The occupation of Washington, D.C., by National Guard troops is nearly a year old. Donald Trump ordered the deployment of about 2,000 camouflage-uniformed personnel in mid-August 2025, ostensibly to fight crime.
But members of the Guard weren’t sent to high-crime areas. They were scattered across tourist corridors including Union Station, federal buildings, monuments, and other public spaces. Most recently, they’ve been seen chasing tourists away from Trump’s algae-clogged Reflecting Pool.
Their presence has done nothing to reduce violent crime in the city, which was already on the decline.
Instead, the Guard members have primarily served as a show of federal force and as a way of accustoming Americans to the presence of soldiers on their city streets, a dangerous precedent as Trump takes increasingly extreme steps to prevent Democratic victories in the midterm elections.
Trump hugely increased the Guard presence in the city in June to about 5,000. That’s way more than the city’s entire police department, which employs just over 3,000 sworn officers.
Historically, Guard members have been sent to Washington only by red-state governors. But a handful of blue-state governors agreed to send a few hundred of their Guard members to Washington for the summer, specifically to provide security for celebrations of the country’s 250th anniversary of independence – and not for Trump’s open-ended occupation.
That has provided activists with a new opportunity to push back against the Guard’s presence in the city.
Free DC, a popular grassroots organization dedicated to winning self-determination for Washington, sent its members out into the city to see how blue-state Guard members were being deployed. (They produced a handy guide to identifying Guard units by the stylized patches on their left sleeves.)
And they found Michigan Guard members far from the Mall, including this group stationed on a street corner in the Georgetown neighborhood.
On June 29, Free DC called for Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to send her troops home immediately.
And on July 7, a powerhouse coalition of civil-society groups sent a letter to Whitmer calling for her to withdraw troops who, “regardless of any assurances you may have received from the administration,… are not being used solely to assist with 250 events.”
The letter revisited the case against the overall deployment:
Governors aligned with the president have sent nearly 5,000 National Guard forces to DC to patrol neighborhoods throughout the city, purportedly for the purpose of controlling street crime, against the will of the people and the local government. As the State of Michigan recognized when it joined an amicus brief in litigation challenging the deployments, this show of military force for the purpose of policing civilians is unprecedented, dangerous, and unlawful. The use of the military to support civilian law enforcement should be a last resort in cases where emergencies have overwhelmed civilian authorities. That is clearly not the case in DC.
And it noted:
Perhaps most worrisome, the addition of Michigan’s Guard forces to the thousands of troops President Trump has already brought to DC threatens to normalize the misuse of the military perpetuated by this administration and allied governors. That normalization poses heightened risks as we move toward the November elections.
The Associated Press reports that Michigan’s deployment is due to continue through Aug. 31. Minnesota is set to withdraw its Guard members on Saturday, earlier than the planned July 23 return.
Washington’s City Paper reports that “Democratic governors Tim Walz (Minnesota), Wes Moore (Maryland), Andy Beshear (Kentucky), and Josh Stein (North Carolina) are removing their guards from D.C.” But I haven’t been able to confirm that.
Getting blue-state Guards out of D.C. doesn’t solve the problem, of course.
Free DC has long called for the entire Guard presence to leave. Its members yelled “Guard go home” and heckled and booed Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, and other top administration officials on July 2 when they held an outdoor event honoring Guard troops.
Hegseth, struggling to be heard, lashed out at the protesters. “This background noise this morning is perfect. It’s the sound of ingrates, of ingratitude, of people who are so blinded by ideology they can’t see law and order and common sense in front of them,” he said. You can also watch Miller trying to talk over the noise here.
Another Success for Bystander Video
Nebraska Public Media reports on how initial DHS claims about the arrest of an immigrant were belied by bystander video.
Gabriel Hurtado-Cariaco, a food delivery driver from Venezuela, was detained in Bellevue, Nebraska, last June. A DHS press release said he “violently attacked an ICE agent” by slamming her head into the ground and attempting to choke her to death. But as the article explains, “Under scrutiny, much of the government narrative crumbled.”
