national guard troop

WASHINGTON — Chicago is emerging as the latest testing ground for President Trump’s domestic deployment of military force as hundreds of National Guard troops were expected to descend on the city.

The president said Wednesday that Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson should be jailed for failing to support federal agents, and continued to paint a dark and violent picture of both Chicago and Portland, Ore., where Trump is trying to send federal troops but has so far been stonewalled by the courts.

“It’s so bad,” Trump said at the White House on Wednesday. “It’s so crazy. It’s like the movies … where you have these bombed-out cities and these bombed-out people. It’s worse than that. I don’t think they can make a movie as bad.”

Pritzker this week characterized Trump’s depiction of Chicago as “deranged” and untrue. Federal agents are making the community “less safe,” the governor said, noting that residents do not want “Donald Trump to occupy their communities” and that people of color are fearful of being profiled during immigration crackdowns.

Trump has taken issue with Democrats in Illinois and Oregon who are fighting his efforts, and has twice said this week that he is willing to use the Insurrection Act of 1807 if local leaders and the courts try to stop him. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller also contended this week that a court ruling blocking Trump’s deployments to Portland amounted to a “legal insurrection” as well as “an insurrection against the laws and Constitution of the United States.”

In a televised interview Monday, Miller was asked about his remarks and asked whether the administration would abide by court rulings that stop the deployment of troops to Illinois and Portland. Miller responded by saying the president has “plenary authority” before going silent midsentence — a moment that the host said may have been a technical issue.

“Plenary authority” is a legal term that indicates someone has limitless power.

The legality of deployments to Portland and Chicago will face scrutiny in two federal courts Thursday.

The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals will hear an appeal by the Trump administration in the Portland matter. A Trump-appointed judge, Karin Immergut, found the White House had not only violated the law in activating the Oregon National Guard, but it also had further defied the law by attempting to circumvent her order, sending the California National Guard in its place.

That three-judge appellate panel consists of two Trump appointees and one Clinton appointee.

Meanwhile, in Illinois, U.S. District Judge April Perry declined Monday to block the deployment of National Guard members on an emergency basis, allowing a buildup of forces to proceed. She will hear arguments Thursday on the legality of the operation.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, one of Trump’s top political foes, has joined the fight against the president’s deployment efforts.

The Trump administration sent 14 members of California’s National Guard to Illinois to train troops from other states, according to court records filed Tuesday. Federal officials have also told California they intend to extend Trump’s federalization of 300 members of the state’s Guard through next year.

“Trump is going on a cross-country crusade to sow chaos and division,” Newsom said Wednesday. “His actions — and those of his Cabinet — are against our deeply held American values. He needs to stop this illegal charade now.”

By Wednesday evening, there were few signs of National Guard troops on the streets of Chicago. But troops from other states, including Texas’ National Guard, were waiting on the sidelines at an Army Reserve Center in Illinois as early as Tuesday.

In anticipation of the deployment, Pritzker warned that if the president’s efforts went unchecked, it would put the United States on a “the path to full-blown authoritarianism.”

The Democratic governor also said the president’s calls to jail him were “unhinged” and said Trump was a “wannabe dictator.”

“There is one thing I really want to say to Donald Trump: If you come for my people, you come through me. So come and get me,” Pritzker said in an interview with MSNBC.

As tensions grew in Chicago, Trump hosted an event at the White House to address how he intends to crack down on antifa, a nebulous left-wing anti-facist movement that he recently designated as a domestic terrorist organization.

At the event, the president said many of the people involved in the movement are active in Chicago and Portland — and he once again attacked the local and state leaders in both cities and states.

“You can say of Portland and you can say certainly of Chicago, it is not lawful what they are doing,” Trump said about the left-wing protests. “They are going to have to be very careful.”

Johnson, the mayor of Chicago, slammed Trump for saying he should be jailed for his actions.

“This is not the first time Trump has tried to have a Black man unjustly arrested,” Johnson posted on social media. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Pritzker continued to attack Trump’s efforts into the evening, accusing the president of “breaching the Constitution and breaking the law.”

“We need to stand up together and speak up,” the governor said on social media.

Times staff writer Melody Gutierrez in Sacramento contributed to this report.

CHICAGO — Illinois and Chicago filed a lawsuit Monday aiming to stop President Trump’s administration from sending hundreds of National Guard troops to the city, just as troops prepared to deploy and hours after a federal judge blocked troops from being sent to Portland, Oregon.

The quickly unfolding developments come as the administration portrays the Democrat-led cities as war-ravaged and lawless and amid Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration. Officials in both cities have disputed the president’s characterizations, saying military intervention isn’t needed and it’s federal involvement that’s inflaming the situation.

The legal challenge comes after Illinois 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.

The lawsuit alleges that “these advances in President Trump’s long-declared ‘War’ on Chicago and Illinois are unlawful and dangerous.”

“The American people, regardless of where they reside, should not live under the threat of occupation by the United States military, particularly not simply because their city or state leadership has fallen out of a president’s favor,” the lawsuit says.

Pritzker said the potential deployment amounted to “Trump’s invasion” and called on Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to block it. Abbott pushed back and said the crackdown was needed to protect federal workers who are in the city as part of the president’s increased immigration enforcement.

White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson confirmed in a weekend statement that Trump authorized using Illinois National Guard members, citing what she called “ongoing violent riots and lawlessness” that local leaders have not quelled.

In Chicago, the sight of armed Border Patrol agents making arrests near famous landmarks amplified concerns from residents already uneasy after an immigration crackdown that began last month. Agents have targeted immigrant-heavy and largely Latino areas.

Protesters have frequently rallied near an immigration facility outside the city, and federal officials reported the arrests of 13 protesters on Friday near the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing facility in Broadview.

The Department of Homeland Security acknowledged that federal agents shot a woman Saturday morning 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.”

No law enforcement officers were seriously injured, DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said.

In Portland, U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut granted a temporary restraining order sought by Oregon and California to block the deployment of guard troops from those states to the city.

There has been a sustained and low-level protest outside the Portland ICE facility, but it’s been less disruptive than the downtown clashes of 2020 when demonstrations erupted after George Floyd’s killing.

Immergut, a first-term Trump appointee, seemed incredulous that the president moved to send National Guard troops to Oregon from neighboring California and then from Texas on Sunday.

“Aren’t defendants simply circumventing my order?” she said. “Why is this appropriate?”

Local officials have suggested that many of the president’s claims and social media posts about Portland appear to rely on images from 2020. Under a new mayor, the city has reduced crime, and downtown has seen fewer homeless encampments and increased foot traffic.

Most violent crime around the U.S. has actually declined in recent years, including in Portland, where a recent report from the Major Cities Chiefs Association found that homicides from January through June decreased by 51% this year compared to the same period in 2024.

Since the start of his second term, Trump has sent or talked about sending troops to 10 cities, including Baltimore; Memphis, Tennessee; the District of Columbia; New Orleans; and the California cities of Oakland, San Francisco and Los Angeles.

A federal judge in September said the administration “willfully” broke federal law by deploying guard troops to Los Angeles over protests about immigration raids.

Press writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — Two hundred members of the Oregon National Guard are being placed under federal control and deployed within the state, a move the Trump administration says is needed to protect immigration enforcement officers and government facilities, according to a Defense Department memo received by state leaders on Sunday.

The deployment is being made over the objections of state leaders and is similar to one in June in Los Angeles, where protesters demonstrated against federal immigration raids, though on a much smaller scale.

There was no immediate comment from the White House. Multiple Pentagon officials were contacted, but none would confirm or deny the authenticity of the memo.

President Trump had announced Saturday that he would send troops to Portland. The state’s governor, Democrat Tina Kotek, said Sunday that she objected to the deployment in a conversation with the president.

“Oregon is our home — not a military target,” she said in a statement.

Dan Rayfield, the state attorney general, said he was filing a federal lawsuit arguing that Trump was overstepping his authority.

“What we’re seeing is not about public safety,” he said. “It’s about the president flexing political muscle under the guise of law and order, chasing a media hit at the expense of our community.”

The Pentagon memo provided by Oregon leaders drew a direct comparison between the deployment of thousands of National Guard troops to Los Angeles and the proposed deployment to the state, adding, “This memorandum further implements the President’s direction.”

