The NPR Politics Podcast - Why Trump Says He Wants To Send The National Guard To Chicago And Portland

Episode Date: October 8, 2025

President Trump has taken steps to deploy National Guard troops to Chicago and to Portland, Oregon. We discuss how the administration justifies those actions, as well as how Albuquerque, New Mexico, is using that state’s National Guard to fight crimeThis episode: senior White House correspondent Tamara Keith, Pentagon correspondent Tom Bowman, justice correspondent Ryan Lucas, and senior political editor and correspondent Domenico Montanaro.This podcast was produced by Casey Morell & Bria Suggs, and edited by Rachel Baye. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi.Listen to every episode of the NPR Politics Podcast sponsor-free, unlock access to bonus episodes with more from the NPR Politics team, and support public media when you sign up for The NPR Politics Podcast+ at plus.npr.org/politics.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

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I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Tom Bowman. I cover the Pentagon. And I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. And today on the show, we're talking about President Trump's decision to deploy national guard troops to American cities. He did it in D.C. Now he's trying to do it in Portland, Oregon and the Chicago area.

Tom, has the Guard arrived in those cities now? What's the latest? They've not deployed yet. There are also California National Guard troops that were sent by President Trump. He's basically taken over the Guard in Oregon. But a federal judge said, listen, we don't think this is legal. The Trump administration has appealed. And in Chicago, we have a couple of hundred Illinois Guard ready to take to the streets. They're going through some training now in crowd control. They could be moving to the streets in the next few days. Also, the Texas Guard has sent in 200 Texas Guardsmen. I'm told they could be protecting an ice facility in Chicago as early as this afternoon.

I mean, like with so many other things with Trump, I mean, it's really another effort by him to really try to consolidate power that is going to be tested, obviously, in the courts as well. But, Tam, I'm wondering, like, what has Trump actually said about any of this and his reasons for sending the guard to those cities? He talks about two things. One, cracking down on illegal immigration, getting people out of the country who are in the country now, who he says shouldn't be there. And then also the idea that all these cities are run by radical left Democratic mayors who are not

being helpful in immigration enforcement or in cracking down on crime. He talks a lot about crime in the cities. That was a big part of his justification going into Washington, D.C. And just today, President Trump put out a post on social media saying, quote, Chicago mayor should be in jail for failing to protect ICE officers, exclamation point. Governor Pritzker also exclamation point. So he described in Portland, Oregon, as a war zone. He's using very stark length. He loves to invoke jail. I mean, this is a thing that he talks about quite a bit. And we don't know that he's actually going to go through with any of that kind of thing to kind of go after, you know, someone like Pritzker or the mayor of Chicago. But, you know, it certainly raises alarm bells when you have a president who's looking to take control of the National Guard and then threatening to put people who are political foes ostensibly in his view in prison. And it certainly gets to some of his justification for federalizing the Guard that these mayors won't go along. Well, actually, it doesn't because if you look at what's going on in the streets of Portland, I mean, it's quite mild there.

And also, there were some protests at the ice facility outside of Portland, but there's clearly no war zone there, no insurrection. And in Chicago, a little more violent, a woman was shot by federal agent. And she was carrying a gun according to federal officials. But again, doesn't rise to the level of insurrection. Tom, you mentioned the word insurrection. That is a word the president has been using. a lot. He described what's happening in Portland as an insurrection. So why that word? What is the significance there? Well, a president has a right to take over a state's guard. Now, the guard is

basically run by the governor, but a president can't take over the guard. It's called federalizing it. And the NPR got a hold of a memo from Defense Secretary Pete Hegset that laid this out. And he cited, get this Title 10, 12406. So we all know what that's about, right? No. Well, it basically does say the president can take over the guard for a foreign invasion, a rebellion, or if the locals can handle it. So that's why they're doing it. And what Hegeseth wants the guard to do is to protect ice facilities in Chicago and also accompany ICE agents as well as federal agents while they're doing their duties going after undocumented migrants. And certainly in his first term, Trump threatened to take military action in American citizens. cities and said that he would invoke the Insurrection Act, you know, saying that if a city or state refused to take the action necessary, then he would deploy the U.S. military to, quote, quickly solve the problem for them. And the Insurrection Act is an 1807 law that essentially,

you know, authorizes the president to be able to call forth militia for the purpose of suppressing insurrection in those cities if it's deemed to be something that's happening in those places. And certainly there's a lot of evidence that Trump has been able to. convince his base that that's happening. Yeah, I think it's important to note here that he has not yet invoked the Insurrection Act. Correct. That is sort of a political third rail. However, he has said now multiple times, I haven't done it yet, but I could. And if the courts or politicians get in my way, then maybe I will. So it's sort of dangling out there. Tom, I want to play a little clip of tape from a speech that President Trump gave last week before an audience of generals

and admirals who had been flown in from all over the world. It was this meeting in Northern Virginia that was called by the Defense Secretary. And President Trump talked about his desire to use the military on U.S. soil. We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military, national guard, but military, because we're going to Going into Chicago version, that's a big city with an incompetent governor. Stupid governor, stupid. No, that troubled a lot of military people I spoke with. They didn't sign up for the military to go after their own citizens.