Two bystander videos of his arrest showed that he resisted being detained, at times pushing against the two agents who attempted to subdue him, but did not actively attack either of them. Prosecutors admitted that Hurtado-Cariaco had not choked the female officer as previously claimed, chalking it up to a “misperception” from the agent who wrote the affidavit that led to Hurtado-Cariaco’s arrest.
Here is one of the videos.
Originally indicted on charges of attempted murder of a federal officer, Hurtado-Cariaco pled guilty last week to one count of forcibly resisting arrest causing bodily injury. At the sentencing, U.S. District Court Chief Judge Robert Rossiter said that the allegations made in the initial complaint were “at worst a misrepresentation and at best complete negligence.”
It’s no surprise, then, that the family of a Mexican national shot and killed by an ICE agent in Houston on Tuesday is calling for an independent investigation, and the League of United Latin American Citizens is offering a $5,000 reward for information, video or witness testimony.
Last Week in the Courts
A federal judge in Georgia quashed a subpoena from the Justice Department that would have forced Fulton County to turn over the names and detailed contact information for thousands of employees and volunteers who participated in election day activities in 2020. Judge William Ray wrote that “everyone, whether you support the President or you do not, or whether you believe the 2020 Election was fair or believe that it was not, should be concerned about the DOJ’s ability to utilize the power of the Grand Jury to appropriate your private information without a legitimate purpose.”
A divided three-judge panel of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court’s injunction that blocked intelligence agencies from firing 19 career intelligence officers because of their work on diversity issues. “Among the promises of the Fifth Amendment is the requirement that no person be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law,” Judge Nicole Berner wrote. “This promise of due process has been construed to require federal government agencies to adhere to their own binding regulations.”
A federal judge in Louisiana ordered the release from ICE custody of a nursing mother who was detained in violation of ICE’s own directive not to detain pregnant, postpartum, or nursing mothers unless there are “exceptional circumstances.” Judge David Joseph scolded government lawyers, who he wrote had “failed to comply with the Court’s invitation to demonstrate that Petitioner’s continued detention comports with the Directive.”
A second federal judge blocked the U.S. Postal Service from determining who can vote by mail. I wrote last week that Judge Indira Talwani of Massachusetts had ruled that the USPS lacked any authority to do so. Now Judge Emmet G. Sullivan in Washington has ruled that the move would also violate a settlement agreement with the NAACP, in which the USPS promised timely delivery of election mail.
A federal judge in Florida threw out a defamation lawsuit filed by Trump’s social media company against the Washington Post. As the Post reported, Judge Thomas Barber wrote in a summary docket entry that Trump’s company “failed to present evidence that would allow a jury to find by clear and convincing evidence” that the Post “published the allegedly defamatory statements with actual malice.”
Public Citizen filed a lawsuit asking a judge to stop the Trump administration’s shocking practice of providing the Iranian government with confidential information from the immigration files of Iranians seeking asylum in the United States. The suite argues: “Disclosing their confidential information to the Iranian Government violates the asylum seekers’ confidentiality rights, endangers their family members and acquaintances who may still be residing in Iran, and puts those who are subject to removal to Iran… at risk of persecution, torture, and death following their arrival in Iran.”
A New York resident is suing ICE for violating his First Amendment rights after it sent officers to his house with a warning because of an email he sent to former ICE chief Todd Lyons. In the email, David Streever called Lyons “a monstrous human being” who “will never know peace.” The “Warning Notice” from ICE’s Office of Professional Responsibility – which is supposed to conduct internal investigations – declared “YOU MAY BE IN VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW.”
A Quaker Declaration of Resistance
The American Friends Service Committee has issued a “Declaration of Resistance”.
“The promise of freedom in the United States has always been incomplete, and in this moment, it is under direct and escalating threat,” organizers wrote in their announcement. “We are living through a time of authoritarianism. We see it in the erosion of civil liberties, in policies that target and divide our communities, and in the steady normalization of fear, exclusion, and control. These are not abstract dangers. They are unfolding before our eyes. And yet, this moment also calls something forward in us—a commitment to resist.”
