Trump Scores Big Court Victory Over Guard Deployments And Hoo Boy Democrats Hate It
On Wednesday, President Trump and his administration celebrated another legal victory as the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals granted their request to pause a lower court’s injunction that had prohibited the Trump administration from deploying or asking for the deployment of National Guard members in the District of Columbia.
In August, President Trump released a memorandum instructing the Secretary of Defense to activate the National Guard of the District of Columbia to combat violent crime and ensure public safety in the area, as well as to coordinate with state governors to send additional National Guard units from various states to the capital.
In September, Washington D.C. initiated a lawsuit against President Trump, the Department of Defense, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, the U.S. Army, Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll, the Department of Justice, Attorney General Pam Bondi, the U.S. Marshals Service, and the Director of the U.S. Marshals Service, Gadyaces S. Serralta, claiming that the deployment of both the D.C. Guard and State Guards infringes upon the Administrative Procedure Act. D.C. then sought a preliminary injunction in the case.
Millett’s statement spans 27 pages and is quite clear. It provides a valuable overview of not just the timeline of the case but also the creation of the National Guard and the legal foundations for its use, along with the formation of the District of Columbia and its governing structure — a compelling read for those interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the historical context.
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Millett gets to the crux of the case this way:
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Because the District of Columbia is a federal district created by Congress, rather than a constitutionally sovereign entity like the fifty States, the Defendants appear on this early record likely to prevail on the merits of their argument that the President possesses a unique power within the District—the seat of the federal government—to mobilize the Guard under 32 U.S.C. § 502(f). It also appears likely that the D.C. Code independently authorizes the deployment of the D.C. Guard.
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In sum, the Defendants are likely to show that Section 502(f)(2)(A) authorized the President and the Secretary of Defense to request that both the D.C. Guard and the State Guards undertake a federal mission in the District.
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In sum, considering the many provisions of the D.C. Code that identify the President’s status as Commander in Chief of the D.C. Guard alongside those that enable the D.C. Guard to assist civil authorities in preserving the operations of the seat of federal government and protecting the Nation’s Capital, the Defendants are likely correct that the President acted consistently with District law in directing the deployment of the D.C. Guard.
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In short, because of the District’s unique constitutional status as a federal territory, the Nation’s Capital, and the seat of federal government, as well as the President’s consent to receive these forces, the Defendants have demonstrated that the district court likely erred in concluding that the deployment of out-of-state guard members to the District raised a serious federalism question under the Constitution.
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Absent a stay pending appeal, the district court’s order also risks the back-and-forth withdrawal and redeployment of guard members pending the completion of litigation.
In a separate statement, Rao even goes on to express doubt that D.C. even has proper standing to bring the litigation:
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I write separately to highlight an additional reason the President and other federal officials are likely to succeed onthe merits of their appeal: the District of Columbia may lack Article III standing to challenge the deployment of National Guard troops in the District.
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We have never recognized that the District possesses an independent sovereignty that can give rise to an Article III injury from actions of the federal government. Such an injury is likely untenable as a matter of first principles and finds no support in our precedent or historical practice.
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To begin with, a theory of sovereign injury is inconsistent with the District’s legal status.
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While Congress has provided the District with a certain degree of self-governance, we have never recognized that the District has standing to sue the President and federal officers for sovereignty-based injuries.
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In finding standing, the district court relied exclusively on cases involving state standing to sue federal entities, but no one suggests that the District has the same sovereignty as a State.
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In their motion for a stay, the Defendants did not object to the District’s standing. Article III courts, of course, have an independent obligation to verify their jurisdiction. Permitting the District to sue the President and other federal officials based on a sovereign injury is unprecedented and likely at odds with the unique legal status of the District. In subsequent proceedings, this important jurisdictional question should be given further consideration.
To be clear, this isn’t the end of the line for the case. D.C. could always seek rehearing en banc. And, as Millett rightly notes in her statement, “This decision does not bind the merits panel, which will engage in a fuller assessment of these issues.” Keep in mind that this decision only relates to temporarily suspending the district court’s injunction while the appeal is resolved on its substance.
Additionally, it’s important not to overinterpret this ruling concerning the other ongoing National Guard cases, as those pertain to federalization and deployment within states, rather than a federal district such as D.C. However, a victory is still a victory, and this serves as one for the administration.
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"""My husband brought his mistress to our daughter’s wedding—and then asked me to give her my seat beside him.
