City attorneys from around the nation, including Los Angeles and Chicago, joined together to side with Oregon and its request for a federal appeals court to keep in place a judge’s order barring the Trump administration’s mobilization of National Guard troops to Portland.
Forty-two cities and counties signed onto a friend-of-the-court brief by the Oakland-based Public Rights Project late Monday. The project provides litigation support to local governments.
Multnomah County’s lawyer was the only other attorney from an Oregon county or city to sign the brief to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
They argued that the federal government is trying to “unlawfully unleash military forces without factual justification” that could harm communities across the United States.
They said the Trump administration has plans underway to deploy National Guard troops to 19 more states and that the appellate court should maintain the status quo and consider the “broader public interest.”
“These are not theoretical plans: just yesterday, the President sought to deploy 400 members of the Texas National Guard ‘where needed, including in the cities of Portland and Chicago,’” the brief said. “(The cities and counties) have a strong interest in ensuring that unmoored and unnecessary deployments cease and that order to the rule of law is restored.”
Attorneys for the Trump administration have urged the 9th Circuit to immediately take up their request to place a hold on U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut’s initial temporary restraining order. The federal government contends Immergut “impermissibly second-guessed the Commander in Chief’s military judgments.”
But the cities and counties in their 35-page brief argued that the balance of interests should weigh in favor of Oregon, reiterating Immergut’s findings that federal law enforcement officers, with the support of local and state police, are capable of handling any threats to the Portland U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office or its officers.
Local law enforcement agencies, they argued, also are better trained than military forces to manage protests at the building.
Further, taxpayers are paying the massive price of such National Guard mobilizations, an estimated $10 million if the 200 Oregon National Guard members are allowed to deploy to Portland for 60 days, and $134 million for the California National Guard members mobilized since June.
The cities, representing millions of Americans “have a fundamental interest in ensuring that these unnecessary deployments cease and that the rule of law is restored,” they wrote.
It’s unclear when the 9th Circuit may rule.
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