A future Democratic-controlled Congress should take up the job that Obama and the party’s old guard abandoned: put strict limits on the use of drones that won’t simply be alternately loosened and tightened by whichever president comes to power, explicitly outlawing “targeted killing” and any other attempt at finding a loophole for the already existing ban on assassinations; finally repeal the 2001 Authorization of the Use of Military Force that has been serially abused by presidents to fight often secret wars all over the world; end mass surveillance, whether in the form of the National Security Agency’s warrantless backdoor searches that Democrats actually expanded under Joe Biden, or in the warrantless spying that the Department of Homeland Security and other agencies now do through private data brokers; close the Guantanamo Bay prison camp that Trump is now trying to send migrants to; and embark on a twenty-first-century version of the Church Committee to investigate and lay bare national security abuses.
Archiv: Posse Comitatus Act (1878)
Trump zieht Nationalgarde aus US-Städten ab
Kurz vor Weihnachten hatte Trump vor dem Obersten Gerichtshof der USA bei seinen Plänen eines Nationalgarde-Einsatzes in Chicago eine Niederlage kassiert. Der Oberste Gerichtshof der USA wies einen entsprechenden Eilantrag ab.
Trump says he’s withdrawing National Guard from Chicago, Los Angeles and Portland
His announcement comes after the US Supreme Court last week rejected his request to allow him to deploy the guard to Chicago to protect ICE agents as part of the administration’s ongoing immigration crackdown.
In major loss for Trump, Supreme Court blocks National Guard deployment to Chicago
“At this preliminary stage, the government has failed to identify a source of authority that would allow the military to execute the laws in Illinois,” the court said in its unsigned order.
The decision, which came over dissents from conservative Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch, was a substantial setback and appeared almost certain to jeopardize deployments of the National Guard in other cities as well.
US judge says Trump must end National Guard deployment in Los Angeles
The U.S. Supreme Court could ultimately decide the issue.
US official says shooting suspect was vetted by intel agencies and “clean on all checks”
At the time, the CIA would have done its own vetting of him through a variety of databases, including the National Counterterrorism Center database, to see if he had any known ties to terrorist groups. The CIA did its own vetting before he started working with them and kept the identities of those they worked with secret, the official said.
NCTC would have vetted him again during Operation Allies Welcome in 2021 for any ties to terrorism before he was allowed into the US. He was clean then as well and did not show any ties to terror organizations, per the senior US official.
Afghan national charged in Guard ambush shooting drove across US to carry out attack, officials say
Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, declined to provide a motive for Wednesday afternoon’s brazen act of violence which occurred just blocks from the White House. The presence of troops in the nation’s capital and other cities around the country has become a political flashpoint.
National Guard shooting suspect served in CIA counterterrorism unit, group says
Rahmanullah Lakanwal, the Afghan man who allegedly shot two National Guard members in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, previously served in one of Afghanistan‘s elite counterterrorism units, according to AfghanEvac, a nonprofit run by U.S. veterans and others who served in Afghanistan.
The unit was operated by the CIA with direct U.S. intelligence and military support, according to AfghanEvac.
Attentat auf Nationalgarde: Wie Trump den Angriff instrumentalisiert
Washingtons Bürgermeisterin und auch die örtliche Polizei haben sich immer wieder gegen den Einsatz der Nationalgarde in ihrer Stadt ausgesprochen. Der Bundesdistrikt Washington D.C. hatte sogar eine Klage gegen die Trump-Regierung eingereicht – und recht bekommen. Eine Bundesrichterin entschied vor etwa einer Woche, dass der immer wieder verlängerte Einsatz der Nationalgarde in der Stadt illegal sei.
Von dieser Entscheidung zeigt sich der US-Präsident aber unbeeindruckt. Nach den Schüssen auf die beiden Nationalgardisten fühlt er sich im Recht. Seinen Pentagon-Chef hat er jetzt sogar angewiesen, noch weitere 500 Nationalgardisten in die Hauptstadt zu schicken.
Entscheidung von US-Richterin: Einsatz der Nationalgarde in Washington ist illegal
Die Regierung von US-Präsident Donald Trump habe die Einheit der Hauptstadt nicht ohne ausdrückliche Anforderung der lokalen Behörden aktivieren dürfen. Zudem hätte sie Nationalgardisten aus anderen Bundesstaaten zu polizeilichen Zwecken nicht nach Washington beordern dürfen, hieß es in der Verfügung weiter.
