One of the proudest moments of my life was the first time I ever put on my boots, put on my uniform and raised my right hand to take my oath to the Constitution as a member of the Illinois Army National Guard.
I cherished every day that I woke up and could call myself an American soldier. And it is precisely because I love our military so deeply that I refuse to let a coward who dodges the draft five times abuse it for his own gain and to the detriment of our country.
Last week, President Donald Trump — the same man who insists on renaming the Pentagon the “Department of War” — told top military leaders at Quantico that he wants to use American cities as a “training ground” for our troops.
TEXAS NATIONAL GUARD DEPOSITS 200 TROOPS TO ILLINOIS FOR FEDERAL PROTECTION MISSION AGAINST PROTESTS
Let that sink in: the Commander in Chief wants members of the War Department to “train” against the very civilians they are sworn to protect. Last month, he announced that Chicago would “find out why it’s called the Department of WAR.” And this week he is making good on his threats: Trump has now forced hundreds of National Guard members into Chicago.
Members of the Texas National Guard gather in Elwood, Illinois, at the Army Reserve Training Center in southwest suburban Chicago on Oct. 7, 2025.
(Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
For months, Trump has fabricated claims of chaos and crime on America’s streets to justify false claims that there is a “need” to deploy troops in our cities against the wishes of local officials. First to Los Angeles, then to Washington, DC – and he doesn’t stop there, he also tries to send troops to Portland. Over the weekend, however, a Trump-appointed federal judge blocked his efforts to deploy troops there — twice — because, in the words of his self-appointed appointee, his claims about why they were needed were “detached from facts.”
Another way of saying that is that he’s lying.
In the past week alone in Chicago, we have seen Trump’s agents arrest innocent Americans, deny citizens their right to legal representation, zip-tie children, arrest elected officials, loot apartment buildings, and injure journalists. And in recent weeks they have shot two people, killing one – a father of two young children. They have made dubious and unsubstantiated claims about why they felt the need to use lethal force.
It’s clear what Trump is doing. He targets and punishes the cities that dare to oppose him – those willing to call the president what he really is: a wannabe emperor with no clothes, no courage and certainly no moral compass.
And while he is currently targeting blue cities with his lies, nothing will stop him – or any future president – ​​from doing so, anywhere, to anyone, for any fabricated reason.
PRITZKER ADDRESSS TRUMP TO BLOCK NATIONAL GUARD ACTION IN ILLINOIS
Let’s be clear: directing our troops to intimidate the very Americans they sacrifice to protect every day does nothing to make our nation safer. Monitoring Americans in their own communities is not the job of the National Guard. They cannot make arrests and are not adequately trained to perform police duties in urban environments. This deployment is simply another unwarranted, unwanted, and unjust move by Trump straight out of the Authoritarian 101 textbook, further endangering civil rights and distracting our troops from carrying out their core mission: protecting our families from the actual adversaries who seek to harm us.
President Donald Trump talks to the media after walking off Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House on October 5, 2025 in Washington, DC (Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)
We know that Trump’s actions are not about “law and order.” Like this 34-time convicted criminal Actually cared about law and order, he would not blatantly and apparently gleefully refuse to coordinate with state and local officials. He wouldn’t take our troops away from their training missions just to carry out his personal wishes, forcing our heroes to pick up trash on the side of the street instead of using their time to protect our nation in the event of a future conflict. He would not literally defund the police by freezing and cutting federal dollars that help hire, train and equip law enforcement officers.
But he did. All of these things, instead of supporting and expanding proven violence and crime prevention strategies that prevent escalation of retaliation.
PRITZKER SAYS TRUMP IS ORDERING 400 TEXAS NATIONAL GUARD MEMBERS TO ILLINOIS, OREGON AND OTHER LOCATIONS
Trump is wasting millions of taxpayer dollars to terrorize law-abiding citizens and legal visa holders who are simply exercising their First Amendment rights. And he is diverting federal resources and agents from operations that investigate drug cartels and arms traffickers, from missions that identify and disrupt terrorist plots, and from actions that protect our families from cyberattacks to do so.
Military personnel in uniform, wearing the Texas National Guard patch, are seen on Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2025, at the U.S. Army Reserve Center in Elwood, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. (AP/Laura Bargfeld)
Today I drove past some National Guard members who had been mobilized on their way to work. I felt for them. Because when they raised their right hands and took their oath, they didn’t do it to help a draft dodger avoid not only wars, but his own personal scandals.
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They signed up to defend America’s right to free speech — not to intimidate Americans into speaking out. They were willing to die to defend this country – not to defend one man’s ego.
Los Angeles didn’t ask for this. Washington DC did not ask for this. Portland didn’t ask for this. Chicago didn’t ask for this. Our service employees do not deserve this. And it is because I respect our military so deeply that I refuse to remain silent as it is disrespected and abused by a man who was never brave enough to serve himself. I cannot and will not allow him to continue giving our troops the middle finger – taking them away from their families and their missions, while eroding the hard-won trust they have earned from the American public for generations.
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These days I may no longer wear my Army uniform, but it still hangs proudly in my Senate office. Now I spend much of my time under the big, beautiful Capitol Dome instead of under the main rotors of my Black Hawk. But my core mission is still the same as it was when I was in the National Guard: to keep America as strong and safe as it should be.
If Donald Trump wanted to do the same.
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