You can sign the declaration here. It consists of three statements:
Protect. I believe in the inherent dignity of all people. Everyone deserves to have their rights and freedoms respected. I will take action to protect people and communities whose rights are being violated.
Resist. I will not help the government, law enforcement, or corporate entities violate the rights of others. I will not cooperate, share information, or provide services that will be used to facilitate repression and violence.
Build. I pledge to join in collective nonviolent protest, mutual aid and community care to prevent the rise of authoritarianism and build a future based on freedom, equality, and justice.
End Notes
From CNN: “US service member arrested at Capitol after calling for Trump’s impeachment.”
From CBS Sunday Morning: “The battle over Stars and Stripes.”
From Kenneth Roth in the Guardian: “Trump is a danger to US democracy. But the resistance is working.”
TRUMP'S MARCH ON WASHINGTON
Trump's decision to extend his illegal deployment of the National Guard for three more years, until January 20, 2029, is an exceedingly dangerous threat to democratic rights. The continued military occupation of the U.S. capital by some 5,100 troops, under the Orwellian moniker "DC Safe and Beautiful Task Force," is the longest such urban deployment in U.S. history.
While there are no tanks in the streets yet, this is an unmistakable attempt to normalize Trump's use of the military for domestic "law enforcement," in violation of the Posse Comitatus prohibition on the domestic use of the military. It carries the unmistakable odor of military coups.
The extension through the next presidential inauguration is particularly ominous given Trump's previous attempt to overturn the election results, together with his current moves to suppress voter turnout and use intelligence apparatuses to subvert the coming midterms.
This must also be viewed in light of the recent statements by Speaker Mike Johnson that Congress must approve a $350 billion Pentagon funding request, explicitly justifying it as necessary to "fight communism on our own shore," and Secretary Pete Hegseth's claim that the funds are needed to counter "domestic threats."
We should take that threat of unleashing the U.S. military against domestic political dissent with absolute seriousness. These are not idle words. It is not the first time Trump and his supporters have called for the use of the military against political dissidents. That is a death threat.
Trump's August 25, 2025 Executive Order, Additional Measures To Address The Crime Emergency In The District of Columbia, establishes standing National Guard "Rapid Deployment" forces in all fifty states as a modern Praetorian Guard, together with secret paramilitary vigilante forces composed of former cops and military veterans under the control of the Department of War, ostensibly to "quell" domestic disturbances. One can easily imagine that might include quelling mass protests against a coup.
Make no mistake. We are the "enemy."
As Trump has repeatedly made clear, that means anyone who opposes his march toward one-man rule.
In this rhetoric, "communists" become a catch-all label for political opponents: anyone who protests ICE, opposes the war against Iran, denounces the genocide in Gaza, opposes the starvation blockade against Cuba, resists Trump's attacks on democratic rights, defends organized labor, challenges Wall Street, or opposes capitalism itself.
Such statements are preparing the political conditions for the eventual unleashing of the military against domestic political opposition.
It begins with a narrative that demonizes all opposition in the most extreme existential terms. It continues with the deployment of military and paramilitary forces, accompanied by open threats against political opponents. Repeat that message often enough, and violence becomes thinkable—even inevitable—in the minds of those prepared to carry it out.
Does anyone seriously doubt that, if he could, Trump would unleash ICE and the U.S. military to impose one-man rule and an authoritarian regime?
Trump may not find it easy to impose authoritarian rule. Millions may resist. But we should have no illusions about his intentions.
We must neither underestimate nor dismiss the gravity of Trump's authoritarian threat.
Like Mussolini's preparations before the 1922 March on Rome, these measures seek to intimidate and normalize force and military power in domestic politics while consolidating executive authority in pursuit of one-man rule.
The evidence points to one conclusion: Trump is preparing his own March on Washington.