Gen. Gregory Guillot, the four-star head of US Northern Command, told senators on Thursday he has seen no “enemy within,” undercutting President Donald Trump’s justification for deploying National Guard troops to American cities over the objections of local officials.
General Firmly Rejects Trump’s ‘Enemy Within’ Claim
“I do not have any indications of an enemy within,” Guillot said, according to an Associated Press report, when pressed about Trump’s claim that an “invasion within” warranted sending troops to Democratic-led cities such as Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, Portland and Memphis.
He added that he has “not been tasked to do anything” that reflects Trump’s rhetoric, despite being in the room when the president urged generals in September to treat “some of these dangerous cities” as “training grounds for our military, National Guard.”
Republicans Defend Guard Deployments As Crime Response
Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee framed the deployments as a necessary response to crime and cross-border threats.
Chair Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) said that “violent crime, rioting, drug trafficking and heinous gang activity have steadily escalated,” while Sen. Tim Sheehy (R-Mont.) argued that foreign powers are “actively attacking this country, using illegal immigration, using transnational crime, using drugs to do so,” a view Guillot said he broadly shares on transnational threats.
Democrats Warn Of Politicized Troop Use Domestically
Democrats cast the deployments as unlawful and politically motivated, invoking the Posse Comitatus Act and warning that Trump’s talk of an “enemy within” risks turning troops against U.S. citizens.
Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) said Trump is “forcing our military men and women to make a horrible choice: uphold their loyalty to the Constitution and protect peaceful protesters, or execute questionable orders from the president,” while Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) said even the idea of stationing Guard troops at polling places “sends a shiver down the spine of every American.”
Charles L. Young III, the Pentagon’s principal deputy general counsel, told senators that federal law generally bars troops from polling sites but emphasized that the president has “exclusive authority” to decide whether an emergency exists requiring a Guard response.
The hearing came one day after a federal judge in California ordered the administration to halt National Guard deployments in Los Angeles without Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) consent.
Image via Shutterstock/ Bumble Dee
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