WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump announced Wednesday that — for now — he has abandoned his intention to deploy National Guard troops to Chicago, Los Angeles and Portland, after legal hurdles blocked that plan.

“We will come back, perhaps in a much different and stronger form, when crime spikes again... It's only a matter of time,” Trump wrote on social media on Wednesday.

Governors typically have control of their national guards. states, and Trump had deployed troops to the three cities against the wishes of state and local leaders. He said it was necessary as part of a broader crackdown on immigration, crime and protests.

The president has made fighting crime in cities a centerpiece of his second term, and has weighed the idea of ​​invoking the Insurrection Act to prevent his opponents from using the courts to block his plans. He has said he believes the issue of public safety will be crucial in next year's midterm elections.

The troops had already left Los Angeles after the president sent them in the middle of the year.

In his post, Trump said the presence of the troops was responsible for a drop in crime in the three cities, although they were never on the streets of Chicago and Portland while the legal challenges were being resolved. When the Chicago deployment was challenged in court, a Justice Department lawyer said the National Guard's mission would be to protect federal property and government agents in the field, not "solve all the crime in Chicago."

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Portland Mayor Keith Wilson's office said in a statement that the reduction in crime in the city was due to the work of local police and public safety programs. Chicago officials shared the sentiment, saying in a statement Tuesday that the city had 416 homicides in 2025, the lowest number since 2014.

Trump's push to deploy troops to cities governed by Democratic officials has faced legal challenges at almost every turn.

Governors' reactions

In December, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to allow the Trump administration to deploy National Guard troops to the Chicago metropolitan area as part of its crackdown on immigration. The order was not a final ruling, but it was a significant and unusual setback by the highest court for the president's plans.

Illinois Governor JB Pritzker wrote Wednesday in A judge permanently blocked the deployment of National Guard troops there in November after a three-day trial.

Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek said in a statement Wednesday that her office had not yet received "official notification that the remaining federalized troops of the Oregon National Guard can return home. They were never legally deployed to Portland and there was no need for their presence. If President Trump has finally decided to follow court orders and demobilize our troops, that is a huge victory for Oregonians and the rule of law."

Trump's decision to federalize the troops. National Guard troops began in Los Angeles in June, when protesters took to the streets in response to a wave of immigration arrests in the area. He deployed about 4,000 soldiers and 700 Marines to protect federal buildings and, later, to protect federal agents while they made immigration arrests.

The number of troops slowly decreased until only a few hundred remained. They were taken off the streets by Dec. 15 following a court ruling that also ordered control returned to Gov. Gavin Newsom. But an appeals court had paused the second part of the order, meaning control remained with Trump. In a court document filed Tuesday, the Trump administration indicated it would no longer seek a pause on that part of the order.

The federal 9th ​​Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday ordered the Trump administration to return control of the National Guard to Newsom.

“It's about time for (Trump) to admit defeat,” Newsom said in a social media post. “We have said it from day one: the federal takeover of the California National Guard is illegal.”

Troops will remain on the ground in several other cities. The federal Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in December paused a lower court ruling that had called for an end to the deployment of National Guard troops to Washington, D.C., where they have been since August after Trump declared a “crime emergency.”

In September, Trump also ordered the deployment of the Tennessee National Guard to Memphis to combat crime, a move supported by Republican senators and the state's governor, Bill Lee, of the same party. A Tennessee judge blocked the use of the National Guard, ruling in favor of Democratic state and local officials who sued. However, the judge stayed the decision to block the National Guard while the state appeals, allowing the deployment to continue.

In New Orleans, about 350 National Guard troops deployed by Trump arrived in the city's historic French Quarter on Tuesday and are scheduled to stay until Mardi Gras to help with security. The state's Republican governor and the city's Democratic mayor support the deployment.

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Ding reported from Los Angeles. Associated Press writers John O'Connor in Springfield, Illinois, Becky Bohrer in Juneau, Alaska, Jack Brook in New Orleans and Adrian Sanz in Memphis contributed to this report.

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This story was translated from English by an AP editor with the help of a generative artificial intelligence tool.