Washington, DC, officials are suing the Trump administration, accusing the president of violating the Constitution and federal law by sending thousands of National Guard troops into the city without consent from local leaders.

The lawsuit, filed Thursday by DC Attorney General Brian Schwalb, claims the troops – many from out of state – have been deputized by the US Marshals office and are patrolling neighborhoods, conducting searches and making arrests, despite federal laws that generally bar the military from acting as local police.

The lawsuit argues that the deployment undermines the city’s autonomy, erodes trust between residents and law enforcement and damages the local economy by discouraging tourism and hurting businesses.

“Deploying the National Guard to engage in law enforcement is not only unnecessary and unwanted, but it is also dangerous and harmful to the District and its residents,” Schwalb said in a statement. “It’s DC today but could be any other city tomorrow. We’ve filed this action to put an end to this illegal federal overreach.”

President Donald Trump rolled out the deployment of troops on August 11 as part of his anti-crime agenda in the nation’s capital, which has also included a surge in federal officers from other agencies and an attempted takeover of the city’s police department.

In the weeks since, National Guard members in DC, which include troops from six GOP-led states, have been ordered to carry weapons. As of Tuesday morning, there were 2,290 National Guard troops assigned to the mission – 1,340 of them from supporting states.

The city, the lawsuit reads, “has suffered a severe and irreparable sovereign injury from the deployment.”

“No American jurisdiction should be involuntarily subjected to military occupation,” reads the complaint, filed in the US District Court for DC. “The District of Columbia brings this lawsuit to obtain declaratory and injunctive relief that will stop Defendants’ violations of law, remedy the harms Defendants are inflicting on the District, and preserve the District’s sovereignty.”

CNN reported earlier this week that National Guard members deployed in DC are expected to have their military orders extended through December to ensure troop benefits.

The Trump administration has touted its efforts in the capital city, pointing to a sharp drop in violent crime since ramping up federal law enforcement last month. But critics — including DC Mayor Muriel Bowser — argue the National Guard deployment is unnecessary and costly, with taxpayers footing an estimated $1 million a day, while troops are seen taking photos with tourists, picking up trash, and laying mulch.

Bowser issued an executive order this week requiring the city to closely coordinate with federal law enforcement indefinitely. While some progressive groups viewed the move as ceding to Trump, Bowser later clarified that the order was designed to provide a pathway for the district to exit the federal emergency by offering the administration and congressional Republicans an off-ramp to scale back their involvement in DC.

“I want the message to be clear to the Congress: We have a framework to request or use federal resources in our city. We don’t need a presidential emergency,” Bowser said Wednesday, emphasizing that protecting DC’s autonomy remains her “north star.”

The lawsuit comes as the Trump administration prepares for a major immigration enforcement operation in Chicago, with Trump pledging to send in National Guard troops, though he has not given a timeline.

While the administration looks to replicate its efforts in other Democratic-led cities – Trump holds unique authority over the DC National Guard, which reports only to the President of the United States. The city’s status as a district — not a state — allows the president and the federal government more leeway in directing troops and a range of federal authorities.

The DC attorney general’s lawsuit comes after another challenge to Trump’s deployment of the National Guard proved successful earlier this week in California.

A federal judge ruled Tuesday that Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth violated federal law by using the US military to help carry out law enforcement activities in and around Los Angeles earlier this summer.

In June, Trump ordered 2,000 National Guard troops and hundreds of Marines into Los Angeles – over the objection of the state’s Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom – to quell immigration protests.

Schwalb sued the Trump administration last month after Attorney General Pam Bondi attempted to appoint an emergency police commissioner to replace DC’s police chief and take over the department’s operations. Ultimately, Trump officials backed down from that sweeping takeover but still maintain the ability to request any services from the local police department as part of the federal emergency, which expires next week unless Congress extends it.

House Republicans are currently weighing legislation that would overhaul criminal justice policies in DC and oust the locally elected Schwalb, replacing him with a presidential appointee.

This week, Schwalb announced he will run for reelection.

LONDON (AP) — European countries are stuck between a rock and a hard place as a coalition of countries meets in Paris on Thursday to discuss security guarantees for a postwar Ukraine.

The war is raging unabated, with no ceasefire in sight — and the crucial question of American involvement in ensuring Ukraine’s future security remains unresolved.

For months, the so-called “coalition of the willing” has been meeting to discuss aid for Ukraine, including sketching out plans for military support in the event of a ceasefire to deter future Russian aggression.

The coalition leaders — French President Emmanuel Macron and U.K.Prime Minister Keir Starmer — have insisted that any European “reassurance” force in Ukraine needs the backing of the United States. But while U.S. President Donald Trump has hinted his country will be involved, he has moved away from calling for a ceasefire in Ukraine and refrained from implementing tough additional economic measures to punish Moscow.

Although Trump said he is “disappointed” in Russian President Vladimir Putin and issued several threats to try to cajole him into negotiating an end to hostilities, none has worked. At a meeting with Putin in Alaska in August, Trump failed to persuade the Russian leader to stop fighting and has not yet managed to broker talks between Putin and Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

While Trump and European leaders met in Washington after the Alaska summit — and U.S., European and NATO military chiefs held discussions on support for Ukraine — little concrete detail has emerged on the security guarantees to deter Moscow from a future conflict.

