Trump orders National Guard withdrawal from Chicago, LA, Portland

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump on Wednesday (local time) announced that the National Guard will be withdrawn from Chicago, Los Angeles, and Portland, claiming that their presence had helped reduce crime in these cities. He also suggested that federal forces could return in the future if crime rises again.

In a post on Truth Social, Trump wrote, “We are removing the National Guard from Chicago, Los Angeles, and Portland, despite the fact that CRIME has been greatly reduced by having these great Patriots in those cities, and ONLY by that fact. Portland, Los Angeles, and Chicago were GONE if it weren’t for the Federal Government stepping in. We will come back, perhaps in a much different and stronger form, when crime begins to soar again – Only a question of time”.

“It is hard to believe that these Democrat Mayors and Governors, all of whom are greatly incompetent, would want us to leave, especially considering the great progress that has been made?” the post read.

Just a week earlier, the United States Supreme Court refused to authorise the deployment of the National Guard in Chicago, over the objection of Illinois officials, amid doubts about the viability of such deployments in other cities, the New York Times reported.

The preliminary order barred the Trump administration from directing a state-based military force to the Chicago area, where an immigration enforcement drive had triggered arrests and confrontations between residents and federal authorities. The court declined to grant the president wide-ranging discretion to deploy the military in American cities.

The New York Times reported that at this stage in the case, the court said the Trump administration had not shown that the statute at issue “permits the president to federalise the Guard in the exercise of inherent authority to protect federal personnel and property in Illinois”. Three conservative justices, Clarence Thomas, Samuel A Alito Jr and Neil M Gorsuch, dissented.

Donald Trump had earlier ordered the National Guard to Portland, Los Angeles, and Washington, DC. Federal law allows the president to federalise the National Guard without the permission of state officials in certain circumstances, including in cases of “rebellion or danger of a rebellion” against the government or when law enforcement cannot execute US law. (ANI)