While the memorandum does not specifically cite Portland as the target of the proposed deployment, Trump, in a social media post Saturday, said he directed the Pentagon, at the request of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, “to provide all necessary Troops to protect War ravaged Portland, and any of our ICE Facilities under siege from attack by Antifa, and other domestic terrorists.”

“I am also authorizing Full Force, if necessary,” Trump added.

Unlike in Los Angeles, it does not appear that Trump or Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth are currently directing the deployment of active-duty troops to the state. The Trump administration deployed about 700 active-duty Marines to Los Angeles, who were withdrawn about a month later.

The action also would be far less than Trump’s deployment to Washington, D.C., where more than 1,000 National Guard troops, including units from other states, have patrolled the streets for weeks. He also has been suggesting that he will send troops into Chicago, but so far has not done so.

Megerian and Toropin write for the Associated Press.

President Trump on Monday continued to flirt with the idea of mobilizing National Guard troops to combat crime in Chicago, just a day after he had to clarify that he has no intent to “go to war” with the American city.

The push to militarize local law enforcement operations has been an ongoing fixation for the president, who on Saturday used war imagery and a reference to the movie “Apocalypse Now” to suggest that the newly rebranded Department of War could descend upon the Democrat-run city.

Trump clarified Sunday that his post was meant to convey he wants to “clean up” the city, and on Monday once again floated the possibility of deploying federal agents to the city — a move that Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a Democrat, has staunchly opposed.

“I don’t know why Chicago isn’t calling us saying, please give us help,” Trump said during a speech at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C. “When you have over just a short period of time, 50 murders and hundreds of people shot, and then you have a governor that stands up and says how crime is just fine. It’s really really crazy, but we’re bringing back law and order to our country.”

A few hours earlier, Trump posted on social media that he wanted “to help the people of Chicago, not hurt them” — a statement that Pritzker mocked as insincere, saying that Trump had “just threatened an American city with the Department of War.”

“Once again, this isn’t about fighting crime. That requires support and coordination — yet we’ve experienced nothing like that over the past several weeks,” Pritzker said in a post on X. “Instead of taking steps to work with us on public safety, the Trump administration’s focused on scaring Illinoisians.”

The White House did not respond when asked whether Trump would send National Guard troops to Chicago without the request from the governor. But the Department of Homeland Security announced in a news release Monday that it was launching an immigration enforcement operation to “target the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens in Chicago.”

For weeks, Trump has talked about sending the military to Chicago and other cities led by Democrats — an action that governors have repeatedly opposed. Most Americans also oppose the idea, according to a recent CBS/YouGov poll, but the Republican base largely sees Trump’s push as a means to reduce crime.

If Trump were to deploy U.S. forces to the cities, it would follow similar operations in Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles — moves that a federal judge last week said was illegal and that amounted to Trump “creating a national police force with the President as its chief” but that Trump sees as victories.

In his Monday remarks, Trump claimed that he “saved Los Angeles” and that crime is down to “virtually nothing” in Washington because he decided to send military forces to patrol the cities. Trump downplayed instances of domestic violence, saying those are “much lesser things” that should not be taken into account when trying to discern whether his crime-fighting efforts have worked in the nation’s capital.

“Things that take place in the home, they call crime. They’ll do anything they can to find something,” Trump lamented. “If a man has a little fight with the wife, they say this was a crime. Now, I can’t claim 100%, but we are a safe city.”

Trump said “we can do the same thing” in other cities, like Chicago and New York City.

“We are waiting for a call from Chicago,” Trump said. “We’ll fix Chicago.”

As of Monday afternoon, Pritzker’s office had yet to receive any “formal communication or information from the Trump administration” about potential plans to have troops deployed into the city, said Matt Hill, a spokesperson for the Illinois governor.

“Like the public and press, we are learning of their operations through social media as they attempt to produce a reality television show,” Hill said in an email. “If he cared about delivering real solutions for Illinois, then we would have heard from him.”

Pritzker, in remarks posted on social media Sunday, said the Trump administration was trampling on citizens’ constitutional rights “in the fake guise of fighting crime.”

“Once Donald Trump gets the citizens of this nation comfortable with the current atrocities committed under the color of law — what comes next?” he said.

CHICAGO — President Trump’s plan to dispatch National Guard troops and immigration agents into Chicago has put many Latino residents on edge, prompting some to carry their U.S. passports and giving others pause about openly celebrating the upcoming Mexican Independence Day.

Though the holiday falls on Sept. 16, celebrations in Chicago span more than a week and draw hundreds of thousands of participants. Festivities kicked off with a Saturday parade through the heavily Mexican Pilsen neighborhood and will continue with car caravans and lively street parties.

But this year, the typically joyful period coincides with Trump’s threats to add Chicago to the list of Democratic-led cities he has targeted for expanded federal enforcement.

His administration has said it will step up immigration enforcement in Chicago, as it did in Los Angeles, and would deploy National Guard troops. In addition to sending troops to Los Angeles in June, Trump deployed them last month in Washington, D.C., as part of his unprecedented law enforcement takeover of the nation’s capital.

Trump posted an illustration of himself on his social media site Saturday as the Robert Duvall character in “Apocalypse Now” — the war-loving Lt. Col. Bill Kilgore — against a Chicago-skyline ablaze with flames and helicopters.

“Chicago about to find out why it’s called the Department of WAR,” he posted, along with “I love the smell of deportations in the morning,” referencing a famous Kilgore line from the 1979 Vietnam War film. Trump has ordered the Defense Department to be renamed the Department of War.

“The President of the United States is threatening to go to war with an American city,” Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker wrote on the social platform X. “Illinois won’t be intimidated by a wannabe dictator.”

Although details about the promised Chicago operation have been sparse, there’s already widespread opposition as protesters marched through downtown Saturday evening. State and city leaders have said they plan to sue the Trump administration.

Debate over postponing festivities

The extended Mexican Independence Day celebrations reflect the size and vitality of Chicago’s Mexican American community. Mexicans make up more than one-fifth of the city’s population and about 74% of its Latino residents, according to 2022 U.S. census estimates.

Parade and festival organizers have been divided over whether to move forward with precautions or postpone, in hopes that it will feel safer for many participants to have a true celebration in several months’ time. El Grito Chicago, a downtown Mexican Independence Day festival set for next weekend, was postponed this week by organizers to protect people.

“But also we just refuse to let our festival be a pawn in this political game,” said Germán González, an organizer of El Grito Chicago.

In Pilsen and Little Village, two of the city’s best-known neighborhoods, with restaurants, businesses and cultural ties to Mexican culture, residents expressed disappointment that the potential federal intervention instilled such fear and anxiety in the community at a time usually characterized by joy, togetherness and celebration of Mexican American heritage.

Celebrating, with precautions

Saturday morning, some parade-goers grabbed free, bright-orange whistles and fliers from volunteers standing outside the Lozano branch of the Chicago Public Library. “Blow the whistle on ICE!” the fliers read, encouraging a nonviolent tactic to raise alarm if they saw agents.

Marchers held up cardboard signs painted with monarch butterflies, the migratory species that travels between the U.S. and Mexico. Many cheered, “Viva Mexico!”

Drivers of vintage cars honked their horns and a drummer kept time for a group of dancers bedecked in feathers. Horseback riders clip-clopped down the street, and one lifted up a large Mexican flag.

Claudia Alvarez, whose 10-year-old daughter was nearby riding a pony, said it’s important that politicians see people out celebrating, though the crowd seemed smaller this year.

“At these hours you should be able to see plenty of people in the streets enjoying themselves, but now there’s not really a lot of people,” she said.

Fabio Fernandez, 39, owner of an art and T-shirt company with a residency at a Pilsen streetwear shop, called it “troubling” and “disheartening” that the possibility of federal intervention has dampened celebrations.

He said there’s a mood of anxiety in the neighborhood, which has translated to lower sales and reduced foot traffic for local businesses like his.

“Come back to 18th Street. Support small businesses here. They’re still working hard as hell to keep their businesses alive,” he said.

Alejandro Vences, 30, became a U.S. citizen this year, “which gives me some comfort during this time,” he said while eating pozole verde at a Mexican restaurant. Still, he said, the anxiety is palpable.

“For us, our Independence Day has always been a celebration of our culture,” he said. “It’s always been a celebration of who we are. It feels like we don’t get to celebrate our culture in the same way.”

