The National Guard’s presence in Washington will grow in the coming days after the governors of West Virginia and South Carolina announced on Saturday that they would send hundreds of their state’s National Guard members at President Trump’s request.
Gov. Patrick Morrisey of West Virginia said the state would send 300 to 400 troops to Washington to support Mr. Trump’s “initiative to restore cleanliness and safety to Washington, D.C.” Hours later, Gov. Henry McMaster of South Carolina pledged to send 200 troops from his state’s National Guard, saying “South Carolina is proud to stand with President Trump as he works to restore law and order to our nation’s capital.”
A White House official confirmed that additional National Guard troops were being called in to Washington, reiterating that their role was to protect federal assets and provide a visible presence.
The 800 already deployed troops all come from the D.C. National Guard, which the president can call out directly. Governors typically control the National Guard in their states, though Mr. Trump circumvented this when he deployed troops to Los Angeles this summer, a matter currently under litigation in federal court.
It was little surprise that the first states to announce plans to send troops to Washington were governed by Republicans like Mr. Morrisey and Mr. McMaster.
National Guard troops have been called out on the streets of Washington before, including in a deployment five years ago during the protests after the killing of George Floyd. But this stationing of military personnel in the city during otherwise ordinary times has drawn significant criticism — possibly more so than some of the administration’s other actions this week, such as the president’s unprecedented step of directing the actions of the Metropolitan Police Department.
The National Guard troops have largely been stationed in high-profile places like the National Mall or landmarks like Union Station, where Humvees are conspicuously parked. Elsewhere in the city, scores of officers from federal agencies like the F.B.I. and the Homeland Security Department have joined the local police on active law enforcement operations this week.
Kingsley Wilson, the Defense Department’s press secretary, told reporters this week that the troops were not intended to perform law enforcement tasks, though some members of the Guard briefly detained a man on Friday who was later arrested on the charge of assaulting a U.S. Park Police officer on the National Mall.
Alan Blinder contributed reporting.
Campbell Robertson reports for The Times on Delaware, the District of Columbia, Kentucky, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia.
Tyler Pager is a White House correspondent for The Times, covering President Trump and his administration.
Eric Schmitt is a national security correspondent for The Times. He has reported on U.S. military affairs and counterterrorism for more than three decades.
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