U.S District Judge Karin Immergut, a Trump appointee, was brimming with skepticism Friday as she pressed on the administration’s rationale for its imminent deployment of the National Guard to Portland.
She was particularly stuck on the government’s struggle to identify recent events outside an ICE facility in the city to justify the occupation, as the Justice Department lawyers frequently pointed back to disruptions in June and July. When she pressed for any incidents closer to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s mobilization of the Guard on Sunday, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Eric Hamilton offered limply that there’d been “some events” after that early summer stretch.
“Some events? And that’s enough to call up the National Guard?” Immergut asked, later referring to the June and July incidents as “old news.”
She was similarly dubious about the government’s argument that President Trump’s sporadic Truth Social posts, some coming after the announcement of the deployment, bolstered his presidential determination and are due significant deference.
“Really? A social media post is going to count as a presidential determination that you can send the National Guard into cities? Is that really what I should be relying on as a determination?” she asked.
She picked apart some other facets of the government’s argument too, pushing on whether the statute the government invoked here, which allows the Guard to be deployed in the face of “danger of a rebellion,” has ever been invoked before (Hamilton said that except for the similar deployment earlier this summer in Los Angeles, it has not), and pointing out that the president deciding Portland’s needs over the contrary determination of the state’s governor “affects states’ rights.” She also said that all of the incidents cited in Portland were resolved at the time by the law enforcement there now.
Immergut even raised an argument for the plaintiff herself, which the state hadn’t yet done: She inquired whether the National Guard would be paid if they were deployed during the shutdown, suggesting it could be part of the state’s irreparable harm argument. The state’s attorneys confirmed that the Guard would not be paid during the appropriations lapse.
The judge’s initial posture may be something of a disappointment to the administration, which successfully pressured the judge initially assigned the case to recuse himself. Judge Michael Simon is married to Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR), whose seat includes parts of Portland and who spoke out against the occupation.
“Although the Court does not believe that recusal is required under either federal law or the Code of Conduct for United States Judges, because it is necessary that the focus of this lawsuit remain on the critically important constitutional and statutory issues presented by the parties, the undersigned U.S. District Judge hereby recuses himself,” Simon wrote Thursday.
The case was then reassigned to Immergut, who previously served as a U.S. attorney under both Presidents Bush and Obama, but was appointed to her current judgeship by Trump.
Despite Immergut only having the case in her hands since Thursday afternoon, she promised a quick turnaround, anticipating a decision on Oregon’s request for a temporary restraining order Friday or Saturday.
