The National Guard has been deployed many times historically. Experts say the president’s decision to deploy the Guard as a blanket response to crime in D.C. is a departure from its intended mission.
President Trump’s decision to assert federal control over Washington, D.C.’s police force and deploy National Guard troops to patrol the capital marked a stunning departure from governing norms, according to experts.
Since Trump’s order last week, hundreds of National Guard troops have set up on the streets of the nation’s capital and hundreds more are expected to arrive in the coming days.
The National Guard is a military branch distinct from others, in that its soldiers answer to state and federal governments, but the president has the power to activate a state’s National Guard without cooperation from the governor.
Since D.C. does not have statehood, its National Guard answers directly to the president.
National Guard troops are a familiar presence during times of crisis — they are often deployed to assist in catastrophic weather events, riots, and even were used during the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.
During the 2020 racial justice protests following the murder of George Floyd, dozens of states called on their National Guards to assist local law enforcement, including in D.C., where at Trump’s orders, more than 5,000 troops patrolled the city to monitor the largely peaceful protests.
However, Trump’s decision to federalize them as a blanket response to crime in D.C. — which he has described repeatedly as out of control, despite the significant drop in the city’s crime rate — is a departure from the National Guard’s intended mission.When has the National Guard been deployed before?
It is not uncommon for governors or the president to call on the National Guard in times of turmoil, but that was not always the case.
The nation’s founders were initially wary of military intervention in domestic matters.
« Their defining experience with domestic deployment of the military was the Boston Massacre and the quartering of troops in private homes », said Joseph Nunn, an attorney at the Brennan Center’s Liberty and National Security Program who focuses on the U.S. military.
« The people who drafted the Constitution were extraordinarily suspicious of military power, so much so that there were vigorous debates at the Constitutional Convention about whether even to allow for the creation of a national standing army or whether the new country should instead rely exclusively on the state militias », he said.
