National Guard Deployments thread

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Illinois filed a lawsuit Monday in an attempt to block the Trump administration from deploying federalized National Guard troops on the streets of Chicago, but the judge assigned to the case indicated she wouldn't take any action until Thursday at the earliest.

Attorneys for the state had urged U.S. District Judge April Perry to issue a ruling immediately after lawyers for the Justice Department acknowledged that members of the state National Guard and members of the Texas National Guard could be activated in the city as soon as Tuesday.

The judge said she needed time to go through the government's response to the suit and scheduled a hearing for Thursday, and she declined to sign the state's temporary restraining order in the meantime.

The suit alleges the administration's efforts to send the National Guard into the state are illegal and unconstitutional.

“The American people, regardless of where they reside, should not live under the threat of occupation by the United States military, particularly not simply because their city or state leadership has fallen out of a president’s favor,” the Illinois attorney general's office wrote in the filing, which names President Donald Trump, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll as defendants.

“The Trump administration’s illegal actions already have subjected and are subjecting Illinois to serious and irreparable harm,” the suit says.

The White House maintained Trump's actions are lawful.

“Amidst ongoing violent riots and lawlessness, that local leaders like [Illinois Gov. JB] Pritzker have refused to step in to quell, President Trump has exercised his lawful authority to protect federal officers and assets. President Trump will not turn a blind eye to the lawlessness plaguing American cities,” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said in a statement.

Representatives for the Justice Department, Army and Department of Homeland Security didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment. The Defense Department declined to comment.

A federal judge in Oregon issued two separate orders over the weekend temporarily blocking the Trump administration from sending federalized National Guard members from California — or any other state — to Portland, Oregon. Portland and Chicago are part of a wave of Democrat-run cities and states that Trump has targeted with federal troops.

“This country has a longstanding and foundational tradition of resistance to government overreach, especially in the form of military intrusion into civil affairs,” U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut, a Trump appointee, wrote in one of her rulings.

The suit brought on behalf of Illinois and the city of Chicago makes similar arguments about federal overreach.

“The Federalization Order’s deployment of federalized military forces to protect federal personal and property from 'violent demonstrations' that 'are occurring or are likely to occur' represents the exact type of intrusion on State power that is at the heart of the Tenth Amendment," it says.

“The deployment of federalized National Guard, including from another state, infringes on Illinois’s sovereignty and right to self-governance. It will cause only more unrest, including harming social fabric and community relations and increasing the mistrust of police. It also creates economic harm, depressing business activities and tourism that not only hurt Illinoisians but also hurt Illinois’s tax revenue,” the suit says.

As President Donald Trump clashes with Democratic governors over his push to deploy federalized National Guard troops to their cities, several former Republican governors are raising concerns about strong-arm tactics and constitutional crises — while also noting that the president has wide latitude to deploy the guard.

The three former governors, who have long histories of criticizing Trump, also expressed a sense of resignation, saying they believe he will charge ahead unless the courts rein him in.

“This is infuriating,” former New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman, who left the Republican Party in 2022 after years of opposing Trump and endorsing his opponents, said in an interview. “It is stoking resentment and fanning the flames. But as a governor there is nothing you can do to really stop the president from federalizing the guard”.

Former Ohio Gov. John Kasich expressed concern with the communication between the Trump administration and state and local officials.

“I would say: ‘Here are my problems. What can you do to help me? Work with me. Don’t just shove stuff down my throat,’” said Kasich, a Republican who ran against Trump in the 2016 GOP presidential primaries and has since been a prominent anti-Trump voice in the party.

While these former governors are critics, their perspectives as former chief executives of their states are instructive when active Republicans dealing with the White House and its political objectives on a daily basis are less inclined to publicly scrutinize Trump.

Sitting GOP governors were less eager to weigh in on the matter, which could escalate if Trump invokes the Insurrection Act, a step he said he would consider if resistance from mayors, governors and courts makes it “necessary.” Roughly a dozen GOP governors, through their spokespeople, either declined or have not yet responded to requests for comment.

