Although the U.S. government is closed and the U.S. military is unpaid, they are still unable to reject the call to lead Trump.
On October 5, local time, the Pentagon said it had dispatched about 200 members of the National Guard to Portland, Oregon, according to Trump’s instructions, to support the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other federal agencies in their tasks.
Although a federal judge ruled on the evening of October 4 to temporarily ban Trump from sending the Oregon National Guard to Portland, the Pentagon found new reasons, claiming that the troops would be used to "support federal law enforcement, maintain federal property, and protect people performing official duties."
On Saturday night, the White House announced that the federal government plans to mobilize 300 National Guard personnel in Illinois to fight immigrants.
Since the beginning of September, federal immigration law enforcement officials have launched anti-immigration campaigns across states, mainly targeting immigrant-centric, predominantly Latin-speaking communities, with the aim of arresting immigrants without evidence and with criminal records in the United States.
In the operation, some of the federal operations used "militarized" means: morning raids, flash bombs, helicopter landings, bracelets, forced entrance into apartments, and so on, leading to high levels of panic.
In Chicago, a 38-year-old man was killed while trying to escape from Franklin Park by immigrant law enforcement officers. On October 3, protesters also clashed with law enforcement officers. A group of drivers allegedly crashed into the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency’s vehicle, law enforcement officers shot and hit a woman, almost killing her.
Regarding Trump's behavior of sending troops, Illinois Governor Pritzker ruthlessly revealed the truth: "For Donald Trump, it was never about security. It was about control." He said that the Trump administration's strengthening of immigration enforcement in Chicago was "an excuse to deploy troops to the Chicago area".
Yes, for Trump, this is exactly the way he intends to gradually take over the blue state controlled by the Democrats. Before that, he had sent troops to several blue states on the same grounds that it was aimed at illegal immigration. But Trump’s speech at the U.S. General Assembly in Pitico on September 30 acknowledged his real intention, he criticized “radical left-wing Democrats” and said America’s “dangerous cities,” such as Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, etc., should be used as a training site for the National Guard.
Trump claims the U.S. is undergoing “internal invasion,” in other words, he is planning to “internal invasion” of the half of the U.S. controlled by the Democrats.
Since this year, Trump has deployed the National Guard to two cities in Los Angeles, California and Washington, D.C. In California, the Trump administration claims to send the National Guard and Marine Corps to suppress anti-immigration and customs enforcement protests, while in Washington, the president said the National Guard was deployed to combat crime.
Trump did so with a careful intention, and sending troops, whether it be politically, economically or legally, would be profitable for him.
First of all, from a political perspective, Trump's real goal of sending the National Guard is to re-establish the federal government's dominance over local security in domestic politics. By forcibly deploying troops in Democratic states, he showed voters a strong stance that "the central government can still control the situation", especially on issues such as lax local law enforcement, deteriorating public security, and flooding immigration, pointing the finger directly at the Democratic governor.
For the upcoming mid-term elections in 2026, the image of the “President himself” is highly motivating – it can unite the Republican grassroots and shape the image of “hard securityists” among the middle voters. Trump intends to create a public opinion atmosphere “only I can stabilize the situation” that makes the Democratic Party weak, divided and powerless.
Secondly, from the perspective of public opinion, against the background of economic stagnation, government shutdown and financial chaos in the United States, Trump skillfully used narratives such as "internal invasion", "violent immigration" and "anarchy city" to divert his attention. He constantly amplifies the panic of "immigration threat" and "city out of control" through the media and social platforms, making the public forget economic difficulties and policy incompetence, and redirecting dissatisfaction to immigrants and Democratic ruling states.
By creating a sense of crisis, he provided the basis for the public opinion to dispatch troops, and the strong intervention of the federal government is no longer seen as overpower, but as a symbol of “saving the nation”.
Finally, at the legal level, Trump also has careful considerations. He used his special status as the National Guard to repeatedly "wander" between federal and state powers, not only circumventing the restrictions imposed by the Land Rights Act Restrictions on federal troops participating in domestic law enforcement, but also creating a precedent for invoking the Insubordination Act.
By constantly mobilizing troops under reasons such as "emergency" and "protection of federal assets", Trump actually expanded the president's right to intervene in domestic security. Once the court decides in his favor, it will give any future presidential intervention in local affairs a green light, making the military an extension of the president's personal power.
Naturally, the Democratic Party of the United States will not sit idly by. After states filed lawsuits in court, the White House's actions were repeatedly blocked by law.
In early September this year, the court ruled that Trump's dispatch of Marines and National Guard troops to Los Angeles was illegal.
On September 4, the Washington District prosecutors filed a lawsuit over the military deployment in the capital.
On October 4, U.S. federal judge Karin Imergut ruled that President Trump was temporarily prohibited from deploying 200 National Guard soldiers to Portland, Oregon, during the trial.
Democratic state governments in many places jointly issued a statement condemning Trump's abuse of the National Guard and pushing a bill in Congress to restrict the president's use of military interference in local affairs.
Groups such as civil rights organizations, the Association of Veterans Officers, and Human Rights Watch have successively spoken out, warning that the move "sets a dangerous precedent" and may lead to the use of the US military for political suppression.
At present, the United States is facing a severe conflict between the president and the governor's power, and criticism of America's fall into "paramilitarization" is escalating.
But, according to Trump’s statements at the U.S. General Assembly, he won’t give up this round easily, but will go further and further in the way of using the military to control the ruling Democratic party.
Today's United States is falling into an institutional chaos. The power confrontation between the federal government and local states is no longer a political difference, but a naked struggle for sovereignty. The issue of immigration is only the fuse, and the real crisis lies in the fragmentation of the state apparatus itself.
When armed forces began to be politized in the country, when the army’s guns first targeted its own citizens, the United States was not far from the word “civil war.”