Baltimore Mayor: 'We'll Be Prepared' If Trump Deploys Natl. Guard

Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott joins Bloomberg Businessweek Daily to discuss the city's development plans, economic backdrop, and more. Scott also says the city will "be prepared" if President Trump deploys the National Guard into the area. Baltimore is still on President Trump's list for a potential deployment. Scott also discusses crime rates and the city's changing reputation, local impacts of the US government shutdown, and more.

A federal judge declined to quickly issue a temporary order blocking the Trump administration’s plan to deploy National Guard members to Chicago to counter protests against the US immigration crackdown, while urging the government to delay the controversial plan until she rules.

US District Judge April Perry on Monday said she could not rule immediately on a request by Illinois for a two-week halt to the deployment, which would include National Guard troops under federal control from Illinois and Texas. She set a Thursday hearing for arguments.

Perry, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, said she was “troubled” by the administration’s lack of clarity about where the troops would be mobilizing and what they would be doing. But the judge said that before she makes a decision, she needed to give the US government time to review demands made by Illinois and the City of Chicago in the lawsuit they filed earlier in the day.

“In the meantime, we’ll wait,” Perry said. “If I were the government, I would strongly consider taking a pause on this until Thursday, so we are not in a position where we’re doing a full-fledged hearing with whatever has happened.”

During the hearing, Attorney Christopher Wells of the Illinois Attorney General’s office urged the judge to immediately bar the mobilization.

“Once they’re here, we don’t know what they’re going to do,” he said.

The judge will consider later a request by Illinois and Chicago for a longer lasting preliminary injunction, which would block the troop deployments until the case is resolved.

The lawsuit was filed hours after a judge in Portland, Oregon, issued an emergency order blocking a similar troop deployment to that state. The suit escalates a growing clash between Democratic-led states and President Donald Trump over the use of National Guard troops in cities he describes as crime-ridden and incapable of protecting federal property.

Stephen Miller, White House deputy chief of staff, told reporters on Monday that the mayor has “failed to condemn the violent obstructive acts against ICE and law enforcement.”

In their complaint, Illinois and Chicago accused Trump of a wide-ranging effort to use National Guard troops “to punish his political enemies.” The deployment, which Illinois said could come as soon as today, infringes on the state’s sovereignty and right to self-governance, according to the suit.

An attorney for the Trump administration said in court that members of the Texas National Guard were already en route to Illinois and that the Illinois guardsmen had been ordered to report Tuesday, though it was unclear when or where they would be hitting the streets.

“The American people, regardless of where they reside, should not live under the threat of occupation by the United States military, particularly for the reason that their city or state leadership has fallen out of a president’s favor,” Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul said in a statement.

The Trump administration claims the military deployment is justified because civilian law enforcement wasn’t doing enough to quell protests and protect Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, a claim denied by Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson.

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