A former Chicago mayor has joined the chorus of Illinois Democrats slamming President Donald Trump’s plan to send the National Guard into Chicago as part of a crackdown on violent crime.
Lori Lightfoot appeared on CNN’s The Arena with Kasie Hunt, where Hunt asked her about Trump’s claim that out-of-control crime in the city necessitates the deployment of troops.
Threats from Trump to deploy troops to more cities have so far only been made to Democrat controled states or cities.
A federal judge ruled on Tuesday that Trump’s decision to send 4,000 National Guard troops into Los Angeles in June violated the law.
“Let’s be clear, this was never about violent crime, it’s not going to be about violent crime. I’m sitting in a studio that is one block away from Trump Tower, they’re charging $800/night for a room. They couldn’t be as bold and audacious to charge that kind of amount if this was a hellscape, if this was a killing field,” Lightfoot argued.
“This is about two things: it’s about power and it’s about money. He wants to exercise his power, he wants to scare the heck out of immigrant communities, and he wants to use the pretense of the National Guard or the military coming in to Chicago to boost up the ICE numbers.”
On Tuesday, Judge Charles Breyer ruled that having heavily armed troops carrying out domestic law enforcement duties violated the Posse Comitatus Act.
In a post on X, Lightfoot said, “No one with a functioning brain is buying your nonsense, Mr. Trump.”
Lightfoot, who was mayor of Chicago from 2019 to 2023, told CNN that if Trump were to follow through on his threats, Illinois would mount a similar legal challenge to California’s. “If he comes to Chicago, he‘s going to be in court, and he‘s going to be sued by the state, he‘s going to be sued by the city. And I believe that there will be private interests that also sue him.
“This is not about violent crime, and I don‘t think we should pretend that this manufactured crisis and his attempt to provoke people in Chicago is a legitimate exercise of power. It is not. Coming into Chicago with troops would violate the Posse Comitatus Act, and he would find the same result as he did in L.A. and in California.”
Trump also deployed more than 2,000 National Guard to Washington, D.C., in response to what he claimed was uncontrollable crime in the capital. The National Guard has had time to carry out 40 beautification projects and litter collection, and some high-profile arrests have not made it through the court system.
He later revealed plans to deploy troops to other cities, all of which have Democratic mayors and are located in states with Democratic governors, starting with Chicago.
Lightfoot argued that if the president really cared about crime, he would focus on issues like gun reform.
“If he really cared about violent crime, go after the gun manufacturers who are just mass producing these weapons and have no liability or accountability, go after the gun stores that know that they‘re selling to straw purchasers that flood into our city, pass common sense gun reform that we have been begging for for decades.”
“Those are the kinds of things that actually would make a meaningful difference in violent crime. He‘s not talking about any of those things. He will not do any of those things because this is not about violent crime. It‘s about something else,” Lightfoot argued.
Lightfoot, who noted that violent crime in Chicago has decreased, also pointed out that Trump was ignoring “red cities in red states that have higher per capita rates of gun violence and other violent crime,” an argument several other Democrats have also made.
When asked by Hunt whether more cops would help, Lightfoot responded, “If they’re well trained and engaged in constitutional policing, but what the what the president has done is brought in the military who are not trained to do local policing.”
She continued, “If he wants to fund more police officers in Chicago, yeah, absolutely. But you put them under local control. You don‘t have the federal government from a distance, who knows nothing about the nuances of local policing, coming into our city and telling us how to police our neighborhoods.
“If you want to send more resources, great. Send more money so we can hire more cops, do more to shore up the federal law enforcement efforts to interdict guns and gun trafficking. Absolutely would welcome that. But that‘s not what he‘s talking about.”
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