Trump National Guard Lawsuits: California, Oregon, Illinois

The Trump National Guard lawsuits are a set of legal challenges brought in 2025 by California, Oregon, Illinois, Washington, D.C., and local officials in Tennessee against President Trump’s federalization and deployment of National Guard troops to protect federal immigration operations. Courts blocked the deployments repeatedly, and on December 23, 2025, the Supreme Court rejected the administration’s core legal theory in Trump v. Illinois. Eight days later, Trump announced the withdrawal of troops from Los Angeles, Chicago, and Portland. Deployments in Washington, D.C., and Memphis continued into 2026 under separate legal authorities and their own pending appeals.¹

What Trump Did and Where

The first deployment came on June 7, 2025, when Trump federalized 4,000 California National Guard members under 10 U.S.C. § 12406 and sent them to Los Angeles to protect ICE personnel and federal property. It was the first time in U.S. history that a state’s Guard had been federalized over its governor’s objections.²

On September 28, the administration federalized 200 Oregon Guard members for Portland.³⁴⁵ Roughly 2,300 troops were also sent to Washington, D.C., beginning in August, and the Tennessee Guard was mobilized to Memphis at the president’s request.⁶⁷

The Legal Question at the Core of the Suits

Every deployment in California, Oregon, and Illinois rested on the same statute. 10 U.S.C. § 12406 permits the president to call up the National Guard only under three conditions: foreign invasion, rebellion, or when the president “cannot with the regular forces execute the laws of the United States.” The administration argued that protests against ICE amounted to a form of rebellion, and that “regular forces” included civilian federal law enforcement agencies like ICE and the Federal Protective Service.⁸

The states argued none of the three statutory conditions had been met, that “regular forces” meant the active-duty military, that the deployments violated the Posse Comitatus Act barring the military from domestic law enforcement, and that federalizing state Guards over governors’ objections violated the Tenth Amendment.⁹¹⁰

California: Newsom v. Trump

Governor Gavin Newsom and California sued on June 9, 2025, in the Northern District of California. Judge Charles Breyer granted a temporary restraining order on June 12, finding the president’s actions “illegal—both exceeding the scope of his statutory authority and violating the Tenth Amendment.”¹¹ A week later, a Ninth Circuit panel stayed the order, holding that review of § 12406 decisions must be “highly deferential” and that the president had a “colorable basis” for invoking the statute.¹²

Breyer then held a bench trial on the Posse Comitatus question. His September 2, 2025 ruling ran 52 pages. He found that Guard troops had participated in more than 60 operations with immigration agents, accompanying them on roughly 75% of missions between June and early July, and had blocked traffic, set up armed perimeters, and apprehended protesters.¹³ Breyer rejected the argument that § 12406 created an exception to the Posse Comitatus Act, writing that the administration’s position would “create a brand-new exception to the Posse Comitatus Act that nullifies the Act itself.”¹⁴ He found the violations “willful.”¹⁵

On December 10, 2025, Breyer granted a preliminary injunction ordering an end to the federalization, finding the original exigency had subsided. The Ninth Circuit vacated its remaining stay on December 31, leaving the injunction in force.⁹

Oregon: State of Oregon v. Trump

Oregon and the City of Portland sued on September 28, 2025. Judge Karin Immergut granted a TRO on October 4, finding protests were “not significantly violent or disruptive” and that the federal government was not unable to execute its laws with regular forces.¹⁶

The case became notable for the administration’s conduct. A small group of Oregon Guard members was deployed to the Portland ICE facility on October 4 despite the order, and the administration overstated the number of Federal Protective Service officers in the city, claiming 115 when the actual number was about 86.¹⁷

After a three-day trial, Immergut issued a 106-page order on November 7 permanently blocking the deployment. She acknowledged that violent protests had occurred but found local law enforcement capable of addressing them and that protests had become “predominately peaceful.” She stressed the ruling did not hold that a president can never deploy the Guard, only that conditions in Portland did not justify it. It was the first case under the Trump administration to go to a full trial on the underlying legality of federalizing the Guard.¹⁷