Cobb ordnete an, den Einsatz der Nationalgarde zu beenden, setzte ihre Entscheidung jedoch für drei Wochen aus, damit die Trump-Regierung in Berufung gehen kann. Die Anordnung bleibt damit bis zum 11. Dezember außer Kraft.
Trump administration ordered to halt ‘unlawful’ Guard deployment in D.C.
U.S. District Judge Jia M. Cobb wrote in her opinion that the deployment was “unlawful,” has caused D.C. “irreparable harm to its sovereign powers under the Home Rule Act” — the 1973 law that gave D.C. residents their own elected government — and has “infringed upon the District’s right to govern itself.”
What is the Posse Comitatus Act, and how does it apply to Trump’s deployment of the National Guard in California and Washington, D.C.?
(September 9, 2025)
Dan Urman, director of the law and public policy minor at Northeastern University, who teaches courses on the Supreme Court, says the National Guard is often caught between state and federal authority. The guard generally reports to their respective state governors, “but if they get called into federal service, then the Posse Comitatus Act applies to them.”
“To work around this, presidents can ask governors to deploy their state’s National Guard members,” Urman says.
Judge permanently blocks deployment of National Guard to Portland, saying Trump exceeded his authority
In a 106-decision, Trump-appointed U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut made permanent an order she issued last month blocking the deployment into the city.
„The evidence demonstrates that these deployments, which were objected to by Oregon‘s governor and not requested by the federal officials in charge of protection of the ICE building, exceeded the president‘s authority,“ the judge wrote.
Court permits Trump‘s troop deployment in Portland, pending further appeal
U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut issued two temporary restraining orders early this month — one that prohibited Trump from calling up the troops so he could send them to Portland, and another that prohibited him from sending any National Guard members to Oregon at all, after the president tried to evade the first order by deploying California troops instead.
The Justice Department appealed the first order, and in a 2-1 ruling Monday, a panel from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the administration.
Immergut’s second order remains in effect, so no troops may immediately be deployed.
WHY ARE US TROOPS OCCUPYING AMERICAN CITIES?
The Trump administration is playing another long game, or trying to, in the streets of US cities under Democratic Party governance, using existing presidential emergency powers to send National Guard, Army troops and ICE agents to hunt down and arrest suspected undocumented immigrants and detain and deport them, without the due process demanded by the Constitution. What’s happening now may be a trial run for the use of those forces to interfere on the behalf of the president and the Republican Party in states where the Democratic Party has a chance to win crucial seats in next fall’s Congressional elections. I’ve been told by someone with inside knowledge that planning for such action is now under way in the White House.
Warum das US-Militär demokratische Städte übernimmt
Trump behauptet, er habe die rechtliche Befugnis, bei Feststellung eines Notstands Kriminalität in allen Staaten zu bekämpfen, einschließlich derer unter demokratischer Kontrolle. Mir wurde jedoch berichtet, dass das politische Team im Weißen Haus eine parallele, tiefere Motivation verfolgt: einen Präzedenzfall für bundesweite Notstandseingriffe zu schaffen – per präsidentieller Anordnung –, um vor den Kongresswahlen im nächsten Herbst mit Truppen intervenieren zu können.
Einige im Weißen Haus – nicht unbedingt der Präsident selbst – wissen, dass diese angerufenen Notstände „falsche Notstände“ sind. Aber wie ein Insider es formulierte: Wenn man es „wiederholt tut“, können solche Maßnahmen zukünftigen politischen Einfluss entfalten. Nennen Sie es eine neue politische Normalität.
Judge halts National Guard deployment to Portland from any state to perform federal duties
“The court recognized what we’ve said all along: there is no rebellion, no invasion, and no justification for militarizing our communities,“ Rayfield said in response to the ruling. „The President cannot keep playing whack-a-mole with different states’ Guard units to get around court orders and the rule of law.”
Illinois files a lawsuit to block Trump deploying the National Guard, joining Oregon
Oregon and Portland went back to the court — this time with California as an additional party to the lawsuit — and asked U.S. District Judge Karin J. Immergut for a new temporary restraining order blocking the Trump administration from sending the California National Guard to Oregon.
In her ruling, Immergut barred any National Guard members from being relocated from any state for service in Oregon. One day earlier, she had temporarily blocked the Trump administration from federalizing the Oregon National Guard.
