According to reports of administration plans to send National Guard soldiers to the Midwestern city, Democratic leaders in the United States are ecstatic that President Donald Trump has the authority to send US troops there.
Trump, a Republican, has stated that he would likely expand the federal forces’ deployment to other cities, including Chicago, to oversee policing in Washington, D.C. He also suggested considering sending troops to Democratic-run Baltimore in Maryland on Sunday.
Hakeem Jeffries, the leader of the Democratic House of Representatives, decried plans to send federal forces to Chicago on Sunday. In Chicago, crime rates, including murders, have decreased recently.
According to Jeffries, “Donald Trump might try to drop federal troops into the city of Chicago has no basis or authority,” he told CNN.
The states are given the authority to policing according to the US Constitution.
The Pentagon has been making plans for a possible troop deployment in Chicago, according to a report released on Saturday by The Washington Post.
The push was quickly rejected by Democratic governor of Illinois, where Chicago is located.
According to a statement from JB Pritzker, “Donald Trump is attempting to manufacture a crisis, politicize Americans who serve in uniform, and continue abusing his power to distract from the pain he is causing working families.”
Trump criticized Maryland’s Democratic Governor Wes Moore for the city’s high crime rates, and criticized the governor there for sending troops there.
The Baltimore police department reported a double-digit decrease in gun violence in July as compared to the previous year. The mayor claims that this year saw the fewest homicides in over 50 years in the city.
Trump stated on his social media platform, Truth Social, on Sunday, “If Wes Moore needs assistance, I will send in the “troops,” which are currently being done in nearby DC, and quickly clean up the Crime.”
Trump has characterized major cities, which are almost entirely run by Democrats, as rife with crime, drugs, and homelessness.
Some rural conservative beliefs toward liberal cities were echoed by that perception.
At Trump’s request, several Republican governors earlier this month sent hundreds of National Guard troops to Washington. Despite official data showing a decrease in crime in the city, the president has claimed that the city is in the grip of a crime wave.
Trump attributed his deployment of troops and hundreds of federal law enforcement personnel to the lack of any supporting evidence in the US capital on Sunday.
Critics of the US president have argued that Washington’s crackdown may serve as a test for the US cities’ continued militarisation.
Trump has far more authority over the District of Columbia, which is not a part of a US state, than he does over Chicago and Baltimore.
A provision in Title 10 of the US Code, a federal law that specifies the duties of the US armed forces, allows the president to deploy National Guard units to repel invasions, halt a rebellion, or put the law into effect, is included.
Governor Gavin Newsom’s objections led to the use of Section 12406, which Trump cited when he sent National Guard units to California earlier this year to protest.
Trump might argue that the military presence is justified by local laws that prohibit city officials from cooperating with federal immigration agents in Chicago.
Source: Aljazeera
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