And clearly, cities are not training ground for the military. They go after foreign enemies. They do not go after their own citizens. Traditionally, there is a pretty big separation between politics and the military. No, absolutely. And if you listen to the speech that he gave at Quantico, he may, mentioned Biden, maybe a half dozen times, trashed these mayors from some of these cities, clearly out of line for a military audience. It was clearly political. But this is par for the course

with Trump. Remember during the first term, he talked about my generals. Back during Trump's first term, I was talking with his general who was talking to Trump about and explaining to him that the military is apolitical. It's always been that way. And he can advise the president, but he's not really part of his administration. Again, he's separate. He's apolitical. And Trump said, really? Well, we can change that.

You'll bring me a bill and I'll sign it. Domenico, how relevant are the politics of the places where President Trump is sending the guard? He has a better opportunity to send National Guard into places that welcome them, obviously. But, you know, when he talks about places like Chicago and New York and so many of these cities that are run by Democratic mayors. It certainly feels like he's doing this intentionally to try to stir up, you know, political opposition. And, you know, you can't help but think that he's maybe distracting from other things because the economy, first of all, is seen as still the top issue for a lot of people. And when you look at polling about his economic handling, it's down in the 30s, which is very different

than where he was in his first term, where people saw that as relative strength and they don't anymore. I mean, there was a recent Harvard-Harris poll, for example, that found that 52 percent of people think that his policies on the economy are resulting in fewer jobs. 56% said that they think that he's losing the battle against inflation. And 58% said that they think tariffs are harming the economy. So he'd rather not talk about that and be talking more about these political opponents and a perception of crime in places where the data show crime is going down. We've heard a lot about states' rights over the years.

And this would seem to be sort of upside down from where Republicans traditionally are about the relationship between states and the federal government? Well, I mean, I think that when it comes to Trump, it's states rights if conservatives are running those states. And it's not if Democrats are because they feel like Democrats aren't doing the right thing. So, you know, I mean, it's not really a core central ideology. I think you can argue Republicans hold right now, especially during this era of Trumpism. All right. We're going to let you go, Tom. Thank you for being here. You're welcome.

And we have to take a quick break, but we will have more in a moment. Before Gwendolyn Christie was cast as Breanne of Tarth on Game of Thrones, she had a hard time finding a good role. The feedback she'd always get was the same, and it wasn't particularly helpful. Because you're too tall and you're too unconventional looking. And I just thought, gosh, I'm limited. Gwendolyn Christie from Game of Thrones, Severance, and more on Bullseye for Maximumfund.com. And we're back. And Justice Correspondent Ryan Lucas joins us now.

Hey, Ryan. Hi there. So we've been talking about the Trump administration's use of the National Guard to assist with crime fighting efforts. Ryan, you've been reporting on a similar use of the National Guard in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Tell us about what you found. It's similar but very different. And it's different because this is not an instance in which President Trump has sent in the National Guard against the wishes of the mayor. What happened in Albuquerque is earlier this year, the Democratic governor of the state,

along with the Democratic mayor of Albuquerque and the police chief got together and decided that it would be helpful to have members of the New Mexico National Guard assist the Albuquerque Police Department when it comes to issues of crime in the city. Crime has been a big challenge in Albuquerque. And I talked to the city's mayor about it, Tim Keller. And he has a very positive view on this. But he says that what this has done has helped the city kind of get a grip on a very challenging, problem that has had with crime for a long time. And he said that in the past nine months, so this year, crime has fallen across all major categories in the city. And he attributes at least part of that to the health that the National Guard has given. It's a concept called civilianization.

It's also widely now studied by the big city mayors and chiefs and their different associations. And the idea is in the modern era, you want civilians doing as much as possible, freeing up officers, to fight violent crime. So we brought in the National Guard in cooperation together in polo shirts and with no law enforcement ability at all and no fatigues and no military vehicles. And all they do is all the civilian work that was tying up the officer's time. That sounds remarkably different from politicians in Oregon and Illinois right now who are describing an invasion. This was an invitation. It seems very different from the way President Trump is handling some of these other cities. It's very different. It's also interesting, the Albuquerque model in particular, because during Trump's first administration, in the summer of 2020, the first Trump administration sent a surge of federal law enforcement, FBI, DEA, to nine cities to help crack down on violent crime because crime was soaring.

one of those cities that they were sent to was Albuquerque. This is a DOJ operation called Operation Legend. And talking to the Albuquerque mayor about this, Tim Keller, he said that presidential-led effort, that Trump administration-led effort had zero impact on crime in Albuquerque. He said crime was going up before the operation, during the operation, and afterwards. It had no effect. And what you see now is the city working in coordination with the governor using the assets that they have with the National Guard. And he says that this has been much more effective. And I also asked the mayor, I said, is there any kind of situation in which you would welcome help from the administration in tackling crime in the city?

