it can use regular troops, almost certainly without invoking 10 U.S.C. § 12406 or any other statute. (This is the "protective" power.) The power the Trump administration is seeking here is much broader-and would almost certainly mean that federalized National Guard troops would start accompanying ICE officers on immigration raids and other operations-even if they're not making the arrests themselves. That would be a ... dramatic ... escalation relative to where we are today.
Shortly after the first government shutdown since 2019 began earlier this month, Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought announced that he was freezing $8 billion in infrastructure projects exclusively in states that voted for Kamala Harris. The projects that Vought consigned to funding purgatory included a multibillion-dollar renovation and expansion of the Hudson Tunnel from New Jersey to New York City and an extension of the Chicago Transit Authority's Red Line.
The foundation of American government rests on a simple but powerful principle: states are not mere departments of the federal government. They are sovereign entities with both the right and the responsibility to protect the health, safety and wellbeing of their residents.
"We're still a federal state, and that means that there are powers that are given to the federal government in D.C. and powers that are given to states and localities," Ross Burkhart told me.
