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\n It\u2019s been evident for a long time that President Donald Trump<\/a> is quite fond of the idea of dispatching the US military on domestic soil. It\u2019s one of the outcomes that those who are wary of Trump\u2019s more authoritarian tendencies fear most, because of the Pandora\u2019s box it could open.\n <\/p>\n \n It appears he\u2019s getting closer and closer to making that longstanding aspiration a reality.\n <\/p>\n \n Trump has floated this idea repeatedly over the years and has taken some bona fide steps toward it in his second term. That includes increasingly militarizing the border<\/a>. And two months ago, he took a limited but significant step of sending not just the National Guard<\/a> but also active-duty troops \u2013 Marines \u2013 to Los Angeles to guard federal buildings amid protests. It was the first time in 60 years that a president had done such a thing without a request from a governor.\n <\/p>\n \n Given the violence in Los Angeles wasn\u2019t nearly as rampant or widespread<\/a> as Trump advertised it, that raised the prospect that he was testing boundaries<\/a>. His move to call in the troops, for example, is the subject of ongoing litigation that heads to trial next week. More broadly, it also tested Americans\u2019 tolerance for the military on US streets.\n <\/p>\n \n Top officials in Trump\u2019s first administration seemed to successfully dissuade the president from such drastic steps. But those people are apparently gone. And there are increasing signs that Trump aims to press forward.\n <\/p>\n \n Twice in just the last two days, he has proposed using the military for domestic law enforcement \u2013 even in the absence of a significant, imminent threat of something like riots.\n <\/p>\n \n On Tuesday, Trump asserted more control<\/a> of the upcoming 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles than presidents usually have. And he quickly floated using the military to protect the Games, while name checking<\/a> two of his favorite Democratic targets \u2013 California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cWe\u2019ll do anything necessary to keep the Olympics safe, including using our National Guard or military, OK?\u201d Trump said. \u201cI will use the National Guard or the military \u2013 this is going to be so safe \u2013 if we have to.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n By Wednesday, Trump expanded his recently pushed idea to federalize law enforcement in Washington, DC, to include using the National Guard<\/a> in a more active role. CNN reports the administration is making plans to increase the presence of federal law enforcement, including Guard troops.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cAnd what a shame. The rate of crime, the rate of muggings, killings and everything else,\u201d Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to let it \u2013 and that includes bringing in the National Guard maybe very quickly too.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n What\u2019s particularly striking about these comments and moves is the lack of an imminent threat.\n <\/p>\n \n Similar to Trump\u2019s proposal to use the military for an Olympics that is three years in the future, there is little evidence of extraordinary circumstances in DC that might historically lead to suggestions of such a response. Crime in the nation\u2019s capital is actually falling for the second straight year<\/a> in the district. But Trump is floating this anyway.\n <\/p>\n \n (The president\u2019s call has come as a former Department of Government Efficiency worker was assaulted in an attempted carjacking.)\n <\/p>\n \n In addition, while Trump has floated the idea of federalizing law enforcement in DC before \u2013 he did so often in 2023 and early 2024, when he was out of office \u2013 the National Guard aspect is new.\n <\/p>\n \n It\u2019s not just his rhetoric, either.\n <\/p>\n \n The administration last week took yet another step toward using the Guard for deportation operations, authorizing their deployments to immigration facilities<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n The move didn\u2019t yet authorize the Guard to participate in immigration raids, but it was yet another escalation in Trump\u2019s efforts to use the military in domestic law enforcement.\n <\/p>\n \n It remains to be seen just how far he goes in using the military on US soil. Trump often floats ideas that don\u2019t come to fruition. There are also legal hurdles, with the most drastic steps legally requiring him to invoke the Insurrection Act.\n <\/p>\n \n But he planted this seed years ago and has conspicuously upped the fertilizer of late.\n <\/p>\n \n In 2020, there were many reports of Trump\u2019s often-privately expressed desired to use the military, particularly to crack down on racial-justice protests that sometimes turned violent. Former Defense Secretary Mark Esper has said Trump floated using 10,000 active-duty troops in DC<\/a>, and that top White House adviser Stephen Miller floated sending as many as 250,000 troops to the US-Mexico border<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n By 2023, Trump signaled that he would break with historical practice \u2013 and possibly the law \u2013 by not deferring to governors and local officials on calling in the military to deal with unrest. \u201cThe next time, I\u2019m not waiting,\u201d Trump said. (He followed through on that threat in Los Angeles this year. A trial next week<\/a> will determine whether he broke the law in doing so.)\n <\/p>\n \n Back then Trump also signaled he would use the military for his mass deportation operation.\n <\/p>\n \n By late in the 2024 campaign, he began building up the supposed menace of the \u201cenemy within\u201d \u2013 supposedly nefarious forces inside the US \u2013 that he said \u201cshould be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n And by the time Trump made the call on sending the Guard and Marines to Los Angeles, he began asserting that this might be the start of a very different new normal.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cWe\u2019re going to have troops everywhere,\u201d he said.\n <\/p>\n \n It might be time to start taking that prospect more seriously.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Facebook Tweet Email Link It\u2019s been evident for a long time that President Donald Trump is quite fond…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":326599,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[49,978,659],"class_list":{"0":"post-326598","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-united-states","9":"tag-us","10":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114990467223749113","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=326598"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326598\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/326599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=326598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=326598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=326598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"President](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/c-gettyimages-2228112530.jpg\")
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