Judge Blocks DC National Guard Deployment

A federal judge on Thursday blocked President Trump’s deployment of National Guard troops to Washington, D.C., amid his crackdown on local crime, the latest blow to the president’s efforts to deploy military forces in Democratic cities without the backing of local leaders.

U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb, an appointee of former President Biden, ruled that the Pentagon’s deployment of D.C. National Guard members for “non-military, crime-deterrence missions” and its calls for assistance from out-of-state troops likely exceeded federal authority and violated the law.

“The record in this case, including many of the amicus briefs filed, makes clear that there are strong views on both sides about whether these deployments represent good policy,” Cobb wrote. “But the Court is only tasked with deciding whether Defendants’ actions are lawful.”

“At its core, Congress has given the District rights to govern itself,” the judge wrote. “Those rights are infringed upon when Defendants approve, in excess of their statutory authority, the deployment of National Guard troops to the District.”

She said that the Trump administration has “usurped” the city’s sovereign powers under the Home Rule Act, the law that governs the district’s control over its local affairs, with its unlawful actions.

Justice Department lawyers contended that Trump’s executive powers alone allow him control over the local National Guard troops, but Cobb determined that the president has “no free-floating Article II power to deploy the (D.C. National Guard) for the deterrence of crime.”

The administration also contended that the city’s mayor, Muriel Bowser, had cooperated with the local crackdown, showing the city has suffered no injury from the troops’ deployment. But the judge said it’s “well-established” that D.C’s attorney general can sue on the city’s behalf.

“Within the context and structure of Title 32, the Court finds that section 502(f) cannot bear the expansive interpretation that Defendants attribute to it and that Plaintiff is also likely to succeed on the merits of this claim,” Cobb wrote.