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National Guard

Trump Sets Military Against Civilians; Service Members Have Duty To Disobey

June 12, 2025 Marjorie Cohn, Truthout. , , , , , , ,
Four and a half months after his inauguration, Donald Trump is exercising his authoritarian chops, targeting immigrants in the state he most despises — California. Making good on Trump’s nativist pledge to deport millions of undocumented immigrants, agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Department of Homeland Security started conducting widespread raids outside workplaces in Los Angeles. They began on June 6, with no prior notification to the California governor, L.A. mayor or local law enforcement.

The Use Of National Guard And Active Duty Troops To Control Opposition

June 10, 2025 James M. Branum, Military Law Task Force. , , , , ,
The Military Law Task Force of the National Lawyers Guild is opposed to the use of military forces to “put down” or “control” the heartfelt reactions by community members to workplace immigration raids in Los Angeles and other cities. The Trump administration claims the use of the troops is necessary because local police are incapable of protecting the masked, non-uniformed, but heavily armed, federal forces from ICE, DHS, ATF and the FBI. Nothing could be further from the truth. In California, for example, Governor Gavin Newsom has denounced the use of military troops as a dangerous escalation of the confrontations.

LA Protest Response Risks Turning US Military Into Political Force

June 10, 2025 Ed Pilkington, The Guardian. , , , , , ,
The Trump administration’s deployment of national guard troops to Los Angeles to intervene in civilian protests in the face of opposition from the Californian governor is a major escalation that risks the politicisation of the US military, armed service veterans are warning. Former top military figures have told the Guardian that the decision to put up to 2,000 troops under federal control and send them into the streets of LA is a violation of the military’s commitment to keep out of domestic politics in all but the most exceptional circumstances. The last time a US president federalised the national guard against the wishes of a state governor was in 1965, when Lyndon Johnson deployed them to protect civil rights marchers in Alabama.

Protesters Clash With Law Enforcement In Downtown Los Angeles

June 8, 2025 Frank Stoltze, Megan Garvey and Jared Bennett, LAist. , , , , ,
Federal agents conducted a series of immigration sweeps across Los Angeles on Friday, prompting anger and resistance from onlookers and immigrant rights groups that have braced for this type of action for months. Over the weekend, tensions continued to rise between state and local authorities and Trump administration officials, who said they were calling up the National Guard in response to what they said were "violent mobs" attacking "ICE Officers and Federal Law Enforcement Agents carrying out basic deportation operations in Los Angeles." Gov. Gavin Newsom called the plan to take over deployment from the state "purposefully inflammatory," adding that it "will only escalate tensions."

Virginia House Unanimously Passes Defend The Guard Act

February 5, 2025 Dave DeCamp, Antiwar.com. , , ,
On Tuesday, the Virginia House of Delegates passed the Defend the Guard Act, legislation that would prohibit the deployment of the state’s National Guard to combat zones without a declaration of war from Congress, as required by the Constitution. The bill passed unanimously in a vote of 99-0, and it now heads to the Virginia Senate. “HB2193 Defend the Guard Act passes the Virginia House of Delegates 99-0. On to the Virginia Senate,” Delegate Nick Freitas, a retired Green Beret who sponsored the bill, wrote on X. “Thank you all and God speed!”

Columbia University Threatens To Deploy National Guard On Students

April 24, 2024 People's Dispatch. , , , , , , , ,
Columbia University students who are part of the Gaza solidarity encampment have raised the alarm that during negotiations, the university administration threatened to call in the National Guard to evacuate the camp. The threat from Columbia’s administration comes on the seventh day of the encampment of hundreds of students who are demanding that the university divest all finances, from corporations that profit in any way shape or form from Israeli genocide and cut academic ties with Israeli institutions. The Columbia encampment already withstood a violent eviction at the hands of the New York City Police Department on Thursday April 18.

Veterans Quit DeSantis’ Florida State Guard Over Militia-Style Training

July 15, 2023 Lawrence Mower, Emma Rose Brown and Ana CeBallos, Orlando Sentinel. , , ,
When the first recruiting class of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ new Florida State Guard showed up for training last month, they had varied experiences and expectations. Over 30 days in June, teenagers out of high school and retired military veterans came to Camp Blanding, the National Guard base near Jacksonville. Many were told they would volunteer for a revived State Guard with a nonmilitary mission: help Floridians in times of need or disaster. Instead, the state’s National Guard trained the volunteers for combat. Khakis and polos were replaced by camouflaged uniforms. Volunteers assured they could keep their facial hair were ordered to shave.

National Guard Seeks To Double Size Of Its Largest Training Site

January 24, 2023 Joe Garofalo, Left Voice. , , ,
Michigan - Nestled near the headwaters of the Au Sable River in Northern Lower Michigan, in lands forcibly taken from the Odawa and Ojibwa, the Michigan Army National Guard (MIANG) currently operates the largest National Guard training site in the country, Camp Grayling. At 230 square miles, it could fit Detroit (139 sq. miles), Lansing (37 sq. miles), and Grand Rapids (45 sq. miles) safely within its footprint. In addition to the Army and National Guard, the area is used by police departments, prisons, private military contractors, and foreign military units. In January of 2022, the National Guard proposed expanding its Land Use Agreement with the state by a staggering 250 square miles, bringing its size to 490 square miles, or about twice the size of Chicago. This is happening at the same time the Air National Guard is seeking separately to expand operations over Northern Michigan and Lake Huron, likely in concert with the proposed expansion of Camp Grayling.

