Appeals Court Rules Trump’s California National Guard Deployment Unlawful
A divided Ninth Circuit panel affirmed an injunction against Trump’s 2025 federalization and deployment of 4,000 California National Guard members in Los Angeles.
A divided federal appeals court ruled Friday, October 23, 2026, that President Donald Trump exceeded his legal authority when he federalized and deployed 4,000 California National Guard members in Los Angeles during protests in June 2025. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed a preliminary injunction directing the administration to return control of the Guard to Governor Gavin Newsom.
The 2-1 decision does not end every issue in the underlying lawsuit, which remains in a preliminary stage. It does, however, uphold the injunction governing the initial federalization order and creates appellate precedent on when a president may call state Guard members into federal service. The ruling came after the administration tried to dismiss its own appeal.
Why the court rejected Trump’s order
Trump invoked 10 U.S.C. § 12406 after demonstrations connected to federal immigration enforcement in Los Angeles. The statute permits federalization in specified emergencies, including when the president is unable to execute federal law with regular forces or when there is a rebellion or danger of rebellion against federal authority.
Writing for the majority, Judge Jennifer Sung said the administration failed to make either threshold showing required to use the Guard to execute federal law. The panel also concluded that describing the conditions in Los Angeles on June 7, 2025, as a rebellion or danger of rebellion did not fall within what the court called a colorable assessment of the facts and law within a range of honest judgment.
The majority said the order therefore exceeded the president’s statutory authority and intruded on Congress’s constitutional power to provide for calling forth the militia. It found California likely to succeed on both its claim that the order was beyond the administration’s legal power and its related Tenth Amendment claim. The court also held that the risk of irreparable harm, balance of equities and public interest supported preliminary relief.
A split panel and an unusual procedural path
Judge Eric Miller joined the result and wrote separately. Trump-appointed Judge Mark Bennett dissented, arguing that the panel should have allowed the administration to withdraw the appeal. He also said the majority mishandled the state’s claims and should not have reached major constitutional questions on limited briefing after an intervening Supreme Court decision.
That Supreme Court decision, Trump v. Illinois, shaped the Ninth Circuit’s analysis by requiring two threshold findings before the president may invoke one part of Section 12406. The Ninth Circuit said the federal government had not shown that Trump possessed authority to use the regular military to execute the relevant laws or that he was unable to do so with those forces.
The Guard is no longer federalized in Los Angeles. Even so, the majority refused to dismiss the initial appeal as moot because Trump had previously said troops could return and because a merits decision could govern similar action in the future. In a separate order, the panel dismissed another administration appeal concerning an extension of the deployment while retaining the initial case.
Reaction and what comes next
Newsom called the decision a defense of the rule of law and a rejection of the federal takeover of California’s Guard. Fox 11 Los Angeles reported that the Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The administration may seek rehearing by a larger Ninth Circuit panel or ask the Supreme Court to review the ruling.
For now, the ruling leaves the preliminary injunction in place and limits the administration’s ability to repeat the 2025 Los Angeles deployment on the same asserted grounds. It does not establish that a president can never federalize a state Guard without a governor’s consent; the decision instead holds that the specific statutory conditions cited for this deployment were not met.
Sources and image credit
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit — published opinion in Newsom v. Trump
- Ninth Circuit — order on the administration’s motions to dismiss the appeals
- Fox 11 Los Angeles — report on the ruling and responses
- Courthouse News Service — independent report on the Ninth Circuit decision
- California governor’s office — Governor Newsom’s response
- Image: U.S. Northern Command photograph via Wikimedia Commons