On the last day of 2025, President Donald Trump announced that he’s ending his National Guard deployment in Los Angeles, along with his attempted military takeovers in Chicago and Portland.
Trump pulls National Guard from Los Angeles, ends attempted deployments in Portland and Chicago
President Donald Trump announced that he’s ending his National Guard deployment in Los Angeles, along with attempted military takeovers in Chicago and Portland. That decision came just a week after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling halting his efforts to send hundreds of Guard troops into Chicago.
But the president also threatened to return: "We will come back, perhaps in a much different and stronger form, when crime begins to soar again," he wrote. "Only a question of time!"
Trump deployed Guard troops to Los Angeles in response to protests against immigration raids, not because of crime. Federal law prohibits troops from performing routine policing activities under normal circumstances.
We will not sit by and let America fall into authoritarianism. The ACLU has filed over 100 lawsuits and blocked some of the Trump administration’s worst policies and actions.
After big talk, Dallas GOP drops ballot hand count plans
Earlier this month, Dallas Republicans announced plans to hand count every ballot cast in the upcoming GOP primary election, insisting “failure is not an option.” This week, failure was very much an option: The Texas GOP announced it would drop the initiative after not securing enough funding and volunteers.
One new U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) voting lawyer worked on the Georgia fake electors plot. Another was part of Cleta Mitchell’s anti-voting network. Meet Christopher Gardner and Megan Frederick, the newest lawyers helping to lead the DOJ’s ongoing legal campaign for access to states’ unredacted voter rolls.
Since day one of the Trump administration, the ACLU has filed over 100 lawsuits to protect our most fundamental civil rights from attacks. And in more than 70% of our cases, we have successfully defeated, diluted, or delayed some of the Trump administration’s worst policies and actions – but our work is far from over.
Trump tells Colorado officials to ‘rot in hell’ over refusal to release convicted election denier Tina Peters
In his latest unhinged social media rant, Trump told Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D) and Mesa County District Attorney Daniel Rubinstein (R) to “rot in hell” for prosecuting, and refusing to release, former GOP county clerk Tina Peters. She is currently serving a nine-year state prison sentence for her role in a voting system data breach.
Trump recently issued a legally meaningless “pardon” to Peters, who was convicted on state, not federal, charges. Attorneys for Peters last week asked a Colorado appeals court to decide whether the president’s pardon has any influence on her case.
Happy New Year from the Democracy Docket team! We’ll see you in 2026.
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