Texas National Guard troops are finally returning home from Chicago after a little over a month, CNN reported. The troops could not carry out operations due to ongoing legal holds.
On Oct. 8, 200 Texas troops arrived in Illinois, called by President Donald Trump to “safeguard” federal agents carrying out deportation efforts. Trump has used protests against ICE’s increasingly aggressive deportation efforts to call Chicago a “hellhole,” a “death trap” and “the most dangerous city in the world,” and to justify the deployment of Texas and federal troopers.
A federal judge immediately blocked the troopers from activating in the city but allowed the guard to remain in Illinois as the legal fight continued. (The case between Illinois and the federal government has reached the Supreme Court, where it remains pending.)
Over the last five weeks, the troops have drawn nationwide ridicule for both being in Chicago at all — and looking less than ready for combat.
CBS News reported that the troops were seen “running, walking and training” on the base. Their presence in Chicago has cost taxpayers at least $4 million dollars, according to estimates by San Antonio Express-News.
In an Oct. 7 letter, eight Texan members of Congress urged Abbott to withdraw the Texas National Guard from deployment out of state. “Texans did not join the National Guard to be used as a political weapon aimed at fellow American citizens in another state,” they wrote. “Turning them into a domestic police force in another state – especially over that state’s objections – erodes public trust and undermines the Guard’s core mission.”
The 200 California National Guard troops who were sent to Portland are also returning to their home state, but U.S. officials have signaled their intention to keep some federal enforcement in these cities. U.S. Northern Command, part of the Department of Defense, posted Friday that, “the Department will be shifting and/or rightsizing our Title 10 footprint in Portland, Los Angeles, and Chicago to ensure a constant, enduring, and long-term presence in each city.”
Gov. Greg Abbott authorized the Texas National Guard for an initial 60-day period, Fox News reported, but due to the legal holds they never actually deployed to the streets of Chicago, remaining stationed at the Army Reserve Center in Elwood, Illinois.
The return of Texas and California troopers probably doesn’t reflect a change in attitude from the federal government — a U.S. official told the The New York Times that with the Guard’s deployment still on court-ordered hold, top Pentagon officials decided to withdraw the out-of-state soldiers “rather than have them continue to sit in a costly limbo separated from their families during the holiday season.”
Meanwhile, more than 3,000 people have been arrested so far by immigration agents in Chicago, where a national spotlight has resulted in stories of Black Hawk helicopters descending on apartments in midnight raids and “nearly naked” children being zip-tied by federal officers.