Newsom joins Oregon’s suit after Trump sends California National Guard to Oregon
(October 5, 2025)
President Donald Trump deployed 300 California National Guard troops to Portland after a federal judge blocked the president’s call-up of Oregon’s National Guard, a workaround that has already drawn a new round of legal challenges.
Late Sunday, Gov. Gavin Newsom joined Oregon leaders’ pending lawsuit, asking Portland-based U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut to block Trump’s effort to sidestep her initial ruling by deploying California troops.
Oregon sues over Trump admin‘s ‚war-ravaged Portland‘ National Guard troop deployment
(September 28, 2025)
The state of Oregon filed a lawsuit Sunday to block President Donald Trump’s plan to deploy 200 National Guard troops to Portland.
The suit was announced by Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield within hours of Gov. Tina Kotek receiving a memo from Department of War Secretary Pete Hegseth, in which he authorized the troop deployment for 60 days.
‘The number of necessary troops is zero’: Portland mayor responds to Trump announcement
Portland Mayor Keith Wilson responded by saying “the number of necessary troops is zero, in Portland and any other American city.”
“Our nation has a long memory for acts of oppression, and the president will not find lawlessness or violence here unless he plans to perpetrate it,” Wilson said. “Imagine if the federal government sent hundreds of engineers, or teachers, or outreach workers to Portland, instead of a short, expensive, and fruitless show of force.”
Trump says he‘ll send troops to Portland, Ore., to handle ‚domestic terrorists‘
He made the announcement on social media, writing that he was directing the Department of Defense to „provide all necessary Troops to protect War ravaged Portland.“ Trump said the decision was necessary to protect U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities, which he described as „under siege from attack by Antifa, and other domestic terrorists.“
Trump to deploy troops to Portland, Oregon, vows ‘Full Force’
(today)
In a brief post to his social media platform, Trump said he would have Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth order troops deployed to Oregon’s largest city.
Trump did not specify what legal justification he had to do so, what military branch would be used or other key details. The troops would be used to defend U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities from “domestic terrorists,” he said.
Pentagon plan envisions 1,000 troops for Louisiana policing mission
(September 13, 2025)
Documents reviewed by The Washington Post illustrate the Trump administration’s evolving strategy for sending the military into cities with Democratic majorities
Trump deployment of military troops to Los Angeles was illegal, judge rules in blistering opinion
Experts say the ensuing judicial dust-up it will clarify precedent in a murky corner of the law. But some warn it could also unearth a road map for future deployments in cities across the U.S.
“If Breyer sides with Newsom and the 9th Circuit sides with Trump, we now have a playbook to use the National Guard and maybe the military around the country,” said Mark P. Nevitt, a law professor at Emory University and one of the country’s foremost experts on the law at the heart of the case.
“He’d have a ruling from the most liberal circuit in America giving the legal go-ahead for this deployment,” Nevitt said. “That would make bad law for the country.”
Donald Trump threatens to arrest NYC mayoral Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani
(July 1, 2025)
Trump threatened to arrest Mamdani if as mayor he follows through on pledges not to assist federal officials enforcing immigration laws.
“Well then, we’ll have to arrest him,” Trump told reporters on July 1 while visiting a detention center in Florida. Trump said that he would “be watching over him very carefully on behalf of the nation.”
Trump also said „a lot of people are saying he‘s here illegally,“ which is false. Mamdani is a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Uganda, who immigrated to the United States with his parents − film director Mira Nair and Columbia University professor Mahmood Mamdani − at the age of seven.
California hopes law from bloody era of U.S. history can rein in Trump’s use of troops
(Today)
Department of Justice has argued Posse Comitatus does not apply to the military’s current actions in Southern California — and even if it did, the soldiers deployed there haven’t violated the law. It also claimed the 9th Circuit decision endorsing Trump’s authority to call up troops rendered the Posse Comitatus issue moot.
Some experts feel California’s case is strong.
“You literally have military roaming the streets of Los Angeles with civilian law enforcement,” said Shilpi Agarwal, legal director of the ACLU of Northern California, “That’s exactly what the [act] is designed to prevent.”
But Nevitt was more doubtful. Even if Breyer ultimately rules that Trump’s troops are violating the law and grants the injunction California is seeking, the 9th Circuit will almost certainly strike it down, he said.
“It’s going to be an uphill battle,” the attorney said. “And if they find a way to get to the Supreme Court, I see the Supreme Court siding with Trump as well.”