CHICAGO — Illinois leaders went to court Monday to stop President Donald Trump from sending National Guard troops to Chicago, escalating a clash between Democratic-led states and the Republican administration during an aggressive immigration enforcement operation in the nation's third-largest city.
The legal challenge came hours after a judge blocked the Guard's deployment in Portland, Oregon.
The Trump administration has portrayed the cities as war-ravaged and lawless amid the government's crackdown on illegal immigration. Officials in Illinois and Oregon say military intervention isn't needed and federal involvement is inflaming the situation.
The lawsuit alleges that "these advances in President Trump’s long-declared 'War' on Chicago and Illinois are unlawful and dangerous."
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said a court hearing was scheduled for Thursday.
"Donald Trump is using our service members as political props and as pawns in his illegal effort to militarize our nation’s cities," said Pritzker, a Democrat.
Lockup lawsuit
Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union said Monday in a lawsuit that immigration detainees sent to a notorious Louisiana prison last month are being punished for crimes for which they have already served time, challenging the government’s decision to hold what it calls the “worst of the worst” there.
The lawsuit accuses Trump's administration of selecting the former slave plantation known as Angola for its “uniquely horrifying history" and intentionally subjecting immigrant detainees to inhumane conditions — including foul water and lacking basic necessities — in violation of the Double Jeopardy clause, which protects people from being punished twice for the same crime.
The ACLU also alleges some immigrants detained at the newly opened “Louisiana Lockup” should be released because the government failed to deport them within six months of a removal order. The lawsuit cites a 2001 Supreme Court ruling raised in several recent immigration cases, including that of the Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil, that says immigration detention should be "nonpunitive."
“The anti-immigrant campaign under the guise of ‘Making America Safe Again’ does not remotely outweigh or justify indefinite detention in ‘America’s Bloodiest Prison’ without any of the rights afforded to criminal defendants,” ACLU attorneys argue in a petition reviewed by The Associated Press.
The AP sent requests for comment to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry.
An 'invasion'
In Illinois, Pritzker said some 300 of the state's guard troops were to be federalized and deployed to Chicago, along with 400 others from Texas.
Pritzker said the potential deployment amounted to "Trump's invasion," and he called on Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to block it. Abbott pushed back and said the crackdown was needed to protect federal workers who are in the city as part of the president's increased immigration enforcement.
White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson confirmed in a weekend statement that Trump authorized using Illinois National Guard members.
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said Monday he signed an executive order barring federal immigration agents and others from using city-owned property, such as parking lots, garages and vacant lots, as staging areas for enforcement operations.
Protesters frequently rallied near an immigration facility outside the city, and federal officials reported the arrests of 13 protesters Friday near the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in Broadview.
Mayor Katrina Thompson, citing safety and other factors, said she limited protests to 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Elsewhere in the area, the Department of Homeland Security acknowledged that agents shot a woman Saturday on the southwest side of Chicago. The department claimed it happened after Border Patrol agents patrolling the area were "rammed by vehicles and boxed in by 10 cars."
Chicago Police Superintendent Larry Snelling said it was reasonable for agents to believe they were being ambushed.
Portland
In Portland, U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut granted a temporary restraining order Sunday sought by Oregon and California to block the deployment of Guard troops from those states to the city.
Immergut, who was appointed by Trump during his first term, seemed incredulous that the president moved to send National Guard troops to Oregon from neighboring California and then from Texas on Sunday, just hours after she ruled against it the first time.
"Aren't defendants simply circumventing my order?" she said. "Why is this appropriate?"
Local officials suggested many of the president's claims and social media posts about Portland appear to rely on images from 2020. Five years later, the city reduced crime, and downtown has seen fewer homeless encampments and more foot traffic.
Most violent crime around the U.S. has declined in recent years, including in Portland, where homicides from January through June decreased by 51% to 17 this year compared to the same period in 2024, data shows.