Protest against ICE

A few miles away in downtown, more than a thousand protesters marched through the streets Saturday evening with signs bearing slogans such as “I.C.E. out of Illinois, I.C.E. out of everywhere.”

Speakers offered the crowd instructions on what to do if encountering Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. They also drew comparisons between the proposed ICE crackdown on Chicago and Israel’s occupation of the Gaza Strip.

“We are inspired by the steadfastness of Palestinians in Gaza, and it is why we refuse to cower to Trump and his threats,” Nazek Sankari, co-chair of the U.S. Palestinian Community Network, said to the crowd as many waved Palestinian flags and donned kaffiyehs.

Viviana Barajas, a leader with the community organization Palenque LSNA, promised that Chicagoans would “stand up” as Los Angeles had if Trump deploys the National Guard in their city.

“If he thinks these frivolous theatrics to undermine our sovereignty will shut out the passion we have for protecting our people — this is Chicago, and he is sorely mistaken,” Barajas said. “We have been studying L.A.. and D.C., and they have stood up for their cities.”

Fernando, Finley, Walling and Raza write for the Associated Press. Fernando and Walling reported from Chicago, Finley from Norfolk, Va., and Raza from Sioux Falls, S.D. AP writers Morgan Lee in Santa Fe and Cal Woodward in Washington contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — Thousands of protesters marched across Washington, D.C., on Saturday in one of the largest demonstrations against President Trump’s federal takeover of policing in the nation’s capital.

Behind a bright red banner reading, “END THE D.C. OCCUPATION,” in English and Spanish, protesters marched more than two miles from Meridian Hill Park to Freedom Plaza near the White House to rail against the fourth week of National Guard troops and federal agents patrolling D.C.’s streets.

The “We Are All D.C.” protest — put together by local advocates of Home Rule and the American Civil Liberties Union — was perhaps the most organized demonstration yet against Trump’s federal intervention in Washington. The president justified the action last month as a way to address crime and homelessness in the city, even though city officials have noted that violent crime is lower than it was during Trump’s first term in office.

Trump targeted D.C. after deploying the National Guard to Los Angeles earlier this year as the administration ramped up its immigration enforcement efforts and attempted to quell protests. The White House then turned to Washington, which presented a unique opportunity for Trump to push his tough-on-crime agenda because of its subservient legal status to the federal government.

The presence of armed military officers in the streets has put Washington on edge and spurred weeks of demonstrations, particularly in D.C. neighborhoods. Trump’s emergency declaration taking charge of D.C. police is set to expire on Wednesday.

Mark Fitzpatrick, a former U.S. diplomat who has been a D.C. resident for about a decade, told the Associated Press on Saturday that he’s worried about the “authoritarian nature” in which the administration is treating his city.

“Federal agents, national guards patrolling our streets, that’s really an affront to the democracy of our city,” he said, adding that it’s worse for D.C. residents due to their lack of federal representation. “We don’t have our own senators or members of the House of Representatives, so we’re at the mercy of a dictator like this, a wannabe dictator.”

Among the protesters Saturday were also former D.C. residents like Tammy Price, who called the Trump administration’s takeover “evil” and “not for the people.”

Jun Lee, an artist living in Washington, showed up with a “Free DC” sign that she made on a woodcut block. She said she came to the protest because she was “saddened and heartbroken” about the effect of the federal intervention on her city.

“This is my home, and I never, ever thought all the stuff that I watched in a history documentary that I’m actually living in person, and this is why this is important for everyone. This is our home, we need to fight, we need to resist,” she said.

Also Saturday, Trump repeated threats to add Chicago to the list of other Democratic-led cities he wants to target for expanded federal enforcement. His administration is set to step up immigration enforcement in Chicago, similar to what took place in Los Angeles, and deploy National Guard troops. Like the District of Columbia, Chicago’s recent crime data do not reflect the war zones Trump has repeatedly compared it to.

Violent crime in Chicago dropped significantly in the first half of the year, representing the steepest decline in over a decade, according to city data. Shootings are down 37%, and homicides have dropped by 32%, while total violent crime dropped by over 22%.

In response to Trump’s threats, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a Democrat, called the president a “wannabe dictator” who is “threatening to go to war with an American city.”

“This is not a joke,” Pritzker wrote on X. “This is not normal.”

Pesoli and Amiri write for the Associated Press and reported from Washington and New York, respectively.

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom said Thursday that President Trump’s decision to deploy National Guard troops to Los Angeles amounted to costly political theater, saddling taxpayers with a nearly $120-million bill.

Newsom’s office said the newly revealed price tag was tallied from estimates provided by the California National Guard about costs incurred since June, when Trump sent more than 4,200 National Guard soldiers and 700 Marines to Los Angeles. That included $71 million for food and other basic necessities, $37 million in payroll, $4 million in logistic supplies, $3.5 million in travel and $1.5 million in demobilization costs, Newsom’s office said.

Most of the soldiers were sent home in August, although 300 remain in Los Angeles.

On Tuesday, a federal judge in San Francisco barred soldiers from aiding immigration arrests in a scathing opinion that amounted to a major win for California and other states critical of the Trump administration’s deployments. Newsom filed a preliminary injunction after the ruling asking that the court block a new order from the U.S. Secretary of Defense that extended the deployment of 300 National Guard members in Los Angeles until after the election in November.

“Let us not forget what this political theater is costing us all — millions of taxpayer dollars down the drain and an atrophy to the readiness of guardsmembers across the nation and unnecessary hardships to the families supporting those troops,” Newsom said in a statement. “Talk about waste, fraud, and abuse. We ask other states to do the math themselves.”

In Washington, D.C., where Trump has deployed the National Guard to the nation’s capital, city leaders filed a lawsuit earlier this week. That lawsuit said more than 2,200 National Guard troops are in Washington D.C., where they are seen dressed in military fatigues and carrying rifles around national monuments. Soldiers are seen picking up trash, laying down mulch and chatting aimlessly as they patrol.

Trump has warned that he intends to expand his use of military forces in other cities.

CHICAGO — Eight people were killed and 50 others were wounded over the Labor Day weekend in dozens of shootings in Chicago, where President Trump has seized on crime to try to justify a greater federal role on the city’s streets.

The toll highlights Chicago’s persistent struggle with gun violence and reveals a grim reality: spikes in shootings during summer holiday weekends, particularly on the South and West sides. The violence this time was deadlier than the last Labor Day, when seven people were killed and more than 20 were wounded.

Asked by reporters about sending National Guard troops to Chicago, Trump said, “We’re going in,” but added, “I didn’t say when.”

“We have the right to do it,” he said.

Mayor Brandon Johnson and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, both Democrats, have repeatedly said there’s no reason for Trump to send the National Guard, which is on the ground in the District of Columbia, targeting crime, immigration and homelessness.

“We’ve got crime on the streets,” Pritzker acknowledged last week. “Any person that gets killed or hurt is a victim of crime, is somebody that we ought to be addressing the challenges for. And we’re doing that every day. But the way to do it is with police officers, not with troops.”

Between Friday night and Monday night, 58 people were shot in 37 separate shootings in the nation’s third-largest city, according to preliminary information from police. Most survivors were in good or fair condition, but several were listed in serious or critical condition, including a 17-year-old boy. In most cases, no suspect was in custody.

Separately, the Trump administration is expected to expand immigration operations in Chicago. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem confirmed plans for a greater presence of federal agents.

Johnson over the weekend signed an order declaring that Chicago police will not collaborate with military personnel on police patrols or civil immigration enforcement.

Police will not be “deputized to do traffic stops and checkpoints for the president,” said the mayor, adding that the Trump administration is “out of control.”

Violent crime has dropped in recent years in Chicago, population 2.7 million, but it remains a persistent problem in some neighborhoods. Some with the highest homicide rates have 68 times more homicides than those with the lowest rates, according to the University of Chicago Crime Lab.

Last year, the city had 573 homicides, or 21 per every 100,000 residents, according to the Rochester Institute of Technology. Other cities had a higher rate in 2024. Chicago’s rate was down 25% compared with 2020.

Chicago police post weekly crime stats online. The department says there were 278 murders so far this year, through August, a 31% drop compared with the same eight-month period in 2024.