And he told me no. He said he just doesn't trust the administration that the folks they would be sent in would be sent in to do the mission that they were ostensibly there to conduct. And that's very different, right? I mean, there's a difference between invasions and invitations. I mean, if you think about like a wedding, there might be somebody who you don't want at the wedding and you don't. invite them, but somebody else might want them at that wedding. You don't want them crashing your wedding if you don't want them there, right? I mean, it's very different. I mean, there have been times that these states have asked for help and they can coordinate, but that's different than a

president federalizing those troops. Ryan, is it, is the difference here that sort of the local directed approach is more responsive to the local needs? I think that there's some of that, yes, and some of what the mayor said this deployment is doing is helping the city deal with a shortage of police officers. And he acknowledges that this is very much a short-term solution to a longer-term problem. He said that he envisions this deployment lasting through the end of the year, maybe through next summer. But what it's helped them do is kind of bridge, he says, a retirement bulge that they have right now so that the police work can still get done. But long-term, they are going to have to hire more officers. I will also say I spoke to members of the community

in Albuquerque to try to get a sense of how it's perceived there. And, I will say, did acknowledge that there are mixed reviews. And so I talked to a couple people. One is Dan Williams from the ACLU of New Mexico. And he had his concerns about the National Guard. We're very worried that even though it is different than what President Trump has done in Washington, D.C. and Memphis and other places, it normalizes the idea of the military doing civilian law enforcement, which is, a tradition almost as old as this country that we reject. And we worry that it fuels over-policing mass surveillance in the communities who are the most vulnerable to that in New Mexico. So we do have some pretty significant concerns still.

And there are others who just have concerns that the way that the money's being spent could be better spent on community services, and that in some instances, adding police, in their view, It adds to what they view as an over-policing. Domenico, more broadly, and this is asking you to pull back a fair bit, but what is public support like for using the National Guard to help with crime fighting? Yeah, people are very split on this. I mean, the latest NPR, PBS News, Marist poll, for example, we asked whether or not people wanted National Guard to come in to be able to be used to support local law enforcement and fight crime. By 5247 margin, they said they did.

That was mostly because of just how in favor Republicans are for this. 89% of Republicans said that they would be in favor of this. 50% said so strongly. On the other side, 76% of Democrats were against it, 61% strongly against it. So very, very different views, independence, pretty much split down the middle. And to the point of Republicans being as in favor as they actually are, I spoke with Keith Herpy from Georgia, who was one of the respondents to the poll. And here's what he had to say about the National Guard. Entity such as the National Guard or whatever go in.

And the cities like Chicago and Seattle and Portland and we're having problems and fix the problem, which some people might be that as violence. I don't. I just, you're putting down an insurrection. You're doing your job. That's what I believe. I think that's what the majority of Americans believe. It's certainly what all my friends and neighbors believe.

And I think that really speaks to the perceived, realities that are very different for a lot of people. If you're just watching Fox News, you might see images of places like Portland and Chicago that appear that the place is burning or looks like some kind of a war zone, maybe even using old footage of it when the data say something very different. Yeah, I think you really point to an important aspect of this, Domenico, that one's perceptions of this are very much going to depend on the media that you're consuming. And there is an actual reality. There are actual facts as to what's going on. But people's perception are going to differ greatly, depending on where they're getting their news.

And if you're getting your news from President Trump, then the message is very dire about the state of American cities. So Albuquerque is a place where the National Guard has been deployed with apparent success, limited pushback. Why are the places where the Guard is invited getting so much less focus from the White House than the areas where they're not welcome, but they're going in by force? Well, I mean, some people would argue that he wants the controversy, you know, to be able to say that there's violence, maybe even the protests that they can show as violence. But other states really don't want them there. They feel like they can handle the situations in their cities and states. And they want to protect their sovereignty. You know, we should say, though, other presidents have gone in against the wishes of those states. People might remember in the 60s, John of Kennedy. Junior, going in to enforce integration in schools and college. And, you know, so I think that he might point to something like that as his reasoning saying, oh, look at all these problems in these places. And that's how he keeps his base in line, even though the reality just

isn't that. All right. Well, we are going to leave it there for today. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. I'm Ryan Lucas. I cover the Justice Department. And I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent. And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast. Thank you.