D.C. Files Suit To End Trump’s National Guard Deployment

Washington, D.C., filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration on Thursday, arguing that the president’s National Guard deployment in the nation’s capital is an “illegal federal overreach.”

D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb, a Democrat, argued that the deployment “is not only unnecessary and unwanted, but it is also dangerous and harmful to the District and its residents.” The lawsuit claims that Trump’s move to send in National Guard troops to help address D.C.’s violent crime problem deprives “the District of the local autonomy granted under the Home Rule Act.”

“No American city should have the US military – particularly out-of-state military who are not accountable to the residents and untrained in local law enforcement – policing its streets,” Schwalb added. “It’s D.C. today but could be any other city tomorrow. We’ve filed this action to put an end to this illegal federal overreach.”

President Donald Trump said he deployed the National Guard to the nation’s capital on August 11 to “reestablish law, order and public safety.” Trump also ordered federal law enforcement officers to assist in making arrests. The White House fired back after the lawsuit was filed, telling The New York Times that D.C.’s move was “nothing more than another attempt — at the detriment of D.C. residents and visitors — to undermine the President’s highly successful operations to stop violent crime in D.C.”

The White House said last week that more than 1,000 arrests have been made, including apprehensions of many suspected illegal immigrants, in D.C. since Trump deployed the National Guard. An administration official told Daily Wire White House Correspondent Mary Margaret Olohan that authorities also seized more than 100 firearms and cleared nearly 50 homeless encampments.

On Wednesday, Trump declared that D.C. “is a totally safe city” following his executive action. “You are not reporting any crime because there is none,” Trump said. “They said crime is down 87%, then I said ‘no it’s not. It’s down 100%.’”

According to data released by the Metropolitan Police Department, violent crime has gone down 39% during Trump’s deployment of the National Guard and federal law enforcement agents compared to the same time last year. Homicides dropped 58% and burglaries decreased by 49%, according to the Metropolitan Police Department’s statistics. President Trump has questioned the D.C. police department’s crime data after allegations surfaced earlier this year that officials “cooked the books” to keep crime numbers down.

The lawsuit follows a ruling from a federal judge on Tuesday who said that Trump broke the law when he deployed the National Guard and Marines to Los Angeles during violent anti-ICE protests in June, The Daily Wire previously reported. The order from Judge Charles Breyer, the younger brother of former liberal Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, takes effect next week.

Breyer’s order blocks the Trump administration from using around 300 National Guard troops left in Los Angeles to engage “in arrests, apprehensions, searches, seizures, security patrols, traffic control, crowd control, riot control, evidence collection, interrogation, or acting as informants, unless and until Defendants satisfy the requirements of a valid constitutional or statutory exception.”

The lawsuit filed by D.C. against Trump makes similar arguments as the case brought against the president in California, claiming that the National Guard deployment to cities violates the Posse Comitatus Act by using the military for domestic law enforcement. While Trump’s move is challenged in D.C., he is also considering deploying the National Guard to tackle violent crime in other cities, such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, New Orleans, and Baltimore.