Illinois: State of Illinois v. Trump

Illinois and Chicago sued on October 6, 2025, two days after the president’s Illinois memorandum. On October 9, U.S. District Judge April Perry granted a TRO barring both the federalization and deployment. She called the administration’s characterization of events in Chicago “simply unreliable” and found “no credible evidence that there is danger of rebellion in the state of Illinois.” Perry noted the area around the Broadview ICE facility had been peaceful for 19 years before federal agents arrived, and criticized the administration for citing the arrest of two individuals who were later cleared by a grand jury.¹⁸

The Seventh Circuit issued a split ruling on October 16: Guard members could remain formally under federal control, but their deployment inside Illinois was blocked. Even under “great deference” to the president, the panel found federal facilities remained open, protests were being managed by local law enforcement, and immigration enforcement numbers in the state were actually rising.¹⁹

The Supreme Court: Trump v. Illinois

The administration asked the Supreme Court to stay the Illinois injunction. On December 23, 2025, the Court denied the request in an unsigned opinion.²⁰

The ruling resolved a question that had split the lower courts: what “regular forces” means under § 12406. A six-justice majority held it “likely refers to the regular forces of the United States military,” not civilian federal law enforcement.²¹ Under that reading, the president can federalize the Guard only when he cannot execute the laws with active-duty troops. The Court then boxed the administration in on the Posse Comitatus question: if the protective tasks the Guard was performing did not count as “executing the laws,” the statute could not authorize the deployment; if they did, the Posse Comitatus Act barred using active-duty forces for them without an express exception the government had not identified.²²

Justice Kavanaugh concurred on narrower grounds, saying the president had never made the required determination that he was unable to enforce the law with military forces. Justice Alito, joined by Justice Thomas, dissented, arguing the majority had improperly reached a question the parties had not raised below. Justice Gorsuch also dissented and would have granted the stay.²¹

Trump Announces the Withdrawal

On December 31, 2025, Trump announced on Truth Social that he would pull the National Guard from Chicago, Los Angeles, and Portland. He framed it as a choice, writing that crime had been “greatly reduced” by the troops and warning, “We will come back, perhaps in a much different and stronger form, when crime begins to soar again.” His statement made no mention of the court rulings. The day before, the Justice Department had dropped its request to the Ninth Circuit to allow Guard personnel back into Los Angeles.¹

A spokesperson for Newsom called Trump’s statement “the political version of ‘you can’t fire me, I quit.'” Illinois Governor JB Pritzker wrote that Trump had been “forced to stand down.” Oregon Governor Tina Kotek said the troops “were never lawfully deployed to Portland and there was no need for their presence.”²³

Washington, D.C. and Memphis Are Separate Cases

The withdrawal did not touch the D.C. or Memphis deployments, which rest on different legal authorities and are governed by their own pending litigation.

Washington, D.C.

D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb sued in August 2025 over the deployment of roughly 2,300 troops drawn from the D.C. Guard and eight other states.⁶ On November 20, 2025, U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb blocked the deployment, ruling that the administration’s justifications “would erase Congress’s role in governing the District and its National Guard.”²⁴ The D.C. Circuit reversed on December 17, allowing troops to remain while the appeal proceeds, reasoning that the president likely holds a “unique power” over the Guard in D.C. because it is a federal district rather than a sovereign state. The administration filed its opening brief on April 1, 2026.²⁵

Memphis

Governor Bill Lee mobilized the Tennessee Guard for the “Memphis Safe Task Force” at Trump’s request, invoking Title 32 and his authority as commander-in-chief and citing violent crime as a “grave emergency.”²⁶ Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris, three Democratic state lawmakers, two county commissioners, and a Memphis councilmember sued in October 2025, arguing that Tennessee statutes require a local government request before the Guard can be deployed and that the state constitution limits militia use to rebellion or invasion.⁷ A lower court temporarily blocked the deployment in November 2025, but that order was put on hold pending an appeal heard in March 2026.

Where Things Stand

Federalized Guard troops have been removed from California, Illinois, and Oregon. The D.C. deployment continues under the D.C. Circuit’s stay while the appeal remains pending. Tennessee Guard members remain in Memphis while the state’s court of appeals considers the challenge. Trump’s December 31 warning that any return could come “in a much different and stronger form” left open the possibility of future deployments framed under a different legal theory than § 12406, the provision the Supreme Court effectively closed off.

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