Chicago mayor vows to fight Trump intervention, signs protective order
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson (D) signed an executive order detailing how the Windy City will attempt to respond to President Trump’s potential deployment of the National Guard.
Johnson’s executive order, which he signed on Saturday, established the “Protecting Chicago Initiative” to protect the constitutional rights of Chicago residents amid the “possibility of imminent militarized immigration or National Guard deployment” into the city.
The order is asking Trump to “stand down” from his threat to deploy the National Guard into Chicago and reaffirms the Chicago Police Department will “remain a locally controlled law enforcement agency.”
“The City of Chicago will do everything in our power to defend our democracy and protect our communities. With this executive order, we send a resounding message to the federal government: we do not need nor want an unconstitutional and illegal military occupation of our city,” Johnson said in a statement.
“We do not want military checkpoints or armored vehicles on our streets and we do not want to see families ripped apart. We will take any action necessary to protect the rights of all Chicagoans,” the mayor added. “Protecting Chicago is the next step in the work we have been doing to defend our city from federal overreach and illegal action.”
The order comes as the president said last week that the administration would focus on lowering the crime rate in Chicago next, after deploying the National Guard to Washington, D.C. Chicago has long struggled with gun violence, although fatal and nonfatal shootings are on a downward trend in the city in recent years, according to the city’s data.
“Chicago’s a mess. You have an incompetent mayor. Grossly incompetent and we’ll straighten that one out probably next. That will be our next one after this,” Trump said at the White House. “And it won’t even be tough.”
Both Johnson and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) oppose Trump’s potential deployment of the National Guard.
The administration is considering using a Navy base near Chicago to support its immigration crackdown efforts. It would reportedly involve deploying more than 200 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agents and using the Naval Station Great Lakes as a staging area.
“If these Democrats focused on fixing crime in their own cities instead of doing publicity stunts to criticize the President, their communities would be much safer. Cracking down on crime should not be a partisan issue, but Democrats suffering from TDS [Trump Derangement Syndrome] are trying to make it one,” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said in a statement to The Hill’s sister network NewsNation.
“They should listen to fellow Democrat Mayor Muriel Bowser who recently celebrated the Trump Administration’s success in driving down violent crime in Washington DC,” Jackson added.