A federal judge has temporarily blocked President Trump’s deployment of National Guard troops to Washington, D.C., ruling that the administration exceeded its legal authority. Judge Jia M. Cobb held that using Guard forces for crime-deterrence in the capital, without a request from the city’s civil authorities, violated both D.C. law and federal statutes.
Cobb argued that while the president does have some authority over the Guard, he cannot unilaterally send troops into the city to act as a local policing force. She emphasized that her interpretation of a broad Article II power would effectively erase Congress’s role in governing the District and erode the capital’s limited self-rule. The judge also found that the Pentagon lacked proper statutory authority to deploy more than 1,000 out-of-state Guard members in support of the mission.
The legal challenge against the deployment was brought by D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb, who warned that this could set a dangerous precedent of military force being used in domestic law-enforcement. Cobb agreed, saying that the city’s “exercise of sovereign powers” is being undermined.
However, the judge has delayed enforcement of her ruling until 11 December to give the Trump administration time to appeal. In response, the White House has defended the deployment as lawful, insisting that the troops are needed to protect federal property and help tackle crime in the capital.
The ruling is part of a broader legal battleground: similar court fights are playing out over Guard deployments in other U.S. cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, and Portland, with judges pushing back on the executive’s domestic use of military forces.
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