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All active Oregon National Guard members that the Trump administration had mustered for a mission to Portland are demobilizing, the Pentagon says.
The development marks a major victory for Oregon and Portland officials and advocates, who regarded the mobilization as illegal and who have been working for months to block the Trump administration from sending troops into the city.
“All Title 10 troops in Portland, Los Angeles, and Chicago are conducting demobilizing activities,” Northern Command said in a Tuesday update on its website. “They will return to their home units once their demobilization is complete.”
Troops barely deployed to Portland at all, since they were blocked from the start by a federal court which found that Trump’s legal justifications for sending the military to the city—which he described as a crime-ridden hellscape—were untethered to the facts on the ground.
At one point, roughly 200 Oregon National Guard members had been mobilized for the mission, in addition to California National Guard members who had been brought into the state. They waited in limbo on bases while Oregon’s lawsuit to block the deployment proceeded.
In early November, Oregon had won its case, with a judge permanently blocking the deployment. But while many troops went home, the Pentagon kept 100 Oregon National Guard troops active on bases pending the Trump administration’s appeal.
That appeal remained active when late last month the U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling on troop deployments in Chicago that augured extremely poorly for the Trump administration’s legal arguments for the Portland deployment.
A few days later, on Dec. 31, President Donald Trump announced he would be removing the troops from Portland, Chicago and Los Angeles.
Trump asserted the troops had done great work to reduce crime, ignoring the fact that in Portland they had waited out the greater part of the past three months on bases outside the city.
In his statement, he wrote, “We will come back, perhaps in a much different and stronger form, when crime begins to soar again - Only a question of time! It is hard to believe that these Democrat Mayors and Governors, all of whom are greatly incompetent, would want us to leave, especially considering the great progress that has been made???”
After the announcement, several days went by with no public indication the troops had in fact been ordered to demobilize. As of midday Monday, for example, the website for Northern Command said troops were “activated” but not deployed in Portland.
Gov. Tina Kotek says the Oregon Military Department got the official demobilization order Monday. In a written statement Tuesday morning, Kotek thanked the troops, who she said are courageous and deserve respect, citing the time they spent in limbo during the holiday season. She also lauded Oregonians who stood against the unconstitutional military intervention.
And she condemned the president too. “President Trump’s disregard for the facts on the ground revealed that he is more focused on provoking a fight in cities and states that don’t share his politics than serving the American People,” Kotek says.
Demobilization procedure requires Oregon National Guard members to travel to Fort Bliss, Texas, before returning to Oregon, Kotek says.
The court cases remain active, for now. The court injunction preventing guard deployment in Oregon remains in effect and on appeal. It remains unclear how the Trump administration will proceed in that case. It did not respond to questions Monday. Dustin Buehler, an Oregon Justice Department lawyer, told WW Monday that the ball is in the feds’ court.