“Uninformed criticisms from irrelevant former politicians shouldn’t be given the time of day,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in an emailed statement. “President Trump is lawfully taking action to protect federal officers and assets amidst ongoing violent riots and lawlessness that Democrat leaders, like [Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker and California Gov. Gavin Newsom] have refused to quell. Why aren’t these washed up nobodies concerned with Democrat inaction to address violent crime and riots?”

The political fallout is falling largely along partisan lines.

The White House has cast Trump’s desire to send troops into Democratic-run cities and states as an effort to curb crime and protect Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and facilities that administration officials say are being targeted by rioters. Trump most recently has called for deploying federalized guard members to Chicago and Portland, Oregon, drawing pushback and lawsuits from the Democratic governors in those states.

A Trump ally, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, is on record embracing the administration’s efforts, writing Sunday on X that he had “fully authorized” Trump to deploy 400 Texas National Guard members to other states. And Trump’s push to mobilize the National Guard and other federal law enforcement agencies in Memphis, Tennessee, has met with support there from Republican Gov. Bill Lee.

“You can either fully enforce protection for federal employees or get out of the way and let [the] Texas Guard do it,” Abbott wrote in his social media post. “No Guard can match the training, skill, and expertise of the Texas National Guard.”

Peter Finocchio, a spokesperson for Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia, did not specifically address the recent developments in Oregon and Illinois but described the governor's administration as supportive of Trump's goals. Finocchio noted the Virginia National Guard's mobilization last month of about 40 soldiers and airmen to “provide administrative and logistics support to ICE at locations across the Commonwealth.”

The mission, Finocchio added, is expected to continue through Nov. 15.

At a news conference Monday, Pritzker suggested that Trump was trying to sow unrest so he can invoke the Insurrection Act. The measure — which allows the president to mobilize the U.S. military to conduct civilian law enforcement activities under certain circumstances — was last used during the 1992 Los Angeles riots.

“The Trump administration is following a playbook: Cause chaos, create fear and confusion, make it seem like peaceful protesters are a mob by firing gas pellets and tear gas canisters at them,” Pritzker said.

Pritzker also threatened this week to withdraw from the National Governors Association if the nonpartisan group does not take a stand against Trump's National Guard moves.

Illinois sued Monday to block the Trump administration from deploying troops to Chicago. A judge declined to immediately block the administration’s move and instead scheduled a hearing for Thursday.

Kasich, who said he was upset about a recent aggressive ICE operation involving a helicopter at a Chicago apartment complex, urged more pragmatic discussions about crime and immigration. Kasich marveled at the success that Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, has had in courting the president on initiatives important to her state. Whitmer, like Pritzker and California's Newsom, another Democrat opposed to Trump’s deployments, is seen as a potential White House contender in 2028.

“Everybody’s running for president, but I can’t blame it all on them, either,” Kasich said. “There’s not much communication coming the other way,” from the Trump administration to the governors.

Whitman was blunter when assessing the partisan politics, asserting that Trump is “absolutely” targeting Democratic states.

“And what I want to say to Republicans who voted for him in those states,” Whitman added, “is, ‘How is that working out for you? Are you happy?

White House officials have held increasingly serious discussions in recent days about President Donald Trump invoking the Insurrection Act, a rarely used 19th century law that gives the president the power to deploy active-duty troops inside the U.S. for law enforcement purposes, five people with knowledge of the talks told NBC News.

The discussions come as Trump has sought to deploy National Guard troops in several major cities — including Los Angeles, Chicago and Portland, Oregon — saying they’re needed to reduce crime and protect Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials from protesters. Critics have said that the Trump administration is exaggerating issues in those cities.

A decision to invoke the act is not expected to be imminent, one senior administration official said. Were it to happen, it would be a notable escalation. The guard is currently deployed in limited support roles since active-duty members of the military are forbidden from conducting civilian law enforcement actions, such as conducting searches and making arrests. But the Insurrection Act allows the president to deploy troops inside the U.S. for that purpose.

Trump’s plans to deploy the National Guard have occasionally hit legal hurdles. A federal judge in Oregon on Sunday blocked the president from sending guard members from any state to Portland. The next day, Trump said publicly that he would invoke the Insurrection Act “if it was necessary.”

“If people were being killed, and courts were holding us up, or governors or mayors were holding us up, sure, I’d do that,” Trump said. As of now, he said, it hasn’t been needed.

