Judge halts Trump’s troop deployment in Portland

U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut hit the pause button Saturday on the Trump administration's order to activate the National Guard and send federal troops to Portland.

The State of Oregon and the City of Portland filed the lawsuitin response to President Donald Trump's Sept. 27 order to send "all necessary troops" to Portland, putting 200 members of the Oregon National Guard under the command of Secretary of War Pete Hegseth.

Trump's order was issued over the vocal objection of Mayor Keith Wilson, Portland city councilors, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek, U.S. Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley, and other local leaders who have denounced the federal deployment and urged Portlanders to act in peace.

"In this case, and unlike in Newsom II, Plaintiffs provide substantial evidence that the protests at the Portland ICE facility were not significantly violent or disruptive in the days-or even weeks-leading up to the President's directive on September 27, 2025," U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut wrote in her decision, issued Saturday. "Furthermore, this country has a longstanding and foundational tradition of resistance to government overreach, especially in the form of military intrusion into civil affairs."

The judge's decision followed a hearing Friday morning before a packed on the 15th floor of the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in downtown Portland.

At issue is the interpretation of Title 10, the law that grants the president the power to deploy the National Guard in case of invasion, rebellion, or where the government is unable to execute the law.

Oregon and Portland, the plaintiffs, argued that the order did not meet the extraordinary legal requirements necessary to activate the National Guard.

"Today's outcome is proof that Portlanders' commitment to peaceful expression and civic unity truly matters," said Mayor Keith Wilson. "We have not met aggression with aggression. We've stood firm, calm and grounded in our shared values and that is why this decision went our way. Portland has shown that peace is power."

Arguing for the plaintiffs, Scott Kennedy, Senior Assistant Attorney General for Oregon, claimed the federal government had simply not produced evidence of the kind of breakdown and lawlessness required.

Instead, he continued, the Trump administration relied on a "fictional narrative" to justify "one of the most dramatic infringements of sovereignty in Oregon's history."

"Sporadic incidents that were quickly contained are not enough to justify this order," he said.

Arguing for the federal government, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Eric Hamilton retorted that the President's recent social media posts on Truth Social claiming that Portland was deteriorating into "lawless mayhem" were sufficient grounds to make the order.

According to arecent rulingby the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, judges must grant the executive branch "great level of deference" in determining whether those conditions exist. For the determination to be valid, the ruling stated, there must be an invasion, rebellion, on an inability to execute the laws. The President's determination cannot be beyond "range of honest judgment" or "obviously absurd or made in bad faith."

Hamilton also cited the tragic shooting of the ICE Facility in Denver as additional reason for the President's order. That event, he said, "underscores the seriousness of the threat" in Portland.

Oregon attorney Kennedy responded that the shooting in Denver, while tragic, did not justify calling up the National Guard in Portland. Trump's posts on social media, Kennedy said, were "incendiary hyperbole" that did not meet the standard set out by the Ninth Circuit.

Hamilton also claimed that "there is a clear danger of rebellion" in Portland, specifying that dangerof rebellion is enough to activate the guard, even in the absence of actualrebellion.

In reply, Kennedy said the protests in Portland were exercises in free speech protected by the First Amendment and did not constitute rebellion. If the federal government's definition were adopted, he said, "almost any protest would qualify as rebellion."