Barry Moore suggests deploying National Guard to Birmingham and Montgomery

U.S. Rep. Barry Moore, R-Enterprise, mentioned the possibility of the National Guard being deployed in Alabama during a hearing Wednesday.

In a hearing on the topic of Restoring Law and Order in High-Crime Cities, Moore asked witnesses if cities that have had National Guard deployments have “seen improvement enough that would warrant the National Guard coming to Alabama.”

President Donald Trump’s administration has deployed the National Guard to several American cities including Washington D.C., Chicago, Portland and several more.

“We’ve seen crime rise in Democrat-ran cities, including in my home state of Alabama, in the two largest Democrat-ran cities, that would be Birmingham and Montgomery,” Moore said.

“Senator [Tommy] Tuberville has noted that he would be supportive of the National Guard coming in to help local police departments in Alabama with rising crime.”

Tuberville previously said in August that if he was governor he would be in favor of deploying the National Guard to Birmingham and Montgomery to fight “rampant crime.”

While Montgomery and Birmingham have some of the highest rates of violent crime in Alabama, both saw drops in crime over the first half of 2025.

Rafael Mangual, a senior policing fellow with conservative think tank the Manhattan Institute, told Moore that evidence suggests that while the National Guard presence has been a deterrent in cities that effect is limited.

Mangual suggested that additional federal resources should be allocated to targeting gang and gun prosecutions.

According to NPR, criminologist and experts have also warned that a prolonged National Guard presence may only artificially reduce crime and lead to other problems like community distrust of a militarized force.

Moore is running in the Republican primary for the Senate seat Tuberville now holds. Tuberville is foregoing a run for re-election to run for governor.

Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, former Navy SEAL Jared Hudson, Rodney Walker, a cattle farmer and businessman, and Morgan Murphy, a former Tuberville staffer, are also running in the GOP Senate primary.