High court hands Trump a major loss

The Hill - The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that Trump may not deploy National Guard troops to Chicago amid his push to patrol multiple Democratic-led cities.

After more than two months of consideration, the court, in an apparent 6-3 decision, declined to pause a district court judge’s ruling temporarily halting the National Guard troops from being federalized and deployed in Illinois, The Hill’s Ella Lee reports.

“At this preliminary stage, the Government has failed to identify a source of authority that would allow the military to execute the laws in Illinois,” the unsigned order reads.

This is the first time the court has ruled on the president’s use of National Guard troops domestically.

The court explained that to justify mobilizing the National Guard, a president must be unable to execute laws with the regular forces of the U.S. military, Lee reports. That would require “exceptional” circumstances because of the Posse Comitatus Act, a law that generally bans federal troops from acting as civilian law enforcement.

Trump has sent the National Guard to major cities including Chicago, Portland, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., prompting challenges that could be affected by Tuesday’s decision.

NPR -  Because the ruling came through an emergency decision, it does not set precedent, NPR's Kat Lonsdorf explains. The decision applies only to this specific case in Illinois, not to troop deployments elsewhere. But deployments in other cities are currently tied up in litigation in lower courts, and Lonsdorf says lower court judges tend to look to these emergency decisions for guidance