The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to allow the Trump administration to deploy National Guard troops in the Chicago area to support what the administration described as an immigration crackdown, keeping in place a lower-court block while litigation continues. The justices declined the administration’s emergency request aimed at overturning a ruling by U.S. District Judge April Perry, which had prevented the deployment from moving forward.
The Supreme Court’s order is not a final decision on the legal questions in the case, but it leaves the Chicago-area deployment sidelined for now. The court took more than two months to act after considering the emergency appeal.
In its order, the majority said that at this “preliminary stage,” the government “has failed to identify a source of authority that would allow the military to execute the laws in Illinois.” The court’s reasoning indicates that, at least for this phase of the challenge, the administration did not meet the burden necessary to move ahead with the military-backed enforcement plan in Illinois.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh said he agreed with keeping the deployment blocked, but he would have left the president more latitude to use troops in possible future scenarios. Three other justices — Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch — publicly dissented from the decision.
The dispute was framed around competing views of what authority the administration had to use the National Guard in support of immigration enforcement. The administration argued that the troops were needed to “protect federal personnel and property from violent resistance against the enforcement of federal immigration laws.” The lower-court order had found insufficient basis for the administration’s contention that a “danger of rebellion” was brewing in Illinois.
Perry’s block began as a two-week order and was later extended indefinitely in October while the Supreme Court reviewed the case. The deployment proposal had initially sought to draw troops from both Illinois and Texas, but the Texas contingent of about 200 National Guard troops was sent home from Chicago.
The legal fight is tied to protests around an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, a west Chicago suburb. The facility has been the site of tense demonstrations in which federal agents previously used tear gas and other chemical agents on protesters and journalists, according to the reporting. Last month, authorities arrested 21 protesters and said four officers were injured outside the Broadview facility, with local authorities making the arrests.
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker praised the Supreme Court decision. He said in a statement that “American cities, suburbs, and communities should not have to faced masked federal agents asking for their papers, judging them for how they look or sound, and living in fear that the President can deploy the military to their streets,” language carried in the reporting.
A White House spokeswoman, Abigail Jackson, said the administration had activated the National Guard to protect federal personnel and property from “violent rioters” and argued that the Supreme Court’s ruling did not undermine the administration’s overall agenda. She said, “Nothing in today’s ruling detracts from that core agenda. The Administration will continue working day in and day out to safeguard the American public.”
The Chicago-area case is one of several lawsuits challenging National Guard deployments connected to immigration enforcement. The reporting noted that District of Columbia Attorney General Brian Schwalb is suing to halt the deployment of more than 2,000 guardsmen in Washington, and that 45 states have filed in that case, with some supporting the administration’s actions and others supporting Schwalb’s challenge. The reporting also said Oregon’s federal court had permanently blocked the deployment there and that California troops were being sent home, while a Tennessee state court ruled in favor of Democratic officials who sought to stop an ongoing Memphis deployment.
In a reminder of how the issue is unfolding across multiple states, a judge in California had said in September that deployment in the Los Angeles area was illegal, and it reported that by then only 300 of the thousands of troops sent there remained. The administration has appealed the California and Oregon rulings to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.