How Border Deployment Led To Union Organizing In Texas

May 2, 2022 Steve Early And Suzanne Gordon, Convergence. , , ,
When a group of Texas workers started discussing job problems and what to do about them a few months ago, their list of complaints would have been familiar to Starbucks baristas, Amazon warehouse staff, or restive young journalists at new and old media outlets. With little notice, their employer changed work schedules and transferred employees to a new job location. Some of those adversely affected applied for hardship waivers, based on family life disruption, but many requests were denied. Meanwhile, access to a major job benefit—tuition assistance—was sharply curtailed. Even paychecks were no longer arriving promptly or at the right address. When a few brave souls called attention to these problems, management labelled them “union agitators” who were trying to “mislead” their co-workers.

Union Members Expel National Guard From St Paul Minnesota Labor Center

April 15, 2021 We Do The Work, Popular Resistance. , , ,
Following several union meetings on Wednesday night, I was made aware that a National Guard unit was occupying the St. Paul Labor Center in downtown St. Paul, Minnesota. Other union members and I were sharply aware of the National Guard’s role in repressing protests during the trial of Derek Chauvin and the recent killing of Daunte Wright, and we concluded immediately that our union hall had no place in those militarized efforts against the Black community, activists, and working class people.   Rank and file union members, community activists, and various union staff members assembled at the Labor Center Wednesday night and found more than 15 armored vehicles, and 50 National Guard troops had been given the keys to the central union facility. Workers from CWA, MNA, UBC and other locals informed the soldiers

The National Guard Crushes Protests Just Like The Military Does

June 14, 2020 Sarah Lazare, In These Times. , , ,
On June 2, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot firmly rebuked President Trump for threatening to unleash a military crackdown on Black Lives Matter demonstrations across the country. Trump made his menacing remarks at a press conference the day earlier, declaring that he would deploy the U.S. military to any city or state that “refuses to take the actions” to quell mass protests against police, touched off by the Minneapolis police murder of George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man. Responding to Trump at a press conference, Lightfoot proclaimed, “It's not gonna happen, not in my city. And I'm not confident that the president has the power to do that. But we have our lawyers hard at work, and if he tries to do that and usurp the power of our governor, and myself as the mayor, we will see him in court.”

As Trump Threatens To Send Military Into Cities, Some GIs Refuse To Comply

June 7, 2020 Candice Bernd, Truthout. , , ,
Some National Guard and active-duty GIs are refusing to deploy to U.S. cities rising up against police-perpetrated killings, saying no to complicity in the repression of the American populace and that they have not been properly trained in riot response or de-escalation tactics on domestic soil. Veterans and GI rights organizations told Truthout that dozens of GIs are reaching out to assess their options as President Trump orders military and federal police onto the streets of Washington, D.C., and threatens to use the 1807 Insurrection Act to send active-duty military into cities across the U.S. if governors cannot repress dissent in their states. The National Guard has already mobilized 20,000 members in at least 29 states, and some governors, including Minnesota’s Tim Walz, have already declined Trump’s offer to send in military police.

National Guard Troops Refuse Trump’s Race War

June 7, 2020 Courage to Resist. , , ,
Courage to Resist is currently assisting members of the National Guard who resisted Trump’s orders to violently attack people on the streets of Washington DC peacefully and lawfully protesting racial injustice. Now that Trump is threatening to use the 1807 Insurrection Act to send active-duty troops in cities across the US, it’s time for every member of the military to search their conscience. We want to make sure we’re there to support the brave men and women who continue to refuse these illegal orders. One Guardsmen who is resisting Trump’s orders originally hoped to join medical missions assisting in natural disasters. Addressing the current situation he says, “I can’t do it. Even looking at my uniform is making me feel sick that I’m associated with this...

More Than 17,000 Troops In 23 States And DC Activated

June 6, 2020 Howard Altman, Military Times. , , ,
The National Guard has drastically increased its response to unrest sweeping America over what prosecutors say was the murder of a handcuffed black man by Minneapolis police. There are now more than 17,000 National Guard troops in 23 states and the District of Columbia have been activated to help quell the unrest. That’s more than a three-fold increase in just over a day. “The hardest mission we do is responding in times of civil unrest,” Air Force Gen. Joseph Lengyel, chief of the National Guard Bureau, said in a statement posted on the NGB homepage ."The activation of Guard members in response to civil unrest has unfolded in multiple cities in the wake of the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis."

Veterans For Peace Calls On The Minnesota National Guard To Stand Down

May 31, 2020 Veterans for Peace. , , ,
Veterans For Peace calls for the immediate withdrawal of the Minnesota National Guard. We are appalled to see military weapons, vehicles and equipment once again deployed in U.S. cities to control community members who are reacting to a long history of state-sanctioned violence. When an already embattled community is subjected to militarized intimidation, by design, their environment becomes a war zone. We call on all those who are serving with the National Guard to refuse to serve violent and racist interests. Veterans For Peace denounces the ongoing instances of police violence against Black bodies and people of color, this time resulting in the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota. We also stand in opposition to the State of Minnesota's and the Minneapolis police force's militarized response to the right to protest.
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