A federal judge ruled Tuesday that the Trump administration’s deployment of U.S. military troops to Los Angeles during immigration raids earlier this year was illegal.

U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer found the deployment violated the Posse Comitatus Act, which limited the use of the military for law enforcement purposes. He stayed his ruling to give the administration a chance to appeal.

“President Trump and Secretary Hegseth have stated their intention to call National Guard troops into service in other cities across the country … thus creating a national police force with the President as its chief,” Breyer wrote.

The ruling could have implications beyond Los Angeles.

Trump, who sent roughly 5,000 Marines and National Guard troops to L.A. in June in a move that was opposed by California Gov. Gavin Newsom and L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, issued an executive order declaring a public safety emergency in D.C. The order invoked Section 740 of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act that places the Metropolitan Police Department under direct federal control.

In June, Breyer ruled that Trump broke the law when he mobilized thousands of California National Guard members against the state’s wishes.

In a 36-page decision, Breyer wrote that Trump’s actions “were illegal — both exceeding the scope of his statutory authority and violating the 10th Amendment to the United States Constitution.”

But the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals paused that court order, allowing the troops to remain in Los Angeles while the case plays out in federal court. The appellate court found the president had broad, though not “unreviewable,” authority to deploy the military in American cities.

In his Tuesday ruling Breyer added: “The evidence at trial established that Defendants systematically used armed soldiers (whose identity was often obscured by protective armor) and military vehicles to set up protective perimeters and traffic blockades, engage in crowd control, and otherwise demonstrate a military presence in and around Los Angeles. In short, Defendants violated the Posse Comitatus Act.”

WASHINGTON — Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Sunday that immigration operations will soon be expanded in Chicago, confirming plans for a stepped-up presence of federal agents in the nation’s third-largest city as President Trump continues to lash out at Illinois’ Democratic leadership.

Noem’s comments came a day after Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson struck back against what he called the “out-of-control” plan to surge federal officers into the city. The Chicago Police Department will be barred from helping federal authorities with civil immigration enforcement or any related patrols, traffic stops and checkpoints during the surge, according to an executive order Johnson signed Saturday.

The Homeland Security Department last week requested limited logistical support from officials at the Naval Station Great Lakes to support the agency’s anticipated operations. The military installation is about 35 miles north of Chicago.

“We’ve already had ongoing operations with ICE in Chicago … but we do intend to add more resources to those operations,” Noem said during a Sunday appearance CBS News’ ”Face the Nation.”

Noem declined to provide further details about the planned surge of federal officers. It comes after the Trump administration deployed National Guard troops to Washington, saying they were needed to target crime, immigration and homelessness, and two months after it sent troops to Los Angeles.

Trump lashed out against Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker in a social media posting Saturday, warning him that he must straighten out Chicago’s crime problems quickly “or we’re coming.” The Republican president has also been critical of Johnson.

Johnson and Pritzker, both Democrats, have denounced the expected federal mobilization, noting that crime has fallen in Chicago. They are planning to sue if Trump moves forward with the plan.

In his order signed Saturday, Johnson directed all city departments to guard the constitutional rights of Chicago residents “amidst the possibility of imminent militarized immigration or National Guard deployment by the federal government.”

Asked during a news conference about federal agents who are presumably “taking orders,” Johnson replied: “Yeah, and I don’t take orders from the federal government.”

Johnson also blocked Chicago police from wearing face coverings to hide their identities, as most federal immigration officers have done since Trump launched his crackdown.

The federal surge into Chicago could start as early as Friday and last about 30 days, according to two U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss plans that had not been made public.

Pritzker, in an interview aired Sunday on “Face the Nation,” said that Trump’s expected plans to mobilize federal forces in the city may be part of a plan to “stop the elections in 2026 or, frankly, take control of those elections.”

Noem said it was a Trump “prerogative” whether to deploy National Guard troops to Chicago as he did in Los Angeles in June in the midst of protests there against immigration raids.

“I do know that L.A. wouldn’t be standing today if President Trump hadn’t taken action,” Noem said. “That city would have burned if left to devices of the mayor and governor of that state.”

Unlike the recent federal takeover of policing in Washington, the Chicago operation is not expected to rely on the National Guard or military and is focused exclusively on immigration, rather than being cast as part of a broad campaign against crime, Trump administration officials have said.

Chicago is home to a large immigrant population, and both the city and the state of Illinois have some of the country’s strongest rules against cooperating with federal immigration enforcement efforts. That has often put the city and state at odds with the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda.

Johnson’s order builds on the city’s longtime stance, that neither Chicago nor Illinois officials have sought or been consulted on the federal presence and they stand against Trump’s mobilization plan.

During his news conference Saturday, Johnson accused the president of “behaving outside the bounds of the Constitution” and seeking a federal presence in Democratic cities as retribution against his political rivals.

“He is reckless and out of control,” Johnson said. “He’s the biggest threat to our democracy that we’ve experienced in the history of our country.”

In response, the White House contended that the potential flood of federal agents was about “cracking down on crime.”

“If these Democrats focused on fixing crime in their own cities instead of doing publicity stunts to criticize the President, their communities would be much safer,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in an email Saturday.

Critics have noted that Trump, while espousing a tough-on-crime push, is the only felon ever to occupy the White House.

Madhani and Beck write for the Associated Press and reported from Washington and Chicago, respectively.

WASHINGTON — Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced Wednesday that his department is taking management of Union Station, the main transportation hub in Washington, away from Amtrak, in another example of how the federal government is exerting its power over the nation’s capital.

Duffy made the announcement in a statement before he joined Amtrak President Roger Harris at Union Station for the launch of the NextGen Acela, the rail service’s new high-speed train.

The secretary said Union Station, located within walking distance of the U.S. Capitol, had “fallen into disrepair” when it should be a “point of pride” for the city.

“By reclaiming station management, we will help make this city safe and beautiful at a fraction of the cost,” Duffy said.

At the event, Duffy said President Trump has been “pretty clear” about what he wants.

“He wants Union Station to be beautiful again. He wants transit to be safe again. And he wants our nation’s capital to be great again. And today is part of that,” Duffy said.

Duffy echoed the Republican president, who said last week he wants $2 billion from Congress to beautify Washington as part of his crackdown on the city. The Republican president has sent thousands of National Guard troops and federal law enforcement officials into Washington in a bid to fight violent crime he claimed had strangled the city.

Local police department statistics show violent crime in Washington has declined in recent years, but Trump has countered, without offering evidence, that the numbers were fudged.

National Guard troops have been on patrol inside and outside of Union Station after Trump launched the anti-crime effort earlier this month. Vice President JD Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth were shouted down by opponents of the federal intervention when they visited with troops there last week.

During Wednesday’s train unveiling, Duffy will also talk about what the administration is doing to turn Union Station into a world class transit hub, according to a Transportation Department news advisory.

Duffy had pressed Amtrak about crime at Union Station in a March letter to its chief operating officer and requested an updated plan on how it intended to improve public safety there.

Superville writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — Public schools reopened Monday in the nation’s tense capital with parents on edge over the presence in their midst of thousands of National Guard troops — some now armed — and large scatterings of federal law enforcement officers carrying out President Trump’s orders to make the District of Columbia a safer place.

Even as Trump started talking about other cities and again touted a drop in crime that he attributed to his extraordinary effort to take over policing in Washington, D.C., the district’s mayor was lamenting the effect of Trump’s actions on children.

“Parents are anxious. We’ve heard from a lot of them,” Mayor Muriel Bowser said at a news conference, noting that some might keep their children out of school because of immigration concerns.

“Any attempt to target children is heartless, is mean, is uncalled for and it only hurts us,” she said. “I would just call for everybody to leave our kids alone.”

Rumors of police activity abound

As schools opened across the capital city, parental social media groups and listservs were buzzing with reports and rumors of checkpoints and arrests.

The week began with some patrolling National Guard units now carrying firearms. The change stemmed from a directive issued late last week by his Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Armed National Guard troops from Ohio, South Carolina and Tennessee were seen around the city Monday. But not every patrol appears to be carrying weapons. An Associated Press photographer said the roughly 30 troops he saw on the National Mall on Monday morning were unarmed.

