The 300 Illinois National Guard troops under Republican President Donald Trump’s control since early October — despite Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker’s objections — will remain federalized until mid-April, even though the Guard members have carried out no significant operational missions and have spent most of their time stationed at a northern Illinois base.
A spokesperson for the Pritzker administration and U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth each told the Tribune that the Trump administration plans to keep the Illinois National Guard members federalized until April 15, and a Pentagon official said the troops would remain under federal control until that month. They were deployed to support the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement personnel participating in the Republican president’s deportation efforts in the Chicago area.
The revelation comes as the Oct. 4 order by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth federalizing Guard troops to support the Department of Homeland Security’s Operation Midway Blitz has long passed the initial 60-day deadline. It also comes as a wave of additional Border Patrol agents arrived in Chicago this week and began detaining and arresting people.
Last week, Pritzker’s office said the 60-day deployment had been “amended and extended an additional 32 days.” But since then, Duckworth, a Democratic member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said she learned of the extended federal activation to April 15, with her staff saying the information came from the U.S. Department of Defense. A Pritzker spokesperson this week said the Illinois Guard has been told “the extension is expected to last until April 15 but has not yet received the official orders with that date.”
And on Wednesday, a Pentagon official told the Tribune, “Consistent with the direction of the president, the Secretary of War has extended the federal protection mission into April 2026,” using Hegseth’s preferred title.
“This basically only continues to undermine the readiness of our nation’s military, of the Illinois National Guard, and it weakens our national security,” Duckworth of Hoffman Estates, a retired Army lieutenant colonel, told the Tribune during a brief interview last week. “Servicemembers signed up to defend the Constitution and our rights, not to be used as political props.”
The Trump administration’s decision will likely exacerbate tensions over his unprecedented move to oversee a group of state troops despite opposition from the governor. It also could signal the Trump administration’s desire to continue immigration enforcement actions well into 2026 and through the March 17 primary election.
“I just want to assure people that I’m going to do everything I can alongside state and local officials to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to stop Donald Trump and his administration’s assault on Chicago and their abuse of our servicemembers,” Duckworth said in the Tribune interview last week after questioning Defense Department officials about the recent military deployments in big U.S. cities at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing.
The Illinois Guard members in question have been staying at an Illinois Army National Guard training site in Marseilles, a state-owned military base about 75 miles southwest of Chicago, and have never deployed for the Trump administration’s stated purpose of protecting federal officers and assets.
The ongoing federalization also drew heightened scrutiny after a federal judge in California last week ordered the Trump administration to return control of that state’s National Guard to California’s Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom.
The judge ruled that the White House overstepped its authority in extending a deployment in Los Angeles, a finding that could affect National Guard units in other states, such as Illinois, that the federal government has commandeered. An appeals court said the Trump administration must end its federal deployment of Guard troops in L.A. by next week. On Wednesday, a federal appeals court ruled that National Guard troops federalized to serve in Washington, D.C. could remain there while judges considered if the deployment was legal.
In Illinois, state officials have scored some lower-court victories barring the state’s National Guard contingent that was federalized from being deployed onto Chicago-area streets, although the case is now before the conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court, which likely won’t issue a ruling until next year. Pritzker has often condemned Trump’s move as an abuse of power and unnecessary, noting that Illinois troops have neither patrolled streets nor guarded federal buildings, and pointing out that the president said he originally intended to deploy National Guard troops in Chicago to curb crime.
Many agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol assigned to the Chicago region, specifically as part of Operation Midway Blitz, left the area about a month ago. That was until Tuesday when at least 100 immigration enforcement agents were actively participating in deportation missions in parts of the city and suburbs, led by Border Patrol Cmdr. Gregory Bovino.
Officers under Bovino’s leadership have come under scrutiny in federal court for their use of tear gas and other controversial tactics on people protesting their actions in the streets.
Unlike the Illinois National Guard troops who have yet to be deployed to protect federal agents, about 200 Texas National Guard troops were sent to a U.S. Army Reserve training center in the Chicago area for that purpose in early October. But during their 41-day deployment, which ended in mid-November, the Texas troops spent less than 24 hours outside an ICE facility in near west suburban Broadview, which had been the site of tense demonstrations, as part of Midway Blitz.