On Tuesday, September 2, 2025, a federal court in California delivered a landmark ruling that President Donald Trump’s deployment of the National Guard and U.S. Marines to Los Angeles in June 2025 was illegal, sparking a renewed national debate over the limits of presidential power and the role of the military in domestic affairs.
The decision, handed down by U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, found that the Trump administration’s actions ran afoul of the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act—a law designed to keep federal troops out of civilian law enforcement. According to Nexstar Media, Judge Breyer wrote, “This was intentional—Defendants instigated a months-long deployment of the National Guard and Marines to Los Angeles for the purpose of establishing a military presence there and enforcing federal law. Such conduct is a serious violation of the Posse Comitatus Act.”
The ruling came after months of escalating tension between the Trump administration and California officials, as protests over immigration enforcement erupted in Los Angeles and turned violent. Trump responded by sending nearly 4,000 National Guard troops and 700 Marines to the city, a move that California Governor Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta quickly challenged in court. Newsom, a vocal critic of Trump and a prominent Democratic figure, argued that the deployment was “unprecedented and unlawful.”
Judge Breyer’s 52-page decision did not mince words. He described the deployment as a “top-down, systemic effort” to use military troops for federal law enforcement across hundreds of miles and over several months, according to Al Jazeera. Breyer rejected the administration’s claim that the protests constituted a “rebellion” requiring military intervention, writing, “There were indeed protests in Los Angeles, and some individuals engaged in violence. Yet there was no rebellion, nor was civilian law enforcement unable to respond to the protests and enforce the law.”
Breyer’s order blocks any remaining National Guard troops from making arrests, conducting searches, performing traffic patrols, or engaging in riot control in Los Angeles—unless the government can demonstrate a valid legal exception. However, the judge paused his order until September 12, 2025, giving the Trump administration time to appeal. As of early September, at least 300 National Guard members remained stationed in southern California under Trump’s command.
The legal battle has been fierce and deeply political. Newsom hailed the ruling as a victory for democracy, posting on social media, “The courts agree — his militarization of our streets and use of the military against US citizens is ILLEGAL.” Attorney General Rob Bonta echoed the sentiment, stating, “Today’s ruling affirms that President Trump is not King, and the power of the executive is not boundless.”
But the Trump administration has pushed back hard. At a press conference in the Oval Office, President Trump denounced Judge Breyer as a “radical left judge” and insisted that the troops still in Los Angeles would remain. “The judge said that, ‘You can leave the 300 people that you already have in place.’ They can stay, they can remain, they can do what they have to do,” Trump asserted, according to Nexstar Media. Acting U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli added, “The military has never engaged in direct law enforcement operations here in LA. They protect our federal employees, our properties so our federal agents can safely enforce federal laws in the face of the thugs being unleashed and encouraged by state and local politicians.”
The roots of this confrontation stretch back to the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement policies, which included workplace raids and a pledge to carry out the “largest deportation programme” in U.S. history. As protests erupted in Los Angeles in early June, Trump issued a memo placing the state’s National Guard under federal command, justifying the move by claiming, “To the extent that protests or acts of violence directly inhibit the execution of the laws, they constitute a form of rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States.”
California leaders, including Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, condemned the federalization as antidemocratic and argued that the military presence only inflamed tensions. “The federal government is now turning the military against American citizens,” Newsom said at the time. “Donald Trump is behaving like a tyrant, not a president. We ask the court to immediately block these unlawful actions.”
Judge Breyer’s ruling also highlighted historical context, noting that the last time a president federalized National Guard troops without a governor’s permission was in 1965, when President Lyndon B. Johnson sent troops to Selma, Alabama, to protect civil rights demonstrators. The judge emphasized that while the president is commander-in-chief, Congress—not the executive branch—holds the bulk of federal authority over the military. “There is little support in the Founding Era for an inherent constitutional authority for the President to call forth the militia, or to use the military generally, to execute the laws,” Breyer wrote.
The court’s decision is limited to the situation in California and does not affect similar deployments in Washington, D.C., where Trump sent National Guard troops in August 2025, citing a “crime emergency.” Federal law grants the executive branch greater latitude in the capital, but legal experts suggest that attempts to deploy troops elsewhere, such as Chicago, could face similar constitutional challenges.
Indeed, Trump has repeatedly threatened to send troops into other Democrat-led cities. On the day of the ruling, he declared, “Chicago is the worst and most dangerous city in the World, by far. I will solve the crime problem fast, just like I did in DC. Chicago will be safe again, and soon. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” During a press conference, he reiterated, “We’re going in. I didn’t say when, but we’re going in. If the governor of Illinois would call me up, I would love to do it. Now we’re going to do it anyway. We have the right to do it because I have an obligation to protect this country.”
Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, however, has made it clear that the National Guard is “not needed or wanted” in Chicago. He warned that federal agents were already gathering at a nearby military base and predicted immigration raids in Latino communities could soon follow, potentially sparking further demonstrations. “We know, before anything has happened here, that the Trump plan is to use any excuse to deploy armed military personnel to Chicago,” Pritzker said.
Legal scholars point out that Judge Breyer’s ruling does not categorically prohibit the federalization of the National Guard but instead found that in this case, the troops “did too much” and crossed the line into prohibited law enforcement activities. Jessica Levinson, a law professor at Loyola Law School, explained to NPR, “This ruling says that once the National Guard was on the ground, that they basically they did too much.”
As the Trump administration prepares an appeal, the country is left grappling with fundamental questions about the balance of power between the federal government and the states, the role of the military in civil society, and the future of protest and dissent in American cities. The outcome of this legal battle will likely reverberate far beyond California, shaping the contours of executive authority for years to come.
