California Attorney General Rob Bonta today filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Supreme Court in Trump v. Illinois in support of Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul’s lawsuit challenging the federalization and deployment of the Illinois National Guard to Chicago. In the brief, Attorney General Bonta, along with Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield, argue that 10 U.S.C. 12406 does not support the Trump Administration’s extraordinary attempt to deploy members of the military to the streets of Chicago. Congress enacted 10 U.S.C. 12406 to address invasions, rebellions, and other “unusual and extreme exigencies.” Nothing of the kind has occurred in Chicago — or anywhere else in the United States — over the past year. Moreover, nothing in the record shows that “regular forces” were unable to execute the laws, the precondition for which the federal government relies on for its invocation of 10 U.S.C. 12406 to federalize the National Guard.
“The Trump Administration is tying itself in knots in its attempt to justify the unjustifiable — the deployment of military troops to American streets during a time of undeniable peace and order,” said Attorney General Bonta. “There is no rebellion. There is no invasion. And there is no inability of regular forces to execute the law. At least one of these preconditions must be met for the invocation of 10 U.S.C. 12406, yet the President’s evidence for any of these has been entirely unsatisfactory and some would say nonexistent. I urge the Supreme Court to reign in this Administration’s reckless interpretation of this century-old statute before the President’s vision of a militarized America is fully realized.”