Oregon judge extends block on National Guard deployment to Portland

A federal judge in Oregon extended her block on President Trump’s deployment of the National Guard in Portland until Friday, thwarting the president’s desire to send in the troops into a city he has called “war-ravaged.”

U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut issued her preliminary injunction against the deployment late Sunday by saying the White House put forward overblown claims of violent protests directed at federal immigration authorities in Portland.

Instead, she wrote that much of the violence involved protesters and counterprotesters who clashed outside the city’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility.

“Based on the trial testimony, this Court finds no credible evidence that during the approximately two months before the President’s federalization order, protests grew out of control or involved more than isolated and sporadic instances of violent conduct that resulted in no serious injuries to federal personnel,” the judge wrote.

Judge Immergut’s block lasts until Friday, which is when the Trump appointee will issue a final ruling.

The judicial ruling cuts against Mr. Trump’s description of Portland last month as a place of “chaos, death and destruction.”

He accused left-wing anarchist groups, such as antifa, of fomenting disorder and “viciously attacking our Federal Law Enforcement Officers.”

But based on her preliminary order, Judge Immergut appeared skeptical about the Trump administration’s argument that such activity was taking place near the federal building.

“Defendants have not, however, proffered any evidence demonstrating that those episodes of violence were perpetrated by an organized group engaged in armed hostilities for the purpose of overtaking an instrumentality of government by unlawful or antidemocratic means,” Judge Immergut wrote.

The White House said previously that 26 people were charged with federal crimes in connection with the Portland demonstrations over the summer. The charges include arson, assaulting a police officer and resisting arrest.

The order leaves National Guard troops from Oregon, California and Texas in a lurch, similar to the legal challenges that have stalled the president’s deployment of guardsmen to Chicago.

Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek, a Democrat, celebrated the decision as “another affirmation of our democracy and the right to govern ourselves” in a statement after the Sunday night ruling.

She added that Oregon “stands united against this unwanted, unneeded, unconstitutional military intervention.”

And Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield echoed the governor’s statement by calling the order “a step toward truth and accountability.”

“From the beginning, this case has been about making sure the facts — not the President’s political whims — guide how the law is applied,” Mr. Rayfield said late Sunday.

Mr. Trump has tried to send the National Guard into several cities as part of his national crime-fighting efforts.

That started with Mr. Trump deploying troops to the District this summer, though that move was legally much easier because the federal government has a much freer hand in the federal capital, including control over the National Guard.

While armed and uniformed, the troops were mainly window dressing to a surge in federal agents who made more than 2,000 arrests during the 30-day emergency period.

About 40% of those taken into custody were on immigration-related offenses.

The District witnessed a sharp drop in violent crime during the month-long mission, but D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and other local leaders said killings and carjackings were already trending down when the president sent in the National Guard.

Protecting federal immigration agents prompted Mr. Trump to order the National Guard deployments in Portland and Chicago.

But judges have instead blocked such actions over issues of state sovereignty, despite some Illinois protesters being charged with ramming their cars into federal vehicles.

The president first activated the California National Guard in June when protesters attacked ICE agents carrying out enforcement sweeps in Los Angeles.

As blue states have put up resistance to the deployments, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, a Republican, welcomed the National Guard to Memphis last month as part of the White House’s goal to clean up the crime-plagued city.

Tennessee is a much commoner case — a conservative state where the worst crime is in a few Democratic-run big cities.

Federal officials said they made nearly 1,900 arrests in Memphis in October as part of their beefed-up patrols, with the National Guard seen near the iconic Pyramid downtown and in neighborhoods around the city.