Why D.C.’s Missing Children Became a Political Rallying Cry

All but 18 have been solved.

When the Washington, D.C., police department began sharing pictures of the District’s missing children on social media earlier this year, its goal was simply to spread the word. Then the faces of more than two dozen black and Latino kids and teens began circulating on Twitter in March, and people took notice in a way the city’s police may never have intended.

Many in the capital’s black community were startled by the posts. Some grew infuriated, believing police had not done enough to respond to or to publicize what appeared to be a wave of disappearances. Activists saw a racial dimension to the apparent scarcity of news coverage of scores of black and brown youth vanishing, their names left unspoken. Outrage spread virally, as it tends to on social media. On Instagram celebrities shared posts about the case. “Missing girls” began to trend in search.

But the facts didn’t match. City officials say reports of missing kids in the District have actually fallen slightly from past years. Some of the children in the shared pictures have been found and many were runaways. Of the 549 missing-juveniles cases in the nation’s capital, all but 18 have been closed as of March 29.

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