Talk inside the White House about invoking the act has ebbed and flowed since Trump took office again in January, said the five people, who include the senior administration official, two people familiar with the discussions and two people close to the White House.

But the debate inside the administration has shifted recently, from whether it makes sense to invoke the act to more deeply exploring how and when it might be invoked, both people close to the White House said.

Administration officials have drafted legal defenses and various options for invoking the act, two of the people said.

But the current, broad consensus among the president’s aides has been to exhaust all other options before taking that step, the senior administration official and one of the people close to the White House said.

The person close to the White House described the process as working its way up “an escalatory ladder.”

Asked about discussions regarding invoking the Insurrection Act, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement: “The Trump administration is committed to restoring law and order in American cities that are plagued by violence due to Democrat mismanagement. And President Trump will not stand by while violent rioters attack federal law enforcement officers. The administration will work to protect federal assets and officers while making American cities safe again.”

The act gives the president broad discretion regarding its invocation. It can be invoked at the request of a state or when the president determines that conditions like “unlawful obstructions,” “rebellion” or “insurrection” have made it difficult to enforce the law. During the Civil Rights era, three presidents — Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson — used the act to protect activists or enforce court orders mandating desegregation. It was last used, at the request of California’s governor, during the 1992 Los Angeles riots.

The governors of Oregon and Illinois both oppose the sending of troops to their states. There are no riots, and authorities there are not defying court orders.

The White House expects that any potential invocation of the act would be met with swift legal challenges and ultimately land at the Supreme Court.

Last month, a federal judge ruled that the White House’s deployment of active-duty troops to Los Angeles in June was illegal under the Posse Comitatus Act, a 19th century law that prevents the military from being used as police. After that decision, administration officials revived discussions and internal legal analyses around invoking the Insurrection Act, according to two of the people familiar with the discussions and one person close to the White House.

But Trump was cautioned that doing so under current circumstances might not hold up in the Supreme Court, which would break his series of victories there, these people said, and the idea was tabled for a time.

A White House official declined to discuss specific deliberations but said the president’s legal team is focused on charting a legal pathway that can withstand judicial scrutiny.

“Ultimately it’s the president’s vision and the president’s policies that he got elected to implement that the attorneys are just working hard to defend,” the White House official said. “We’re working hard to look at the law and say, ‘How do we achieve the president’s vision?’”

Trump considered invoking the act in his first term during the protests after George Floyd’s killing in 2020. He declined despite the urging of some allies and later regretted that decision, according to the senior administration official. He is viewing his current decision through that lens, the senior administration official said.

One of Trump’s deputy chiefs of staff, Stephen Miller, has been a leading and longtime proponent of invoking the Insurrection Act. Miller has been at the center of discussions on the issue since Trump took office, said the five sources plus another person familiar with the discussions.

Administration officials have discussed invoking the act if local law enforcement cannot or will not protect ICE and federal law enforcement agents, one of the people familiar with the discussions said.

But one concern that some officials have raised is that invoking the act could eventually lead to pitting active-duty U.S. troops against other Americans, this person said.

Trump has stepped up his use of the word “insurrection” to describe developments in Portland and Chicago in recent days. On Monday he said the pushback on ICE agents’ attempts to carry out immigration enforcement operations in both cities is “criminal insurrection.”

Trump and Miller have described the protesters against ICE operations in Chicago and Portland as participating in organized violence against the federal government.

Some 500 National Guard members have arrived in the Chicago area and are mobilized for an initial period of 60 days, despite an ongoing lawsuit challenging their deployment there, according to a statement Wednesday morning from U.S. Northern Command, a part of the Defense Department.

About 200 members from multiple units in the Texas National Guard and some 300 members from multiple units in the Illinois National Guard have been activated and sent to Chicagoland, the statement said. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker has denounced the deployment as an unconstitutional invasion.

The troops are stationed at the Army Reserve center in Elwood, outside of Joliet, Illinois, about an hour southwest of Chicago.

“These forces will protect U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other U.S. Government personnel who are performing federal functions, including the enforcement of federal law, and to protect federal property,” U.S. Northern Command said in its statement.

On Tuesday, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek directed U.S. Northern Command to demobilize Oregon’s 200 National Guard troops and return another 200 California National Guard members to their state.

