Illinois officials filed a lawsuit Monday to block President Donald Trump’s plan to deploy National Guard troops to Chicago, marking a sharp escalation in the standoff between Democratic-led states and the Republican administration. The move came just hours after a federal judge in Oregon halted a similar deployment in Portland, reported AP.
Governor JB Pritzker, a Democrat, blasted what he called “Trump’s invasion,” saying the president’s order to federalize roughly 300 Illinois Guard members — alongside 400 from Texas — amounted to political punishment. “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 state’s lawsuit argues, according to AP.
The White House defended the action, saying the president approved the Guard’s use to address “ongoing violent riots and lawlessness” that local officials had failed to control. In a weekend statement, spokesperson Abigail Jackson said Trump acted to “protect communities where local leadership has abdicated its responsibilities.”
Governor Pritzker urged Texas Governor Greg Abbott to block the deployment of his state’s troops, but Abbott rejected the request. He insisted that the measure was necessary “to protect federal workers” stationed in Chicago amid intensified immigration enforcement operations.
The clash follows an aggressive federal crackdown on illegal immigration that has rattled Chicago’s immigrant neighborhoods. Residents have reported seeing armed Border Patrol agents making arrests near well-known landmarks and in largely Latino communities. Tensions rose further when federal agents shot a woman Saturday morning on Chicago’s southwest side. According to the Department of Homeland Security, the shooting occurred after agents “were rammed by vehicles and boxed in by 10 cars.” No officers were seriously hurt, DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said.
Mayor Brandon Johnson responded by signing an executive order preventing federal immigration agents and other federal personnel from using city property — such as parking lots, garages, or empty lots — as staging grounds for enforcement operations.
Protests have erupted near a suburban immigration facility in Broadview, where 13 demonstrators were arrested Friday outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building.
Meanwhile, in Portland, U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut issued a temporary restraining order blocking Trump’s attempt to send Guard troops from Oregon, California, and later Texas to the city. Immergut, who was appointed by Trump during his first term, questioned whether the administration was trying to skirt her earlier ruling. “Aren’t defendants simply circumventing my order?” she asked during a Sunday hearing. “Why is this appropriate?”
Local officials in Oregon and California accused the administration of reviving a false narrative of chaos. They noted that Trump’s social media posts about Portland often use images from 2020, when protests over George Floyd’s death turned violent. In 2025, the city has seen crime drop significantly — homicides in the first half of this year fell 51% from the same period in 2024 — and downtown areas are reporting more foot traffic and fewer homeless encampments.
In Chicago and other cities, officials have warned that federal intervention is inflaming tensions rather than easing them. The Illinois lawsuit accuses the Trump administration of acting “unlawfully and dangerously” in what it calls “President Trump’s long-declared ‘War’ on Chicago and Illinois.”
Since the beginning of his second term, Trump has deployed or threatened to deploy National Guard troops to at least ten cities, including Baltimore; New Orleans; Memphis, Tennessee; the District of Columbia; and several in California — Los Angeles, Oakland, and San Francisco among them. A federal judge ruled in September that the administration “willfully” violated federal law when it sent troops to Los Angeles during protests over immigration raids.
With inputs from AP
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