US president withdraws military deployment to US cities after legal setback, vows to return if crime ‘starts to spike’.
In a major shift in policy, U.S. President Donald Trump announced he would end Democratic-led efforts to send federal troops to several cities.
Wednesday’s announcement came amid legal setbacks to President Trump’s efforts to send the National Guard to Chicago, Illinois. Los Angeles, California. and Portland, Oregon.
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In a post on Truth Social, President Trump said he would “remove” the National Guard from those cities, although deployment of the National Guard has already been largely restricted by lower courts.
“We’re removing the National Guard from Chicago, Los Angeles, and Portland, despite the fact that having these great patriots in those cities has significantly reduced crime, and that’s just because of that fact,” he said.
Despite this claim, the National Guard is prohibited from directly participating in law enforcement, which remains illegal under U.S. law. Trump had not invoked the Insurrection Act of 1807, which allows the president to send troops into the country when “unlawful obstruction, association, assembly, or insurrection” against the federal government makes U.S. laws “impossible to enforce” “through ordinary judicial processes.”
As such, troops deployed in or around Los Angeles, Portland, and Chicago were primarily tasked with guarding federal buildings and providing support services to immigration authorities.
At the time of President Trump’s announcement, about 300 National Guard troops remained under federal control in both Los Angeles and Chicago, and another 200 in Portland.
Since first deploying the National Guard to Los Angeles in response to protests against large-scale immigration raids, President Trump has repeatedly asserted that major cities across the country are plagued by the overlap of crime and immigration crises.
Critics have accused Trump of engaging in dangerous political theater targeting his opponents.
President Trump’s announcement did not mention the ongoing deployment of the National Guard to Washington, D.C., and New Orleans, Louisiana, which Republican governors specifically requested.
legal setback
The president’s move comes amid a series of legal setbacks, including last week’s Supreme Court order upholding a lower court ruling that barred the president from sending the National Guard to Chicago.
While part of the federal military, the National Guard is typically deployed at the request of a state governor. The president can unilaterally deploy the National Guard, but only if other federal agents are unable to enforce the law.
A majority of the Supreme Court justices ruled that President Trump does not yet meet that standard, dealing a major blow to the administration’s justification for similar deployments across the country.
Earlier Wednesday, lawyers for California’s Department of Justice appealed a lower court ruling and withdrew a request to place the state’s military under federal control. The ruling by U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer said the military must be returned to state control.
“The admission of Trump and his occult cabinet members means this illegal intimidation tactic will finally end,” the office of California Governor Gavin Newsom, a top Democratic critic of Trump, said in a post on X.
Newsom and his staff “look forward” to a more permanent court ruling on the issue.
Meanwhile, Trump said in a post on Truth Social that he would not hesitate to redeploy the military.
“It will probably come back in a much different and more powerful form when crime starts spiking again. It’s only a matter of time!” he said.