Armed Guard members in Washington will be operating under long-standing rules for the use of military force inside the U.S., the military task force overseeing all the troops deployed to D.C. said Monday. Those rules, broadly, say that while troops can use force, they should do so only “in response to an imminent threat of death or serious bodily harm” and “only as a last resort.”

The task force has directed questions on why the change was necessary to Hegseth’s office. Those officials have declined to answer those questions. Speaking in the Oval Office on Monday, Hegseth said that it was common sense to arm them because it meant they were “capable of defending themselves and others.”

Among their duties is picking up trash, the task force said, though it’s unclear how much time they will spend doing that.

Bowser reiterated her opposition to the National Guard’s presence. “I don’t believe that troops should be policing American cities,” she said.

Trump is considering expanding the deployments to other Democratic-led cities, including Baltimore, Chicago and New York, saying the situations in those cities require federal action. In Washington, his administration says more than 1,000 people have been arrested since Aug. 7, including 86 on Sunday.

“We took hundreds of guns away from young kids, who were throwing them around like it was candy. We apprehended scores of illegal aliens. We seized dozens of illegal firearms. There have been zero murders,” Trump said Monday.

Some other cities bristle at the possibility of military on the streets

The possibility of the military patrolling streets of Chicago, the nation’s third-largest city, prompted immediate backlash, confusion and a trail of sarcastic social media posts.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, a first-term Democrat, has called it unconstitutional and threatened legal action. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker deemed it a distraction and unnecessary as crime rates in Chicago are down, as they are nationwide.

Pritzker, often mentioned as a presidential contender, posted an Instagram video Monday of his 6 a.m. walk along a Lake Michigan path filled with runners and walkers.

“I don’t know who in Washington thinks that Chicago is some sort of hellhole, but you may need to look inward,” he said, mocking Trump’s term describing Washington.

Others raised questions about where patrols might go and what role they might play. By square mileage, Chicago is more than three times the size of Washington, and neighborhoods with historically high crime are spread far apart.

Former Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy, who also worked for the New York Police Department, wondered what the National Guard would do in terms of fighting street violence. He said if there was clear communication, they could help with certain tasks, like perimeter patrol in high-crime neighborhoods, but only as part of a wider plan and in partnership with police.

National Guard troops were used in Chicago to help with the Democratic National Convention last summer and during the 2012 NATO Summit.

Overall, violent crime in Chicago dropped significantly in the first half of 2025, representing the steepest decline in over a decade, according to police data. Shootings and homicides were down more than 30% in the first half of the year compared with the same time last year, and total violent crime dropped by over 22%.

Still, some neighborhoods, including Austin on the city’s West Side, where the Rev. Ira Acree is a pastor, experience persistent high crime.

Acree said he’s received numerous calls from congregants upset about the possible deployment. He said if Trump was serious about crime prevention, he would boost funding for anti-violence initiatives.

“This is a joke,” Acree said. “This move is not about reducing violence. This is reckless leadership and political grandstanding. It’s no secret that our city is on the president’s hit list.”

In June, roughly 4,000 National Guard troops and 700 Marines were sent to Los Angeles to deal with protests over the administration’s immigration crackdown. California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, and other local elected officials objected.

Sherman, Khalil and Tareen write for the Associated Press. Tareen reported from Chicago. AP writers Konstantin Toropin and Will Weissert contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — President Trump took executive action Monday threatening to cut federal aid to cities and counties that offer cashless bail to criminal defendants, a move that could place Democratic jurisdictions throughout the country under further financial strain.

Trump’s first executive order specifically targeted the practice of cashless bail in the District of Columbia, where the president has sent National Guard troops to patrol the streets. His second action directed the Justice Department to draw up a list of jurisdictions that have “substantially eliminated cash bail as a potential condition for crimes that pose a clear threat to public safety and order” — a list that would then be subject to federal funding cuts, the White House said.

“That was when the big crime in this country started,” Trump said. “That was when it happened. Somebody kills somebody, they go and don’t worry about it — no cash, come back in a couple of months, we’ll give you a trial. You never see the person again.”

“They thought it was discriminatory to make people put up money because they just killed three people lying in the street,” he added. “We’re ending it.”

Trump does not have the power to unilaterally change D.C. law. But administration officials hope the threat of significant financial pressures on the city will force local lawmakers to change it themselves.

Similarly, his second order could ultimately result in cuts to federal grants and contracts with Los Angeles County, where courts use cash bail only in the most serious criminal cases.

Studies have not shown a correlation between cashless bail policies and an increase in crime.

As of October 2023, nearly everyone accused of misdemeanors or nonviolent felonies in Los Angeles County is either cited and released or freed on certain conditions after their case is reviewed by a judge. The judge can offer other conditions for release, including electronic monitoring or home supervision by probation officials.

“A person’s ability to pay a large sum of money should not be the determining factor in deciding whether that person, who is presumed innocent, stays in jail before trial or is released,” then-Presiding Judge Samantha Jessner said at the time.

The county reached out to the court on how Trump’s executive order may affect the county’s bail policies and had not heard back.

The county policy has proved controversial with some cities saying they believed the lack of cash bail would make their communities less safe. Twelve cities within the county sued unsuccessfully to block the cashless bail reform, arguing it would lead to higher crime rates and violated the court’s responsibilities to uphold public safety. Sheriff Robert Luna told the supervisors in 2023 that some communities were alarmed at the “lack of consequences for those who commit crimes.”

The sheriff’s office and the public defender’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The county had initially begun a zero-bail system during the pandemic to prevent crowding in jails. A report to the Board of Supervisors found instances of re-arrest or failure to appear in court remained relatively stable despite the change.

In the fall of 2022, six people sued the county and city, arguing they spent five days in custody solely because they could not afford bail, leaving them in “dismal” conditions. Demanding cash bail created a “wealth-based detention system,” the plaintiffs alleged. The suit led to a preliminary injunction barring the city and county from enforcing cash bail requirements for some people who had yet to be arraigned.

Gov. Jerry Brown signed a bill in 2018 to end cash bail across California. Voters nixed it after the bail bond industry spearheaded a campaign to send the measure to voters. The referendum was defeated in 2020 with 56% voting “no.”

Trump also signed an executive action directing the Justice Department to investigate and prosecute individuals for burning the American flag, calling it an act of incitement, despite standing Supreme Court precedent that doing so is an expression of free speech.

They were the latest steps in a spree of executive actions from Trump ostensibly targeting crime in the United States, following Trump’s deployment of Marines and the National Guard to Los Angeles in June and his federalization of the National Guard in D.C. earlier this month.

He has threatened to launch similar operations with federal forces to New York and Chicago, despite local officials telling the Trump administration that the deployments are not necessary.

“They probably do want it,” Trump said. “If we didn’t go to Los Angeles, you would literally have had to call off the Olympics. It was so bad.”

Ahead of the 2028 Olympics, to be held in Los Angeles, American cities should be “spotless,” Trump added.

Wilner reported from Washington, Ellis from Los Angeles.

NEW YORK — President Trump stood among several hundred law enforcement officers, National Guard troops and federal agents at a U.S. Park Police operations center in one of Washington, D.C.’s most dangerous neighborhoods. As the cameras rolled, he offered a stark message about crime, an issue he’s been hammering for decades, as he thanked them for their efforts.

“We’re not playing games,” he said. “We’re going to make it safe. And we’re going to then go on to other places.”

The Republican president is proudly promoting the work of roughly 2,000 National Guard troops in the city, lent by allied governors from at least six Republican-led states. They’re in place to confront what Trump describes as an out-of-control crime wave in the Democratic-run city, though violent crime in Washington, like dozens of cities led by Democrats, has been down significantly since a pandemic high.

Trump and his allies are confident that his stunning decision to dispatch troops to a major American city is a big political winner almost certain to remind voters of why they elected him last fall.

Democrats say this is a fight they’re eager to have.

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, an Army veteran, cast Trump’s move as a dangerous political stunt designed to distract the American people from his inability to address persistent inflation, rising energy prices and major health insurance cuts, among other major policy challenges.

“I’m deeply offended, as someone who’s actually worn the uniform, that he would use the lives of these men and women and the activation of these men and women as political pawns,” Moore told the Associated Press.

Trump’s extraordinary federal power grab comes as the term-limited president has threatened to send troops to other American cities led by Democrats, even as voters voice increasing concern about his authoritarian tendencies. And it could be a factor for both sides in elections in Virginia and New Jersey this fall — and next year’s more consequential midterms.

