Bowser extends DC’s expired juvenile curfew by declaring emergency

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser declared a 15-day public emergency Thursday to reinstate and extend the District’s limited juvenile curfew, as D.C. Council debates whether to make it permanent.

The curfew applies to all people younger than 18 across the District between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m. and is meant “to address disorderly behavior, prevent violence, and protect public safety,” Bowser’s office said in a news release.

The emergency order also allows D.C.’s interim police chief to declare juvenile curfew zones any time police learn that more than eight minors are planning to gather after 8 p.m. “and the safety of the youth, residents or the public is endangered,” according to the release.

It’s the law behind the numerous curfew zones in Navy Yard and the U Street corridor that D.C. has set over the past several months.

“The safety of our young people is the most important thing to me as Chief of Police and members of the Metropolitan Police Department,” Jeffery W. Carroll, the interim chief, said in the release. “Curfew zones, and an 11:00 p.m. citywide curfew, have been instrumental in keeping our young people safe.”

Thursday’s emergency order is an extension of actions taken by the Council and the mayor last year, when the Juvenile Curfew Emergency Amendment Act of 2025 amended a 1995 law.

The 2025 emergency legislation allowed old curfew rules to apply to 17-year-olds, and to be enacted on weekends, not just weekdays.

But on Wednesday, that 2025 legislation expired.

According to the release, “the extended curfew was successful in reducing fights, violence, and vandalism by young people” — though at least one group of D.C. residents criticized the curfews, saying they target and criminalize young people, especially Black teens.

That group, the Pan-African Community Action Group, rallied over the weekend to ask the Council to allow the curfews to expire.

It seems the mayor’s office stepped in with a response: Thursday’s order fills what would have been a lapse in the curfew between its expiration April 15, and April 21, when the Council is next scheduled to vote on an extension to the law.

It’s not yet clear how the Council will vote on the matter, but Bowser’s office left room for whatever changes they might make.

“The emergency declared by this Order shall be in effect for 15 calendar days unless rescinded, modified, or extended by Mayor’s Order or subsequent legislation,” the release said.