Appeals court rules Oregon National Guard may remain under the Trump administration’s control

A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that the Oregon National Guard may remain under the Trump administration’s control for now but cannot be deployed to Portland.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit argued in their ruling that the “status quo” should, for the time being, be preserved.

“The effect of granting an administrative stay preserves the status quo in which National Guard members have been federalized but not deployed,” they wrote.

According to Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB), the administrative stay “is a temporary measure while the court prepares to more fully take up the question of whether federalized Oregon National Guard members can be sent into Portland.”

This “question” popped up after U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut previously blocked all National Guard members from being deployed in Portland.

According to The Hill, the bipartisan panel of judges — two of the three are Trump appointees, while the third is a Clinton appointee — will hear arguments this Thursday regarding the merits or lack thereof of Immergut’s order.

The Trump administration had hoped the appeals court would take action by this past Monday.

“The district court’s order improperly impinges on the Commander-in-Chief’s supervision of military operations, countermands a military directive to officers in the field, and endangers federal personnel and property,” Trump administration lawyers wrote about Immergut’s ruling in court filings submitted Sunday.

Oregon Democrats predictably celebrated the appeals court’s ruling.

“Today’s order from the Ninth Circuit doesn’t change anything on the ground,” Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield, a Democrat, said in a statement.

“While it keeps the Oregon National Guard under federal status, most importantly [it] prevents the President from deploying the guard in Portland. That means no unnecessary federal escalation – and that’s a win for Oregonians who want calm, not conflict in our communities,” he added.

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The good news for the Trump administration is that the stay prevents Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek, another rabid Democrat, from sending the state’s National Guard units home like she tried to do on Monday.

OPB notes that on Monday, she submitted a letter to Gen. Gregory Guillot, the commander of U.S. Northern Command, calling for the demobilization of National Guard soldiers in her state.

She wrote that the National Guard soldiers deserve better than to be “uprooted from their families and careers, only to be mobilized for an illegal mission.”

“Additionally, as you can understand, this mission disrupts an already demanding schedule of our National Guard soldiers’ required trainings and lawful deployments currently planned out for the next several years,” she added. “It also comes with a price tag currently being footed by the American people.”

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Wednesday’s order is one of several that have come down in recent weeks, ever since President Donald Trump deployed the National Guard to Portland on Sept. 27.

Local officials immediately sought to block the deployment and won an early victory on Oct. 4 when Immergut blocked the president from deploying the Oregon National Guard.

She issued a follow-up order the next day, blocking any National Guard soldiers from being deployed to Portland. The order was issued after Trump threatened to send National Guard members from California and Texas to Oregon.

Note that Immergut is herself a Trump appointee:

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All this comes as Portland’s federal immigration facilities have been under attack by far-left Antifa extremists.

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Vivek Saxena

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