A federal judge in Oregon temporarily blocked President Donald Trump from sending Oregon National Guard troops to Portland, siding with state and city officials who argued the move overstepped federal authority.
U.S. District Judge Karin J. Immergut granted a temporary restraining order on Saturday, pausing the deployment while the lawsuit proceeds.
The ruling came after the administration sought to send about 200 Guard members to protect federal facilities in the city.
Immergut’s order frames the dispute as a constitutional test of who controls a state’s Guard in the absence of rebellion or an acute breakdown in law enforcement.
Oregon’s leaders said those thresholds were not met and warned that federalizing the troops without the governor’s consent would infringe on state sovereignty.
In her reasoning, the judge cited a lack of evidence that Portland faced the level of unrest described by the administration and concluded that allowing the deployment could cause irreparable harm to the state’s authority.
The order is temporary, it runs through October 18, with a hearing scheduled for October 17 on whether to extend it while the case continues.
City and state officials filed their challenge jointly, and the court set an expedited schedule given the national security and civil liberties questions at stake.
The White House said it will appeal, maintaining that federal personnel are needed to safeguard government property amid protests outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility.
Local officials have countered that recent demonstrations have been largely small and largely nonviolent, and that bringing in federalized Guard troops risks escalating tensions rather than calming them.
Saturday’s ruling underscores the legal and political fight over the scope of presidential power to use military resources inside U.S. cities.
Federalizing a state’s National Guard without the governor’s consent is an extraordinary step, one typically justified by rebellion or an inability of civil authorities to keep order.
Immergut concluded the facts on the ground in Portland did not support that step.
The court’s analysis also touched on the Tenth Amendment, which reserves powers to the states, and on the traditional limits that separate military functions from civilian law enforcement.
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Federal interventions can change the tone of a city’s public life, affect business operations near federal facilities, and influence how municipalities manage demonstrations.
Court checks on those interventions add another layer of uncertainty, since appeals can stretch on and policy can shift with each ruling.
This is not the only courtroom test of the administration’s approach. A separate attempt to send Guard forces to California also ran into a legal roadblock this year, and that dispute is still moving through the courts.
The Portland case could become a reference point for judges weighing similar clashes between federal authority and state control.
The administration must convince either the Ninth Circuit or Immergut that conditions in Portland justify federalizing the Guard.
Oregon and Portland officials, for their part, will aim to extend the restraining order and convert it into a longer injunction as they press their constitutional claims.
If the case proceeds to fuller arguments, the court could dig deeper into the factual record around the size and character of the protests, the risk to federal property, and what alternatives short of federalized troops are available to local authorities.
The broader question of how the federal government engages with local law enforcement remains unresolved, and the answer will likely be shaped by a series of fast-moving filings over the next two weeks.
