An appeals court on Monday overturned a court order blocking the deployment of the National Guard in Portland, handing the Trump administration a victory in its bid to bolster military presence in cities governed by Democrats.
A Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel vacated the restriction imposed by Judge Karin Immergut, who last week extended the ban on troop deployments by 14 days.
National Guard Deployment Authorized in Portland
We strongly disagree with this Court ruling allowing a major escalation of Trump’s efforts to deploy the national guard to Portland and drive further chaos and division. In Seattle, we’re taking every step we can to prepare and to protect our community. pic.twitter.com/7jiYq5MJBF
– Major Bruce Harrell (@MayorofSeattle) October 20, 2025
“At this preliminary stage, we conclude that it is likely that the President legitimately exercised his statutory authority authorizing federalization of the National Guard when ‘the President cannot, with regular forces, execute the laws of the United States,'” wrote the three-judge panel, which voted two to one.
Trump last month ordered the militarization of Portland which he described as “a devastated war zone” and “besieged by Antifa and other domestic terrorist attacks.”
The Pentagon federalized 200 Oregon National Guard soldiers on Sept. 28, who remain awaiting deployment.
Following Immergut’s order, Trump called in 300 California National Guard troops under his command last June without the concurrence of the state’s governor, Democrat Gavin Newsom, in a move that had not occurred in the U.S. for 60 years, but the judge also blocked him from deploying.
The Trump Administration insists that Portland is engulfed in violence over protests outside Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities, although demonstrators in that city have changed the narrative by increasingly coming to protests dressed in costume or nude.
Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield is expected to appeal the decision and take the fight all the way to the full Ninth Circuit and even the Supreme Court, which has already been consulted by Trump in his push to deploy troops to Chicago, Illinois.
The president has already achieved militarization in Democratic cities such as Los Angeles and Washington.
In his fight against the Democratic cities, Trump even went so far as to threaten to use the ancient Insurrection Act, which dates back to the 19th century and allows the Executive, among other things, to suppress protests and riots.
Filed under: National Guard authorized in Portland
With information from EFE