"""My husband brought his mistress to our daughter’s wedding—and then asked me to give her my seat beside him. For a few seconds, I honestly thought I was looking at the wrong table, because my name card had vanished and Melissa’s was sitting exactly where mine had been on every seating chart. She wore a pale blue silk dress, lifted her champagne as if she belonged there, and avoided my eyes when I stopped beside the chair. David stood up, pointed to an empty seat at the next table, and quietly said, “For tonight, why don’t you sit over there?”
I had spent fourteen months helping our daughter, Emily, plan that wedding, from dress fittings and florist meetings to late-night calls over napkins and seating charts. That morning, while I fastened the pearl buttons on her gown, she made me promise I would enjoy the day and not let anything between her father and me touch it. I meant that promise, because whatever was left of my marriage, I would not make my daughter’s wedding the battlefield where it died. But David had apparently made a different plan, and he expected me to cooperate with it in silence.
When I asked what Melissa was doing there, David’s face showed guilt for only a second before he hid it behind irritation. He acted as though I were creating the problem simply by noticing that his mistress was seated at the family table in the place reserved for the bride’s mother. Then Melissa looked at me and said, “Honey, today really isn’t the day to make Emily uncomfortable.” I almost laughed, because the woman who had been sleeping with my husband for nearly a year was now warning me not to embarrass my own daughter.
I could feel people settling into nearby seats, laughing and talking, unaware that my marriage was being quietly rearranged in front of them. David kept his voice low and told me we should not “do this here,” as if the humiliation belonged to me because I refused to disappear politely. I looked at the empty chair he had chosen for me between a cousin and someone from the groom’s side, and I realized something colder than anger. This was not spontaneous; he had thought about where Melissa would sit, and he had assumed I would move.
For twenty-eight years, I had been the woman who adjusted, explained, forgave, and made excuses when David forgot anniversaries, missed dinners, or put work ahead of family. When he became distant, I learned to expect less instead of asking for more, and somewhere along the way he mistook that patience for permission. Even now, part of me considered taking the other chair, smiling for photographs, swallowing the humiliation, and telling myself it was all for Emily. I actually reached for the chair because protecting my daughter still mattered more to me than winning a public fight.
Then I heard one word behind me: “Mom?” Emily was walking toward us in her wedding dress, still glowing from the ceremony, and at first she looked confused rather than angry. Her eyes moved from me, to the empty chair, to Melissa, then back to the family table where she had personally placed me months ago. David quickly stepped in and announced that he had “rearranged a few things,” as if changing the bride’s seating chart without permission were no more serious than moving a centerpiece.
Emily asked why I was not sitting in my seat, and David casually pointed to the neighboring table and said I would be sitting “right there.” Her smile disappeared, and her eyes dropped to the place card in front of Melissa. I watched my daughter’s expression go completely still as she picked up that card and turned it over in her hand. In that instant, I understood the worst part: Emily had not approved this, and David had brought his mistress into our daughter’s wedding believing he could force everyone to accept what he wanted once it was already done.
What Emily did not know was that six months earlier, I had discovered David’s affair through a message that appeared on his phone while he was in the shower. Melissa had written, “I hate pretending I don’t miss you when she’s around,” followed by another message asking whether Friday was still theirs. When I confronted him, David spent eleven minutes calling me paranoid, insecure, dramatic, suspicious, and unfair before I repeated Melissa’s words exactly. The silence that followed ended our marriage long before either of us ever said the word divorce.
We had kept the details quiet because Emily was planning her wedding, and I refused to turn her happiest season into a crisis about us. David told me he was “confused,” that what he had with Melissa was “more complicated than an affair,” and that he needed time before making decisions. I agreed only that Emily’s wedding came first, so we slept in separate rooms, spoke carefully, and tried to appear functional while our marriage quietly collapsed. I believed David understood that one day required restraint, but he had apparently used that silence to prepare something else.
Three weeks before the wedding, he had casually asked whether Emily had finalized the family table and whether every seat had been assigned. At the time, I thought it was harmless conversation, but standing there with Melissa’s card in my daughter’s hand, I finally understood why he had asked. He had been checking whether there would be room, and when there was not, he simply removed me. Emily looked up at her father and asked, very quietly, “Where is Mom’s place card?”—and for the first time that night, David had no easy answer.
…FULL STORY IN THE COMMENT 👇👇👇"" "
