Illinois has joined California and Oregon in filing lawsuits aimed at stopping President Donald Trump from deploying National Guard troops to Democrat-led major cities.
The lawsuit, filed on Monday by the state of Illinois and the city of Chicago, claims Trump’s order to send 300 troops to the Windy City is “unlawful and dangerous.” Trump, meanwhile, has defended the move, saying the deployment is necessary to support federal immigration enforcement and curb rising crime.
In Oregon, a federal judge on Sunday temporarily halted a similar deployment, just hours after the state’s governor announced that California National Guard troops had already arrived, with more en route to Portland.
The idea of sending the National Guard into states against the wishes of their governors is not new within Trump’s circle. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller said in November 2023 that a second Trump administration would direct the Guard from Republican-led states to Democrat-run ones that refuse to cooperate with his mass deportation agenda.
Here’s a snapshot of where things stand:
Trump's efforts meet pushback
The lawsuit filed by Illinois and Chicago comes after Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker said some 300 of the state’s guard troops were to be federalized and deployed to the nation’s third-largest city, along with 400 others from Texas.
“Donald Trump is using our service members as political props and as pawns in his illegal effort to militarize our nation’s cities,” Pritzker said after the lawsuit was filed. He said a court hearing was set for Thursday.
The ACLU of Illinois also filed suit Monday against Trump, the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and several of the agencies’ leaders, accusing them of unleashing a campaign of violence and intimidation against peaceful protesters and journalists during protests outside an ICE detention facility in Broadview, Illinois.
At the facility, about 12 miles (19 kilometers) west of Chicago, federal agents have repeatedly fired tear gas, pepper balls and other projectiles toward crowds. At least seven people have faced federal charges after being arrested in those clashes.
Filed by a coalition of news outlets, media associations and protesters, including the Illinois Press Association, Block Club Chicago and the Chicago Headline Club, the lawsuit alleges federal agents used “indiscriminate” force and interfered with First Amendment rights, including freedom of speech and press.
Broadview Mayor Katrina Thompson issued an executive order Monday requiring protesters to demonstrate outside the ICE facility only between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. daily. Thompson said the order was an effort to “balance the constitutional rights of protestors with the needs and safety of Broadview’s residents and businesses.”
Latest federal deployments target Portland, Chicago
White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson confirmed that the president authorized using Illinois National Guard members, citing what she called “ongoing violent riots and lawlessness” that local leaders have not quelled.
Trump has characterized Portland and Chicago as rife with crime and unrest. Since the start of his second term, he has sent or talked about sending troops to 10 cities, including Baltimore, Maryland; Memphis, Tennessee; the District of Columbia; New Orleans; and Oakland, San Francisco and Los Angeles.
Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek talked to Trump in late September and said a deployment was unnecessary. She refused to call up Oregon National Guard troops, so Trump did so himself in an order to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. That prompted a lawsuit from city and state officials that led to Sunday's temporary hold.
In Chicago, alarms raised about racial profiling
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson signed an executive order Monday barring federal agents from using city-owned property as staging areas. It applies to parking lots, garages and vacant lots.
The sight of armed, camouflaged and masked Border Patrol agents making arrests near famous downtown landmarks has amplified concerns about racial profiling. Many Chicagoans were already uneasy after the immigration crackdown began. Agents have targeted immigrant-heavy and largely Latino areas.
DHS acknowledged that federal agents shot a woman Saturday on the southwest side of Chicago. A department statement said it happened after Border Patrol agents patrolling the area “were rammed by vehicles and boxed in by 10 cars.”
“The officers exited their trapped vehicle, when a suspect tried to run them over, forcing the officers to fire defensively,” the statement said.
No law enforcement officers were seriously injured, DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said.
The woman who was shot is a U.S. citizen and was armed with a semiautomatic weapon, according to McLaughlin. She was being treated at a hospital, according to fire officials.
“Federal agents, ICE, HSI are officers," Chicago Police Superintendent Larry Snelling told reporters Monday. “If you box them in with vehicles, it is reasonable for them to believe that they are being ambushed and this could end in a deadly situation, and its reasonable for them to use force based on those conditions.”
Deployment in Portland temporarily blocked by judge
About 400 protesters marched Saturday to a Portland ICE detention facility. Federal agents used chemical crowd control munitions, including tear gas canisters and less-lethal guns that sprayed pepper balls, the Oregonian reported.
U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut temporarily blocked the deployment of Oregon National Guard troops on Saturday, saying the relatively small protests did not justify the use of federalized state forces and that the deployment could harm Oregon’s sovereignty.
The Trump administration responded by attempting to send in National Guard troops from California and Texas, prompting Kotek and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, also a Democrat, to go back to court Sunday. Immergut blocked any National Guard troops from being sent to Oregon for 14 days.
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller told reporters the administration would appeal the ruling.
The Portland ICE facility has been the site of demonstrations for months. Since June, 30 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the protests since June, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Oregon said Monday.
Efforts in Memphis and Louisiana
On Wednesday, Hegseth, Miller and Attorney General Pam Bondi rallied members of a federal law enforcement task force that began operating in Memphis as part of Trump’s crime-fighting plan. Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, a Republican, has supported the effort.
On Sept. 30, Republican Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry asked for a guard deployment to New Orleans and other cities to help fight crime.
Appellate court weighs California deployment
Trump deployed guard soldiers and active duty Marines in Los Angeles during the summer over the objections of Newsom, who sued and won a temporary block after a federal judge found the president's use of the guard was likely unlawful.
The Trump administration appealed, and the block was put on hold by a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The appellate case is still underway, but the panel has indicated that it believes the administration is likely to prevail.
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