Inside the White House strategy

The president and White House see Trump’s decision to take over the D.C. police department as a political boon and have been eager to publicize the efforts.

The White House offered a livestream of Trump’s Thursday evening appearance, and on Wednesday, Vice President JD Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made a surprise visit to Union Station, D.C.’s busy transit hub, to thank members of the National Guard over Shake Shack burgers.

Each morning, Trump’s press office distributes statistics outlining the previous night’s law enforcement actions, including total arrests and how many of those people are in the country illegally.

The strategy echoes Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration, which has often forced Democrats to come to the defense of people living in the country illegally, including some who have committed serious crimes.

A White House official, speaking on background to discuss internal deliberations, dismissed concerns about perceptions of federal overreach in Washington, saying public safety is a fundamental requirement and a priority for residents.

Trump defended his efforts during an interview on “The Todd Starnes Show” on Thursday.

“Because I sent in people to stop crime, they said, ‘He’s a dictator.’ The real people, though, even Democrats, are calling me and saying, ‘It’s unbelievable’ how much it has helped,” he said.

The White House hopes to use its actions in D.C. as a test case to inspire changes in other cities, though Trump has legal power to intervene in Washington that he doesn’t have elsewhere because the city is under partial federal control.

“Everyday Americans who support commonsense policies would deem the removal of more than 600 dangerous criminals from the streets of our nation’s capital a huge success,” said White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers. “The Democrats continue to be wildly unpopular because they oppose efforts to stop violent crime and protect law-abiding citizens.”

Democrats lean in

Moore, Maryland’s Democratic governor, suggested a dark motivation behind Trump’s approach, which is focused almost exclusively on cities with large minority populations led by Democratic mayors of color.

“Once again, we are seeing how these incredibly dangerous and biased tropes are being used about these communities by someone who is not willing to step foot in them, but is willing to stand in the Oval Office and defend them,” Moore said.

Even before Trump called the National Guard to Washington, Democratic mayors across the country have been touting their success in reducing violent crime.

Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, who leads the Democratic Mayors Assn., noted that more than half of the 70 largest Democratic-led cities in the country have seen violent crime decrease so far this year.

“He’s stoking racial division and stoking fear and chaos,” Bibb said. “We need someone who wants to be a collaborator, not a dictator.”

Democratic strategists acknowledge that Trump’s GOP has enjoyed a significant advantage in recent years on the issues of crime and immigration — issues Trump has long sought to connect. But as Democratic officials push back against the federal takeover in Washington, party strategists are offering cautious optimism that Trump’s tactics will backfire.

“This is an opportunity for the party to go on offense on an issue that has plagued us for a long time,” said veteran Democratic strategist Daniel Wessel. “The facts are on our side.”

A closer look at the numbers

FBI statistics released this month show murder and nonnegligent manslaughter in the U.S. in 2024 fell nearly 15% from a year earlier, continuing a decline that’s been seen since a pandemic-era crime spike.

Meanwhile, recent public polling shows that Republicans have enjoyed an advantage over Democrats on the issue of crime.

A CNN/SSRS poll conducted in May found that about 4 in 10 U.S. adults said the Republican Party’s views were closer to their own on crime and policing, while 3 in 10 said they were more aligned with Democrats’ views. About 3 in 10 said neither party reflected their opinions. Other polls conducted in the past few years found a similar gap.

Trump also had a significant edge over Democrat Kamala Harris on the issue in the 2024 election. About half of voters said Trump was better able to handle crime, while about 4 in 10 said this about Harris, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of the American electorate.

At the same time, Americans have expressed more concern about the scope of presidential power since Trump took office for a second time in January.

An AP-NORC poll conducted in April found that about half of U.S. adults said the president has “too much” power in the way the U.S. government operates these days, up from 32% in March 2024.

The unusual military presence in a U.S. city, which featured checkpoints across Washington staffed in some cases by masked federal agents, injected a sense of fear and chaos into daily life for some people in the nation’s capital.

At least one day care center was closed Thursday as childcare staff feared the military action, which has featured a surge in immigration enforcement, while local officials raised concerns about next week’s public school openings.

Moore said he would block any push by Trump to send the National Guard into Baltimore.

“I have not seen anything or any conditions on the ground that I think would justify the mobilization of our National Guard,” he said. “They think they’re winning the political argument. I don’t give a s—- about the political argument.”

Peoples and Colvin write for the Associated Press. AP writers Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux and Chris Megerian in Washington contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered that National Guard troops patrolling the streets of Washington for President Trump’s law enforcement crackdown be armed, the Pentagon said Friday.

The Defense Department didn’t offer any other details about the new development or why it was needed.

The step is a escalation in Trump’s intervention into policing in the nation’s capital and comes as nearly 2,000 National Guard members have been stationed in the city, with the arrival this week of hundreds of troops from several Republican-led states.

Trump initially called up 800 members of the District of Columbia National Guard to assist federal law enforcement in his bid to crack down on crime and homelessness in the capital. Since then, six states have sent troops to the city, growing the military presence.

It was unclear if the guard’s role in the federal intervention would be changing. The guard has so far not taken part in law enforcement but largely have been protecting landmarks like the National Mall and Union Station and helping with crowd control.

The Pentagon and the Army said last week that troops would not carry guns. The new guidance is that they will carry their service-issued weapons.

The city had been informed about the intent for the National Guard to be armed, a person familiar with the conversations said earlier this week. The person was not authorized to disclose the plans and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Spokespeople for the District of Columbia National Guard and a military task force overseeing all the guard troops in Washington did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

Toropin writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Anna Johnson contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — Federal authorities have used checkpoints around the nation’s capital to screen vehicles, sometimes asking people for their immigration status after stopping them, as President Trump’s crackdown reaches the two-week mark in Washington.

The use of checkpoints, which can be legally controversial, is the latest indication that the White House’s mass deportation agenda is central to its assertion of federal power in Washington. Federal agents and hundreds of National Guard troops have surged into Washington this month, putting some residents on edge and creating tense confrontations in the streets.

The city’s immigrant population, in particular, is rattled. A daycare was partially closed on Thursday when staff became afraid to go to work because they heard about federal agents nearby. An administrator asked parents to keep their children at home if possible.

Other day cares have stopped taking kids on daily walks because of fears about encountering law enforcement.

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser acknowledged Thursday that the proliferation of traffic checkpoints are an inevitable aspect of the federal law enforcement operations.

“The surge of federal officers is allowing for different types of deployments, more frequent types of deployments, like checkpoints,” Bowser said.

Since Aug. 7, when Trump began surging federal agents into the city, there have been 630 arrests, including 251 people who are in the country illegally, according to the White House. Trump has been ratcheting up the pressure since then, seizing control of the D.C. police department Aug. 11 and deploying more National Guard troops, mostly from Republican-led states.

Soldiers have been largely stationed in downtown areas, such as monuments on the National Mall and transit stations.

However, federal agents are operating more widely through the city — and some may soon get a visit from the president himself.

Trump is expected to join a patrol in D.C. on Thursday night. He told his plans to Todd Starnes, a conservative commentator.

Not a normal traffic stop

On Thursday morning, as Martin Romero rode through Washington’s Rock Creek Park on his way to a construction job in Virginia, he saw police on the road up ahead. He figured it was a normal traffic stop, but it wasn’t.

Romero, 41, said that U.S. Park Police were telling pickup trucks with company logos to pull over, reminding them that commercial vehicles weren’t allowed on park roads. They checked for licenses and insurance information, and then U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents came over.

Romero said there were two agents on one side of his truck and three on the other. He started to get nervous as the agents asked where they were from and whether they were in the country illegally.

“We just came here to work,” Romero said afterward. “We aren’t doing anything bad.”

Two people in his truck were detained and the agents didn’t give a reason, he said. He also saw three other people taken from other vehicles.

“I feel really worried because they took two of our guys,” he said. “They wouldn’t say where they’re taking them or if they’ll be able to come back.”

Romero said he called his boss, who told him to just head home. They wouldn’t be working today.

Enrique Martinez, a supervisor at the construction company, came to the scene afterward. He pondered whether to call families of the detained men.

