UPDATE: Oct. 23, 2025: U.S. District Judge April Perry on Wednesday extended an order preventing the Trump administration from deploying the National Guard in Illinois — which was set to expire tonight — until the U.S. Supreme Court rules on the Trump administration’s plea to stay her ruling.
During a telephone status hearing, Perry said the Supreme Court “could very well rule today, they could also wait a week.” Every day the plaintiffs and defendants have to wait, they are losing time to prepare for a trial, she said.
A trial on the merits of Illinois v. Trump, a lawsuit filed by Chicago and the state of Illinois asking the court to block federalized Texas National Guard troops from being deployed in the state, is essentially on hold while the Supreme Court considers the Trump administration’s emergency application to stay Perry’s Oct. 9 order barring the federal government from deploying the troops.
If the Supreme Court agrees to stay Perry’s ruling, allowing National Guard troops to be deployed despite city and state leaders’ objections, the state will seek an expedited injunction hearing, said Christopher Wells, a lawyer with the Illinois Attorney General’s office.
This morning, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker announced he is signing an executive order to create the Illinois Accountability Commission, which is charged with creating a public record of what he called federal immigration agent abuses, capturing their impact on families and the community and recommending actions to “prevent further harm and pursue justice.”
“We hope to reveal to the public — in Chicago, the state of Illinois, across the nation and around the world — the facts on the ground about what is happening here,” Pritzker said.
“We will not meet intimidation with fear. We will meet it with truth,” he said. “We can either let these abuses become our new normal and abandon the rule of law and our democratic values, or we can pursue real justice and accountability and transparency.”
UPDATE: Oct. 21, 2025: The city of Chicago and the state of Illinois on Monday urged the Supreme Court to leave in place a temporary restraining order blocking the Trump administration from deploying federalized National Guard troops in Illinois.
The appeal states that the Seventh Circuit’s order permitting the National Guard to remain federalized but temporarily prohibiting troops from being deployed in Chicago “acknowledges the federal interests in this space while imposing a temporary freeze of the status quo while this fast-moving and complex litigation proceeds.”
The Trump administration on Friday asked the Supreme Court to stay the Oct. 9 order barring the federal government from deploying the troops pending consideration and disposition of the government’s appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and “any further proceedings in this Court.”
UPDATE: Oct. 14, 2025: National Guard troops sent from Texas to Illinois last week can remain there but can’t be deployed in the Chicago area, a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit ruled Saturday.
The court granted an emergency motion to temporarily stay a lower court’s order to federalize the National Guard but denied the Trump administration’s request to stay the lower court’s ruling halting deployment pending appeal.
“Members of the National Guard do not need to return to their home states unless further ordered by a court to do so,” the one-page ruling states.
Dive Brief:
- A federal judge Thursday issued a temporary restraining order preventing the Trump administration from “ordering the federalization and deployment of the National Guard within Illinois” for two weeks.
-
U.S. District Court Judge April Perry issued the order after hearing arguments in a lawsuit filed Monday by Chicago and the state of Illinois asking the court to block federalized Texas and Illinois National Guard troops from being deployed in the city.
- Perry will hold a telephone hearing Oct. 22 to determine whether the temporary restraining order should be extended for another two weeks.
Dive Insight:
In early September, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security launched Operation Midway Blitz, saying it was targeting “the criminal aliens who flocked to Chicago and Illinois because they know Governor [JB] Pritzker and his sanctuary policies would protect them and allow them to roam free on American streets.”
Protests have been ongoing outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, Illinois, west of Chicago. Federal agents have fired rubber pellets, tear gas and other chemicals at protesters, and several arrests have been made.
On Monday, President Donald Trump issued a memo to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Attorney General Pam Bondi calling “at least 300” Illinois National Guard members into service to protect federal agents “who are executing Federal law in Illinois, and Federal property in the State of Illinois.”
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Tuesday sent National Guard members from his state to Illinois.
Perry said during her ruling that the Trump administration’s portrayal of the situation in Chicago as a rebellion was “simply unreliable.”
“I have found no credible evidence that there is a danger of rebellion in the state of Illinois,” she said. Further, she said, “The National Guard are not trained in de-escalation or other extremely important law enforcement functions that would help to quell these problems.”
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said in a statement that the city would “continue to use all of the tools at our disposal to end the Trump administration’s war on Chicago.”
Chicago Attorney General Kwame Raoul said in a statement that he “will continue to fight back against this unlawful attack on our state’s sovereignty.”
White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement Thursday night that “President Trump will not turn a blind eye to the lawlessness plaguing American cities and we expect to be vindicated by a higher court.”
