multi-agency operation through a presidential memorandum on Sept. 15, 2025, ordering federal, state and local authorities to coordinate against street and violent crime in Memphis. The task force is led by the U.S. Marshals Service and includes mobilized members of the Tennessee National Guard.
The White House said Tuesday that the operation had produced 12,747 arrests as of Sept. 15, including 131 homicide arrests, 1,276 firearms arrests and 1,408 arrests of known gang members.
The administration also credited the task force with taking 2,160 illegal guns off the streets and recovering 189 missing children.
FBI ANNOUNCES 305 ARRESTS, 24 MISSING CHILDREN RECOVERED IN CHICAGO DURING OPERATION NEW DAWN
President Donald Trump speaks during an event to sign a memorandum to send federal resources to Memphis, Tennessee, for a surge against local crime, in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., on September 15, 2025. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)
Overall crime in Memphis fell nearly 36% compared with the previous year, while murders dropped 36%, robberies fell 42% and vehicle thefts plunged 57%, according to figures released by the White House. City data had already shown crime falling before the task force arrived, and the statistics do not establish how much of the decline resulted directly from the federal surge.
“That era is over. President Trump rejected the excuses, restored law and order, and once again proved that decline is a choice,” the White House said.
FBI REPORTS LARGEST DROP IN VIOLENT CRIME AND MURDER SINCE 1937 AS HOMICIDES FALL MORE THAN 18%
Ballinger said the change became personal when her children could play outdoors without the constant fear that had gripped her neighborhood.
She recalled a shooting four houses away in which she said roughly 30 gunshots struck a home occupied by a grandmother and her grandchildren. The family never returned, she said, leaving the property overtaken by grass and weeds.
TRUMP’S DC CRIME CRACKDOWN ‘WORKING’ AS CITY SEES HOMICIDES PLUMMET 43% SINCE 2025: SLAIN INTERN’S MOM
“We’ve been begging for years for our local leaders for assistance and for help,” Ballinger said. “My children deserve peace, and with the Memphis Safe Task Force being here, we’ve finally been able to get that peace.”
Now, she and other supporters argue the operation’s arrests mean little if prosecutors later reduce or dismiss cases without explaining why.
PROSECUTOR OUSTED AFTER ALLEGED ROMANCE WITH ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT SEX-CRIME SUSPECT: ‘PATTERN OF MISCONDUCT’
Federal law enforcement officers stand at the intersection of Beale St. and N. Second St., Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2025, in Memphis. (George Walker IV/AP Photo)
A Change.org petition titled “Stop Memphis DA From Protecting Criminals” had gathered nearly 10,000 verified signatures Wednesday.
The petition calls on Mulroy to drop a May lawsuit challenging the Memphis Safe Task Force Accountability Act and a separate law that authorizes the Tennessee attorney general to audit his office’s decisions in task force cases.
The accountability law requires Mulroy’s office to submit a report every 10 business days when it settles or dismisses a charge arising from the task force. The second law allows the state attorney general to review prosecutorial decisions in those cases and ask the Tennessee Supreme Court to appoint a temporary prosecutor.
PRIMARY SHOWDOWN: CONSERVATIVE FIREBRAND MARSHA BLACKBURN EYES GOVERNOR’S OFFICE IN TENNESSEE
Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy is challenging two Tennessee laws that increase oversight of his office’s handling of Memphis Safe Task Force cases. (Fox News Digital)
Mulroy argues that both laws unconstitutionally single out Shelby County, intrude on the discretion of a locally elected prosecutor and burden his staff with duplicative reporting. His office said it already reports case outcomes under existing Tennessee law.
“These bills target Shelby County unfairly and infringe on the rights of Shelby County voters,” Mulroy said when the lawsuit was filed. He has characterized the dispute as a battle over whether Shelby County voters or state officials in Nashville control the district attorney’s office.
Petition supporters see the lawsuit differently.
“Thanks to President Trump, the Memphis Safe Task Force has delivered more for this city in one year than anyone thought possible,” Ballinger, one of the petition’s leading voices, said in a statement. “While federal, state, and local agents risk their lives taking criminals off our streets, DA Mulroy is fighting in court to hide how his office is undermining this task force.”
President Donald Trump arrives to participate in a roundtable discussion on public safety at a Tennessee Air National Guard Base, Monday, March 23, 2026, in Memphis. (Mark Schiefelbein/AP Photo)
U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Tennessee state Sen. Brent Taylor previously pressed Mulroy for details after his office reported that 430 of 514 felony cases resolved in December 2025 ended without prison time and that 166 of the cases were categorized as violent. The lawmakers said the figures left unanswered how many defendants in violent cases received no prison sentence. Mulroy has accused his Republican critics of distorting crime data for political purposes.
Ballinger rejected the claim that the petition is merely a partisan campaign against a Democratic prosecutor.
“We have children. We have regular people that might not even be into politics,” she said. “We deserve peace. Whether it’s on the East Coast, the West Coast or South, we all deserve peace.”
MISSISSIPPI DISTRICT ATTORNEY JODY OWENS RESIGNS AFTER PLEADING GUILTY IN FEDERAL BRIBERY CASE: REPORT
Some Memphis residents think the police department, Tennessee Highway Patrol troopers and FBI are effectively fighting crime. (Fox News)
The task force has also drawn fierce opposition. The ACLU of Tennessee and several Memphis residents have accused agents of aggressive policing and retaliation against people who record law enforcement.
Four residents filed a federal lawsuit this year alleging harassment, unlawful arrests and physical mistreatment while exercising their First Amendment rights.
The allegations have not been proven in court, while task force supporters point to thousands of arrests and sharply falling crime numbers as evidence the operation is working.
Ballinger said legitimate complaints should be reviewed, but she does not believe they justify dismantling an operation she credits with making her neighborhood livable again.
“I’m all for fairness, and I’m all for law and order,” she said. “If we need to go back to the table [and] restructure so that people can feel safe, we can definitely put that on the board.”
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
For Ballinger, the anniversary is measured less by government statistics than by what she can see and hear beyond her front door.
“It was noticeably enough to where it’s like, ‘Wow, there’s kids actually outside playing,’” she said.
Fox News Digital reached out to Mulroy’s office for comment.