Former military generals and experts suggest Europe is in a bind — not knowing the level of support the U.S. is prepared to provide the coalition, the nature of any ceasefire or if the U.S. will abide by commitments made. It’s also far from certain that Putin would agree to a cessation of hostilities, something Russian officials have invariably dismissed.

“Talking about detailed operational planning when you don’t actually have your mission is, quite frankly, impossible,” said Ed Arnold, an expert in European Security at the Royal United Services Institute in London and a former military planner.

Why Europeans believe a ceasefire is necessary

The “coalition of the willing” is a broad term for about 30 nations supporting Ukraine, but the so-called “reassurance force” that would provide security guarantees to Kyiv is a subset of that group.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Thursday that 26 of those countries — including the U.K. and France — have pledged to deploy troops as a part of that force once there is a ceasefire to deter Putin from attacking again.

There is “no suggestion” that any troops will be deployed without a ceasefire because it’s too risky, said François Heisbourg, special adviser at the Foundation for Strategic Research in Paris.

Despite Zelenskyy signaling his willingness to talk, a ceasefire agreement is not currently in the cards — not least because of the positions of the U.S. and Russian presidents.

At his Aug. 18 meeting with European leaders at the White House — three days after meeting Putin — Trump walked back his previous demands for a ceasefire in Ukraine and said he thought a peace agreement was preferable.

The comments marked a shift toward the Russian position from Trump and would allow Moscow to fight on in Ukraine while peace negotiations are underway.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov later suggested an end to hostilities was even further away, stating that Moscow will not accept Zelenskyy’s signature on any peace agreement as Russia considers him to be an illegitimate president.

“If Putin doesn’t want a ceasefire — and if Trump doesn’t call for a ceasefire — what are the chances of a ceasefire happening?” asked Heisbourg.

What a European security guarantee for Ukraine could look like

Even if a ceasefire or peace agreement for Ukraine were implemented, it’s not clear it would be a sufficient deterrent to Putin and it would still be “very, very risky” for European nations to deploy troops, said Arnold at RUSI.

Such an operation hinges on the U.S. providing intelligence support and the deterrent effect of U.S. airpower in countries outside Ukraine.

The Western appetite to potentially shoot down Russian missiles violating a ceasefire or target launchers firing them from within Russia is “close to zero,” said Heisbourg.

Any response to a ceasefire violation, he said, would likely depend on “how many Western soldiers the Russians would have actually killed…and nobody wants to think about that too much in advance.”

In March, Starmer told allies that a force for Ukraine would need at least 10,000 troops, but that would potentially require around 30,000 troops when taking into account those on rotation and rest.

As a coalition leader, the U.K. should look at contributing a brigade of 5,000 soldiers which would become 15,000 when taking into account rest and rotation, said Arnold.

That figure would account for about 30% of the deployable capacity of the British Army, he said, and potentially create a “tricky” problem whereby the U.K. deploys more forces on behalf of non-NATO ally Ukraine than it does for NATO allies such as Estonia.

European officials have indicated that the troops could be involved in training Ukrainian soldiers and likely based away from the frontlines although the risk of Russian missile and drone strikes would remain high.

But there would be “zero credibility” if Western troops were put in various Ukrainian towns without a clear mission or purpose, said Ben Hodges, former commanding general of the U.S. Army in Europe.

“That will not impress the Russians at all,” he added.

US as a reliable partner

European leaders are also grappling with the question of whether to take Trump and his officials at their word while also eyeing the rise of populist parties — particularly in the U.K., France and Germany — which may not share the same commitment to Ukraine as current political leadership.

That means the future of any security guarantees for Kyiv could be extremely fragile.

There is “absolutely no guarantee” that Trump will abide by commitments made to European nations over Ukraine, said Arnold, pointing to Trump’s withdrawal from previous agreements, including the Paris climate agreement and Iran’s nuclear deal.

That means European nations cannot rely on him ordering U.S. jets into action in the event of a ceasefire violation because “at one time he may say yes, at another time he may say no,” Arnold said.

With NATO membership for Kyiv ruled out by Trump and a host of hurdles to overcome to implement security guarantees for Ukraine, European leaders may decide to navigate the situation by spending “a lot more money on weapons” for Kyiv, said Heisbourg.

Arnold agreed, adding that the best option could be to give Kyiv “loads of guns and loads of ammo.”

“There’s no easy way out,” he said. “None of the options, especially for the Europeans, are good.”

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This version has corrected to say the European leaders meeting was three days after the Trump-Putin summit, not one day.

Madeline Halpert
US Reporter

Image source, Getty Images

Since taking the helm at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in February, Kennedy has made a number of moves that have alarmed health experts and caused chaos at health agencies.

A vaccine sceptic, Kennedy has attempted to remake how the federal government regulates and recommends immunisations.

He fired every member of a panel of independent vaccine experts that issues recommendations for the shots, and replaced them with people who are more sceptical of vaccines.

He has attempted to narrow recommendations for who should get Covid-19 vaccines, excluding healthy children and pregnant women.

As an outbreak of measles became the worst in the US in decades, he continued to spread misinformation about the safety of the measles vaccine.

Recently, hundreds of HHS employees wrote a letter to Kennedy, accusing him of contributing to the harassment of health workers after a gunman fired 500 rounds at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention headquarters in Atlanta last month.

They said the misinformation he has spread has helped sow mistrust in public health officials.