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President Trump’s decision to federalize and deploy National Guard troops to Chicago has sparked a ferocious legal fight from Illinois and the city itself, who raced to federal court this week to try to halt what they call an “unlawful” federal occupation. The move follows a separate judicial rebuke in Portland, and it shows how Democratic political leaders would rather sue than secure their own streets.
In Portland a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order blocking Guard deployments to the state, sounding incredulous that the administration would try to circumvent earlier rulings by simply moving troops from one state to another. That ruling feeds the predictable narrative among activists and liberal officials that any show of federal force is an “invasion,” even as federal property and personnel face repeated attacks.
The White House has been explicit: the deployments are meant to protect federal buildings, Border Patrol and ICE personnel, and to restore basic order in neighborhoods where federal agents have been targeted during violent protests. Memos and briefings revealed by local outlets show plans to federalize roughly 300 Illinois Guard members and supplement forces with Guard troops from Texas and elsewhere to respond to violent incidents.
Illinois’s lawsuit accuses the administration of violating statutes like the Administrative Procedure Act and even claims Posse Comitatus problems, portraying a law-and-order response as illegal political theater. Those legal arguments are being pushed by partisan state officials who have repeatedly refused to enforce immigration and public-safety laws, then cry foul when the federal government finally acts.
Make no mistake: the president, as commander in chief, has the responsibility to defend federal property and personnel when local leaders either refuse to act or tacitly empower mobs. The White House has defended the moves as lawful and necessary, and hardworking Americans watching their downtowns decline have every right to demand decisive federal action.
Meanwhile, Democratic governors and big-city mayors play politics with public safety, branding troops sent to protect courthouses and federal facilities as an “occupation” while their own police departments are hamstrung by woke policies. This litigation campaign is less about the law than about rewarding a narrative that excuses chaos and hands the country over to the soft-on-crime elites who run these cities into the ground.
Hardworking Americans want safe streets, functioning courts, and respect for the rule of law—not more excuses and more lawsuits. If the federal government must step in to defend federal employees and property while local politicians posture, then so be it; leadership means doing what’s necessary, even when it triggers the predictable outrage from the coastal political class. The choice is blunt and simple: restore order, or watch disorder become the permanent policy of Democratic-run cities.