“This has never happened to our company before,” Martinez said. “I’m not really sure what to do.”

Checkpoints are legal, to a point

The Supreme Court has upheld the use of law enforcement and government checkpoints for specific purposes, such as for policing the border and for identifying suspected drunk drivers.

But there are restrictions on that authority, especially when it comes to general crime control. Jeffrey Bellin, a former prosecutor in Washington and professor at Vanderbilt Law School who specializes in criminal law and procedures, said the Constitution doesn’t allow “the government to be constantly checking us and stopping to see if we’re up to any criminal activity.”

He said checkpoints for a legally justifiable purpose — like checking for driver’s licenses and registrations — cannot be used as “subterfuge” or a pretext for stops that would otherwise not be allowed. And though the court has affirmed the use of checkpoints at the border, and even some distance away from it, to ask drivers about immigration status, Bellin said it was unlikely the authority would extend to Washington.

Anthony Michael Kreis, a professor at Georgia State College of Law, said the seemingly “arbitrary” and intrusive nature of the checkpoints in the capital could leave residents feeling aggrieved.

“Some of the things could be entirely constitutional and fine, but at the same time, the way that things are unfolding, people are suspicious — and I think for good reason,” he said.

From Los Angeles to D.C.

There are few places in the country that have been unaffected by Trump’s deportation drive, but his push into D.C. is shaping into something more sustained, similar to what has unfolded in the Los Angeles area since early June.

In Los Angeles, immigration officers — working with the Border Patrol and other federal agencies — have been a near-daily presence at Home Depots, car washes and other highly visible locations.

In a demonstration of how enforcement has affected routines, the bishop of San Bernardino formally excused parishioners of their weekly obligation to attend Mass after immigration agents detained people on two parish properties.

Immigration officials have been an unusually public presence, sending horse patrols to the city’s famed MacArthur Park and appearing outside California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s news conference last week on congressional redistricting. Authorities said an agent fired at a moving vehicle last week after the driver refused to roll down his window during an immigration stop.

The National Guard and Marines were previously in the city for weeks on an assignment to maintain order amid protests.

A federal judge blocked the administration from conducting indiscriminate immigration stops in Southern California but authorities have vowed to keep the pressure on.

Megerian and Martin write for the Associated Press. AP writers Eric Tucker and Ashraf Khalil in Washington and Elliot Spagat in San Diego contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — Bringing prominent White House support to the streets of Washington, Vice President JD Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Wednesday visited with National Guard troops at the city’s main train station as protesters chanted “free D.C.” — the latest tense interlude from President Trump’s crackdown in the nation’s capital. “We brought some law and order back,” the vice president asserted.

“We appreciate everything you’re doing,” Vance said as he presented burgers to the troops. Citing the protesters whose shouts echoed through the station, Vance said “they appear to hate the idea that Americans can enjoy their communities.”

The appearance, which also included White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, was a striking scene that illustrated the Republican administration’s intense focus on the situation in Washington and its willingness to promote an initiative that has polarized the Democrat-led city.

An estimated 1,900 troops are being deployed in D.C. More than half are coming from Republican-led states. Besides Union Station, they have mostly been spotted around downtown areas, including the National Mall and Metro stops.

An early morning accident involved an armored vehicle

The intersection of life in the city and a military presence produced another striking scene early Wednesday when an armored vehicle collided with a civilian car less than a mile from the U.S. Capitol. One person was trapped inside the car after the accident and had to be extricated by emergency responders, according to D.C. fire department spokesman Vito Maggiolo. The person was taken to a hospital because of minor injuries.

It was not immediately clear what caused the crash. A video posted online showed the aftermath of the collision, with a tan-colored armored vehicle twice the height of the civilian car with a crushed side.

“You come to our city and this is what you do? Seriously?” a woman yelled at the troops in the video.

Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi said more than 550 people have been arrested so far, and the U.S. Marshals are offering $500 rewards for information leading to additional arrests. “Together, we will make DC safe again!” Bondi wrote on social media.

City officials work to navigate the situation

Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser, trying to balance the constituency that elected her and the reality in front of her, acknowledged the changing situation in the city as she attended a back-to-school event with teachers and staff.

“This is not the same time, is it, that we experienced in opening school last year,” she said. Bowser said she would worry about the politics and told school employees that “your job is to love on the kids, teach them and make sure that they are prepared and to trust that I’m going to do the right thing for all of us.”

Despite the militarized backdrop, Bowser said it’s important that children “have joy when they approach this school year.” Public schools around Washington reconvene Monday.

The skewer-everyone cartoon TV show “ South Park,” which has leaned into near-real-time satire in recent years, this week made the federal crackdown fodder for a new episode. A 20-second promo released by Comedy Central depicts the character “Towelie” — a walking towel — riding in a bus past the U.S. Supreme Court building and White House, where armed troops are patrolling. A tank rolls by in front of the White House.

“This seems like a perfect place for a towel,” the character says upon disembarking the bus.

“South Park” creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone recently signed a reported $1.5-billion, five-year deal with Paramount for new episodes and streaming rights to their series, which began its 27th season this summer.

The season premiere mocked the president’s body in a raunchy manner and depicted him sharing a bed with Satan.

Whitehurst, Brown and Megerian write for the Associated Press. AP writers David Bauder and Michelle Price contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — Joining forces from three other Republican-led states, the Mississippi National Guard will deploy 200 troops to Washington as part of the Trump administration’s ongoing federal policing and immigration overhaul in the nation’s capital.

Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves said in a statement Monday that he has approved the deployment of approximately 200 Mississippi National Guard Soldiers to Washington, D.C.

“Crime is out of control there, and it’s clear something must be done to combat it,” Reeves said.

Mississippi joins three other states that have pledged to deploy hundreds of National Guard members to the nation’s capital to bolster the Republican administration’s operation to overhaul policing in the Democratic-led city through a federal crackdown on crime and homelessness.

West Virginia said it was deploying 300 to 400 troops, South Carolina pledged 200 and Ohio said it will send 150 in the coming days, deployments that built on top of President Trump’s initial order that 800 National Guard troops deploy as part of the federal intervention.

Trump’s executive order that launched the federal operation declared a “crime emergency” in the District of Columbia and initiated a takeover Washington’s police department. The administration has ordered local police to cooperate with federal agents on immigration enforcement, orders that would contradict local laws prohibiting such collaboration.

“D.C. has been under siege from thugs and killers, but now, D.C. is back under Federal Control where it belongs,” Trump wrote on his social media website a day after issuing his order. “The White House is in charge. The Military and our Great Police will liberate this City, scrape away the filth, and make it safe, clean, habitable and beautiful once more!”

National Guard members in the District of Columbia have been assisting law enforcement with tasks including crowd control and patrolling landmarks such as the National Mall and Union Station. Their role has been limited thus far, and it remains unclear why additional troops would be needed.

Over the weekend in Washington, protesters pushed back on federal law enforcement and National Guard troops fanning out in the city. Scores of protesters gathered in the city’s Dupont Circle on Saturday and marched to the White House.

Brown and Pesoli write for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — As a wary Washington waited, the White House promised a ramp-up of National Guard troops and federal officers on the streets of the nation’s capital around the clock starting Wednesday, days after President Trump’s unprecedented announcement that his administration would take over the city’s police department for at least a month.

The city’s Democratic mayor and police chief framed the influx as a plus for public safety, though they said there are few hard measures for what a successful end to the operation might look like. The Republican president has said crime in the city was at emergency levels that only such federal intervention could fix even as District of Columbia leaders pointed to statistics showing violent crime at a 30-year low after a sharp rise two years ago.

For two days, small groups of federal officers have been visible in scattered areas of the city. That is about to change, the administration says.

A “significantly higher” presence of guard members was expected Wednesday night, and federal agents will be out 24/7 rather than largely at night, according to the White House. Hundreds of federal law enforcement and city police officers who patrolled the streets Tuesday night made 43 arrests, compared with about two dozen the night before.

In one neighborhood, officers from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the FBI could be seen along with the U.S. Park Police searching the car of a motorist parked just outside a legal parking area to eat takeout and drop off a friend. Two blocks away, U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers gathered in a parking lot before driving off on patrol.

In other parts of the city, including those with popular nightlife hot spots, federal patrols were harder to find. At the National Mall, there was little law enforcement activity aside from Park Police cruisers pulling over a taxi driver near the Washington Monument.

