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The White House blasted a federal judge who temporarily blocked the Trump administration twice from dispatching National Guard troops to Oregon in October, asserting that President Donald Trump has “undisputed authority” to deploy troops to Portland amid ongoing immigration protests there.
U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut issued a ruling late Sunday blocking the Trump administration from sending California National Guard troops to Oregon — or any other state as Trump advances his quest to deploy troops to major U.S. cities to tackle crime and to keep watch on Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt discredited Immergut’s ruling Monday and said that the Trump administration was appealing the decision.
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“I think her opinion is untethered in reality and in the law,” Leavitt told reporters at a White House press briefing. “The president is using his authority as commander in chief, U.S. code 12 406, which clearly states that the president has the right to call up the National Guard and in cases where he deems it’s appropriate. … The ICE facility has been really under siege. And, by these anarchists outside, they have been, disrespecting law enforcement. They’ve been inciting violence.”
Earlier Monday, White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller said that Immergut, a Trump appointee, has no authority to bar the president from sending troops to Oregon, and blasted the decision as one of the most “egregious” orders he’s ever seen.
“A district court judge has no conceivable authority, whatsoever, to restrict the President and Commander-in-Chief from dispatching members of the US military to defend federal lives and property,” Miller said in a Monday X post. “Today’s judicial ruling is one of the most egregious and thunderous violations of constitutional order we have ever seen — and is yet the latest example of unceasing efforts to nullify the 2024 election by fiat.”
“Remember: all of this is about preventing the removal of illegal alien trespassers from the United States at any cost,” Miller said.
The Sunday temporary restraining order came just hours after Trump signed off on mobilizing California National Guard troops to Portland, despite Immergut’s initial restraining order Saturday blocking the deployment of Oregon National Guard troops to the city.
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“How could bringing in federalized National Guard from California not be in direct contravention to the temporary restraining order I issued yesterday?” Immergut said during a telephone hearing Sunday.
“Aren’t defendants simply circumventing my order?” Immergut said later. “Why is this appropriate?”
The Trump administration has argued that the deployment of National Guard troops to Portland, Oregon, is necessary to defend ICE officers amid ongoing protests at an ICE facility there.
Miller previously railed against Immergut’s first restraining order barring the Trump administration from sending troops to Portland, Oregon, and said Saturday the deployment is “an absolute necessity to defend our personnel, our laws, our government, public order and the Republic itself.”
Miller’s posts come amid recent scrutiny for denouncing judges. For example, Democratic Rep. Daniel Goldman of New York singled out Miller and the “extreme right” for “threatening judges” who rule against Trump after a fire broke out at a South Carolina Circuit Court judge’s property Saturday.
Trump’s effort to deploy National Guard troops to U.S. cities comes just after he told military leaders in September that they could be tasked with neutralizing the “enemy within” and that Democratic-led cities where he’s sending troops could serve as “training grounds.”
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“We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military, National Guard, but military,” Trump said Tuesday to top military leaders in Quantico, Virginia.
The effort is controversial, given that the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 puts restrictions on deploying U.S. troops to enforce domestic law.
National Guard troops are reserve forces that are mobilized in response to state and federal operations, including natural disasters, and typically are overseen by their respective state governments. However, Trump controversially deployed National Guard troops from states to respond to immigration riots in June, bypassing California Gov. Gavin Newsom to dispatch the troops.
Newsom responded to Immegut’s order late Sunday, and said: “We just won in court — again.”
“Trump’s abuse of power won’t stand,” Newsom said in a post on X.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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