Referencing the judge’s decision temporarily blocking Trump from sending the National Guard into Portland, Kotek said in a statement, “Judge Karin J. Immergut’s orders are a clear and forceful rebuttal to President Trump’s misuse of states’ National Guard.”

“Thus, I am directing Northern Command to send Oregon’s citizen-soldiers home from Camp Rilea immediately,” Kotek said. “Let’s remember that these Oregonians are our neighbors and friends, who have been unlawfully uprooted from their family and careers — they deserve better than this.”

It was unclear if Kotek’s letter to U.S. Northern Command would have any effect. The governor’s office did not respond to a request for comment from NBC News regarding legal standing for directing U.S. Northern Command to send troops home. NBC News also reached out to U.S. Northern Command for comment.

Vice President JD Vance indicated in an interview on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” on Sunday that President Donald Trump was not opposed to invoking the Insurrection Act.

Asked by moderator Kristen Welker whether the White House was seriously considering invoking the 1807 statute, Vance said, “The president is looking at all his options.”

“Right now he hasn’t felt he needed to,” he added.

Responding to the question about the Insurrection Act, Vance pointed to attacks on law enforcement officers who are enforcing immigration laws.

“The problem here is not the Insurrection Act or whether we actually invoke it or not. The problem is the fact that the entire media in this country, cheered on by a few far-left lunatics, have made it OK to tee off on American law enforcement,” Vance told Welker. “We cannot accept that in the United States of America.”

Pressed as to whether there was a “rebellion” in the cities to trigger the Insurrection Act, Vance accused the cities of not “keeping the statistics properly,” without offering proof.

“The president just wants people to be kept safe, and we’re exploring everything that we can do to make sure that the American people are safe in their own country,” Vance said.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he is removing National Guard troops from Chicago, Los Angeles and Portland, Oregon, following a major setback at the Supreme Court.

“We will come back, perhaps in a much different and stronger form, when crime begins to soar again — Only a question of time!” Trump said on Truth Social.

The Supreme Court last week declined an emergency request from the Trump administration that said the troops were necessary to protect federal agents working in Chicago to enforce immigration policies.

In an unsigned order, the court rejected the administration's claim that circumstances on the ground in Illinois met the criteria for the president to invoke a federal law allowing him to call up the National Guard to federal service.

“At this preliminary stage, the Government has failed to identify a source of authority that would allow the military to execute the laws in Illinois,” the court ruled.

The decision involved only Chicago, but it was likely to strengthen other challenges to National Guard deployments. It does not affect the District of Columbia, where troops have also been deployed, as it is a federal district, not a state.

A spokesperson for California Gov. Gavin Newsom — a Democrat — said in an email Wednesday: "We won in court and forced him to. Trump’s rambling here is the political version of 'you can’t fire me, I quit.'"

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, also a Democrat, said on X that "Donald Trump's lying again."

"He lost in court when Illinois stood up against his attempt to militarize American cities with the National Guard. Now Trump is forced to stand down," Pritzker said.

Democratic Gov. Tina Kotek of Oregon said in an emailed statement that "my office has not yet received official notification that the remaining federalized Oregon National Guard troops can return home."

Trump initially deployed National Guard troops to Los Angeles in June following upheaval between anti-immigration raid protesters and law enforcement. Then, in October, 500 National Guard troops arrived in the Chicago area. The same month, the Trump administration activated 200 troops for Portland.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday directed the Trump administration to return control of the California National Guard to Newsom, lifting a pause it issued this month.

Trump has used National Guard deployment as a political cudgel, sending troops to areas governed by Democrats. In early December, The Associated Press reported that Trump said the National Guard would go to New Orleans.

On Dec. 22, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth “authorized the activation of up to 350 Louisiana National Guard members” who will be under the command of Republican Gov. Jeff Landry through Feb. 28, Defense Department spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement.

"These National Guard troops will support federal law enforcement partners, including the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security, as they enforce federal law and counter high rates of violent crime in New Orleans and other metropolitan areas in Louisiana," Parnell said.

In addition, more than 2,400 National Guard members from 10 states and D.C. remain on the streets of the nation's capital as a result of a monthslong deployment by the Trump administration.