CHICAGO — The Trump administration has agreed to extend a federal judge’s temporary block on deploying National Guard troops to Chicago while the U.S. Supreme Court weighs whether to stay the judge’s order.
In a filing Tuesday — two days before U.S. District Judge April Perry’s 14-day temporary restraining order is set to expire — Department of Justice attorneys said they’d consented to a 30-day extension of the order. The Trump administration appealed the matter to the U.S. Supreme Court late last week, and it’s unclear when the high court may rule.
Read more: Trump asks U.S. Supreme Court to allow National Guard deployment in Illinois
In its filing to the Supreme Court, U.S. Solicitor General John Sauer argued the judicial branch has no right to “second guess” a president’s judgment on national security matters or resulting military actions. The administration maintains National Guard deployment is necessary to protect federal immigration agents and property from protesters.
“A federal district court lacks not only the authority but also the competence to wrest control of the military chain of command from the Commander in Chief,” he wrote.
Read more: Immigration officials seek to justify use of force on Chicago-area protesters | Judge grants restraining order protecting protesters, journalists in Chicago-area protests
Lawyers for the state of Illinois shot back in its own filing Monday, citing two U.S. Supreme Court decisions from the last century, including one “invalidating presidential seizure of steel mills during the Korean War.”
“Furthermore, ‘federal courts are fully empowered to consider’ claims ‘resulting from military intrusion into the civilian sector,’” lawyers in Attorney General Kwame Raoul’s office wrote, citing a 1972 decision. “There are numerous indications that the questions presented here ... fall within this duty.”
President Donald Trump’s Oct. 4 order to federalize, or take control of, 300 members of the Illinois National Guard, along with the deployment of 200 Texas guardsmen and another 16 troops from California, has been blocked since Perry’s Oct. 9 ruling.
Read more: Illinois sues to block Trump’s National Guard deployment to Chicago | Over Pritzker’s objections, Trump sending 300 National Guardsmen to Chicago, governor says
The judge said the Department of Justice’s arguments of violence added to a “growing body of evidence that (Department of Homeland Security’s) version of events are unreliable” as the administration’s narrative about “violent” protests in Chicago differed so strongly from the accounts of state and local law enforcement.
Perry also found there was “no credible evidence that there is a danger of rebellion in the state of Illinois.” The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals backed up Perry last week, with a three-judge panel writing in an opinion published Thursday that “political opposition is not rebellion.”
Read more: Judge calls feds ‘unreliable,’ temporarily blocks National Guard deployment to Illinois | Former military leaders decry National Guard deployment in Illinois
The three-judge appeals panel did stay the portion of Perry’s order blocking the administration from federalizing National Guard troops. But the administration accused the 7th circuit of “judicially micromanaging the exercise of the President’s Commander-in-Chief powers” as the appellate judges still sided with Perry on the actual deployment of guardsmen.
Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.
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