A variety of infractions are targeted

The arrests made by 1,450 federal and local officers across the city included those for suspicion of driving under the influence, unlawful entry, as well as a warrant for assault with a deadly weapon, according to the White House. Seven illegal firearms were seized.

Unlike in other U.S. states and cities, the law gives Trump the power to take over Washington’s police for up to a month. Extending Trump’s power over the city for longer would require approval from Congress, and that could be tough in the face of Democratic resistance.

The president has full command of the National Guard, but as of Tuesday evening, guard members had yet to be assigned a specific mission, according to an official who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. As many as 800 troops were expected to be mobilized in a support role to law enforcement, though exactly what form remains to be determined.

The push also includes clearing out encampments for people who are homeless, Trump has said. U.S. Park Police have removed dozens of tents since March, and plan to take out two more this week, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt has said. People are offered the chance to go to shelters and get addiction treatment, if needed, but those who refuse could be fined or jailed, she said.

City officials said they are making more shelter space available and increasing their outreach.

Violent crime has dropped in the district

The federal effort comes even after a drop in violent crime in the nation’s capital, a trend that experts have seen in cities across the U.S. since an increase during the coronavirus pandemic.

On average, the level of violence in Washington remains mostly higher than averages in three dozen cities analyzed by the nonprofit Council on Criminal Justice, said the group’s president and CEO, Adam Gelb.

Police Chief Pamela Smith said during an interview with the local Fox affiliate that the city’s Metro Police Department has been down nearly 800 officers. She said the increased number of federal agents on the streets would help fill that gap, at least for now.

Mayor Muriel Bowser said city officials did not get any specific goals for the surge during a meeting with Trump’s attorney general, Pam Bondi, and other top federal law enforcement officials Tuesday. But, she said, “I think they regard it as a success to have more presence and take more guns off the street, and we do too.”

She had previously called Trump’s moves “unsettling and unprecedented” while pointing out he was within a president’s legal rights regarding the district, which is the seat of American government but is not a state.

For some residents, the increased presence of law enforcement and National Guard troops is nerve-racking.

“I’ve seen them right here at the subway … they had my street where I live at blocked off yesterday, actually,” Washington native Sheina Taylor said. “It’s more fearful now because even though you’re a law-abiding citizen, here in D.C., you don’t know, especially because I’m African American.”

Whitehurst and Khalil write for the Associated Press. AP writers Konstantin Toropin and Will Weissert, photographer Jacquelyn Martin and video journalist River Zhang contributed to this report.

President Trump’s decision to deploy hundreds of National Guard troops to Washington has California officials on high alert, with some worrying that he intends to activate federal forces in the Bay Area and Southern California, especially during the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.

Trump said that his use of the National Guard to fight crime could expand to other cities, and suggested that local police have been unable to do the job.

Legal experts say it is highly unusual and troubling for forces to be deployed without a major crisis, such as civil unrest or a natural disaster. The Washington deployment is another example of Trump seeking to use the military for domestic endeavors, similar to his decision to send the National Guard to Los Angeles in June, amid an immigration crackdown that sparked protests, experts said.

Washington has long struggled with crime but has seen major reductions in recent years.

Officials in Oakland and Los Angeles — two cities the president mentioned by name — slammed Trump’s comments about crime in their cities. Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee said in a statement that the president’s characterization wasn’t rooted in fact, but “based in fear-mongering in an attempt to score cheap political points.” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass called it “performative” and a “stunt.”

Trump has said he would consider deploying the military to Los Angeles once again to protect the 2028 Olympic Games. This month, he signed an executive order that named him chair of a White House task force on the Los Angeles Games.

The White House has not said specifically what role Trump would play in security arrangements.

Los Angeles City Councilmember Imelda Padilla, who sits on the city panel overseeing the Games, acknowledged last week that the city is a “little nervous” about the federal government’s plans for securing the event.

Congress recently approved $1 billion for security and planning for the Games. A representative for the Department of Homeland Security declined to explain to The Times how the funds will be used.

Padilla said her concern was based on the unpredictable nature of the administration, as well as recent immigration raids that have used masked, heavily armed agents to round up people at Home Depot parking lots and car washes.

“Everything that we’re seeing with the raids was a real curveball to our city,” Padilla said during a Los Angeles Current Affairs Forum event. It dealt “a real curveball to [efforts] to focus on the things that folks care about, like homelessness, like transportation … economic development,” she said.

Bass, appearing on CNN this week, said that using the National Guard during the Olympics is “completely appropriate.” She said that the city expects a “federal response when we have over 200 countries here, meaning heads of state of over 200 countries. Of course you have the military involved. That is routine.”

But Bass made a distinction between L.A. Olympics security and the “political stunt” she said Trump pulled by bringing in the National Guard and the U.S. Marines after protests over the federal government’s immigration crackdown. That deployment faces ongoing legal challenges, with an appeals court ruling that Trump had the legal authority to send the National Guard.

“I believed then, and I believe now that Los Angeles was a test case, and I think D.C. is a test case as well,” Bass said. “To say, well, we can take over your city whenever we want, and I’m the commander in chief, and I can use the troops whenever we want.”

On Monday, Trump tied his action to what has been a familiar theme to him: perceived urban decay.

“You look at Chicago, how bad it is, you look at Los Angeles, how bad it is. We have other cities that are very bad. New York has a problem. And then you have, of course, Baltimore and Oakland. We don’t even mention that anymore —they’re so far gone,” he said. “We’re not going to let it happen. We’re not going to lose our cities over this.”

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said officers and agents deployed across the District of Columbia have so far made 23 arrests for offenses including homicide, possession with intent to distribute narcotics, lewd acts, reckless driving, fare evasion and not having permits. Six illegal handguns were seized, she said.

Citing crime as a reason to deploy National Guard troops without the support of a state governor is highly unprecedented, experts said. The National Guard has been deployed to Southern California before, notably during the 1992 L.A. riots and the civil unrest after George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis in 2020.

“It would be awful because he would be clearly violating his legal authorities and he’d be sued again by the governor and undoubtedly, by the mayors of L.A. and Oakland,” said William Banks, a law professor at Syracuse University. “The citizens in those cities would be up in arms. They would be aghast that there are soldiers patrolling their streets.”

The District of Columbia does not have control over its National Guard, which gives the president wide latitude to deploy those troops. In California and other states, the head of the National Guard is the governor and there are legal limits on how federal troops can be used.

The Posse Comitatus Act, passed in 1878 after the end of Reconstruction, largely bars federal troops from being used in civilian law enforcement. The law reflects a tradition dating to the Revolutionary War era that sees military interference in American life as a threat to liberty and democracy.

“We have such a strong tradition that we don’t use the military for domestic law enforcement, and it’s a characteristic of authoritarian countries to see the military be used in that way,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley Law School and a constitutional law expert. “That’s never been so in the United States, and many are concerned about the way in which President Trump is acting the way authoritarian rulers do.”

Whether the troops deployed to Los Angeles in June amid the federal immigration raids were used for domestic law enforcement in violation of the Posse Comitatus Act is central in the trial underway this week in federal court in San Francisco.

If Trump were to send troops to California, Banks said, the only legal lever he could pull would be to declare an insurrection and invoke the Insurrection Act.

Unlike in D.C., Trump wouldn’t be able to federalize police departments in other parts of the country. There are circumstances where the federal government has put departments under consent decrees — a reform tool for agencies that have engaged in unlawful practices — but in those cases the government alleged specific civil rights violations, said Ed Obayashi, a Northern California sheriff’s deputy and legal counsel on policing.

“You are not going to be able to come in and take over because you say crime is rising in a particular place,” he said.

Oakland Councilman Ken Houston, a third-generation resident who was elected in 2024, said his city doesn’t need the federal government’s help with public safety.

Oakland has struggled with crime for years, but Houston cited progress. Violent crimes, including homicide, aggravated assault, rape and robbery are down 29% so far this year from the same period in 2024. Property crimes including burglary, motor vehicle theft and larceny also are trending down, according to city data.

“He’s going by old numbers and he’s making a point,” Houston said of Trump. “Oakland does not need the National Guard.”

Times staff writer Noah Goldberg contributed to this report.