November 7, 2025
CHICAGO (AP) — Illinois leaders went to court Monday to stop President Donald Trump from sending National Guard troops to Chicago, escalating a clash between Democratic-led states and the Republican administration during an aggressive immigration enforcement operation in the nation’s third-largest city.
The legal challenge came hours after a judge blocked the Guard's deployment in Portland, Oregon.
The Trump administration has portrayed the cities as war-ravaged and lawless amid the government's crackdown on illegal immigration. Officials in Illinois and Oregon say military intervention isn’t needed and that federal involvement is inflaming the situation.
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a Democrat, said some 300 of the state's guard troops were to be federalized and deployed to Chicago, along with 400 others from Texas.
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.
Separately, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said he signed an executive order barring federal immigration agents and others from using city-owned property, such as parking lots, garages, and vacant lots, as staging areas for enforcement operations.
In Chicago, the sight of armed Border Patrol agents making arrests near famous landmarks has amplified concerns from residents already uneasy after an immigration crackdown that began last month.
Protesters have frequently rallied near an immigration facility outside the city, and federal officials reported the arrests of 13 protesters on Friday near a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in Broadview.
The Department of Homeland Security acknowledged that 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 on Sunday 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.
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