Challenging President Trump’s National Guard Deployment in Washington, D.C.

The Constitution gives Congress authority over the District of Columbia. In 1973, Congress used that constitutional authority to pass the Home Rule Act, which empowers the District to govern itself.    

In August 2025, President Trump deployed over 2,000 members of the National Guard to the District, against the will of D.C. residents. The democratically elected leadership in the District did not ask for or consent to the deployment, and on September 4, 2025, the District of Columbia filed suit, arguing that the president had no legal authority to deploy the National Guard to the District.  

The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia denied the Trump administration’s motion to dismiss the case and preliminarily blocked the deployment. The Trump administration appealed the district court’s order and sought a stay of the preliminary injunction in the interim, which the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit granted. As a result, the National Guard remains deployed in D.C.

As the D.C. Circuit prepares to hear the Trump administration’s appeal on the merits, Campaign Legal Center Action filed an amicus brief on behalf of 114 members of the United States House of Representatives explaining why the military takeover of the District both violates the Home Rule Act and flouts the careful statutory scheme Congress constructed to govern the District and the National Guard.  

President Trump’s deployment of the National Guard in Washington, D.C., is dangerous executive overreach that tramples on the District of Columbia’s right to self-governance provided by Congress. Using federal troops to intimidate everyday Americans and override the District’s elected officials undermines this self-governance and ignores the limits Congress very intentionally placed on presidential authority.