Trump Administration Completes Withdrawal of National Guard From Los Angeles, Chicago and Portland

The Trump administration has withdrawn all federalized National Guard troops from Los Angeles, Chicago and Portland, ending one of the most contentious confrontations between the White House and Democratic-led states after repeated legal setbacks stymied the president's push for a show of force in major American cities.

The deployments began last summer, when President Donald Trump federalized National Guard members and sent them to Los Angeles following clashes between law enforcement and demonstrators protesting immigration enforcement raids. The administration later expanded the strategy, activating roughly 500 troops in the Chicago area and about 200 in Portland, Oregon, over the objections of local and state officials who insisted the forces were unnecessary.

From the outset, the moves drew fierce resistance from governors, mayors and civil-liberties groups, who argued the president had overstepped his authority by federalizing the Guard without the consent of state leaders. A series of court challenges followed, with judges in multiple cases finding that the administration likely exceeded its powers — rulings that blunted the deployments and kept the troops largely sidelined.

The legal picture was not uniform. A three-judge appeals court panel ruled that the White House had likely acted lawfully when it federalized the Guard in at least one instance, halting a lower-court decision that had found the activation illegal. But the cumulative weight of the litigation, combined with mounting political pressure, left the surge effectively paralyzed, and the administration ultimately chose to pull the forces out rather than press on.

The withdrawal was completed with little fanfare from the White House or the Pentagon, beyond an earlier social-media post in which Trump announced that the troops would be removed from the three cities. The quiet conclusion stood in sharp contrast to the high-profile manner in which the deployments had been ordered, amid televised standoffs and curfews in parts of downtown Los Angeles.

For Democratic officials, the pullout amounted to a vindication of their argument that the federal government had improperly militarized a domestic political dispute. For the administration, it marked a rare retreat on an immigration-and-security agenda that has defined much of Trump's term. The episode is likely to leave a lasting imprint on the legal boundaries of presidential power over the National Guard, with several of the underlying cases still working their way through the courts.