The new force will “siege” neighborhoods under police pressure and will be tasked with enforcing immigration laws.
President Donald Trump signed a memorandum on Monday mobilizing the National Guard to Memphis and also sending a “Task Force” to the city to “eradicate street and violent crime” through various measures such as “the large-scale saturation of besieged neighborhoods with police personnel.”
“The Secretary of War (Pete Hegseth) will request the Governor of Tennessee (Bill Lee) (…) to make Tennessee National Guard units available to support public safety and law enforcement operations in Memphis,” reads the document released by the White House.
While Trump stated in it that this deployment will be “in the numbers and for as long as the Governor deems necessary,” the text emphasizes that Attorney General Pam Bondi and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem “will request necessary and appropriate National Guard support,” while Hegseth “is authorized to… authorize the mobilization and training of additional National Guard personnel.”
The memorandum also includes the creation of a “Memphis Security Task Force” with the goal of “eradicating street and violent crime.” To this end, the document signed by Trump envisions strategies such as “rigorous policing, aggressive prosecution, complex investigations, the application of financial measures, and the large-scale saturation of besieged neighborhoods with law enforcement personnel.”
Furthermore, this new force will be responsible for “enforcing federal immigration law,” among other tasks, including “coordinating the strict enforcement of applicable laws regarding quality of life, nuisances, and public safety,” and where the text also mentions “unpermitted riots and demonstrations.”
This detachment, which will report to the White House through his advisor Stephen Miller, will include, according to the text, representatives from multiple departments, such as the Treasury, Defense, Justice, and Homeland Security, as well as the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). It “may, within legal limits, request operational assistance and coordination” from authorities in Memphis, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Mississippi, among others.
Donald Trump signed this memorandum in the Oval Office, where he stated that this deployment “will replicate our extraordinarily successful efforts here” in Washington, and declared that Chicago would be the next city where his administration will conduct a similar operation.
This deployment follows those in the nation’s capital and California, Los Angeles, which a federal judge in the state declared illegal for violating a 19th-century law known as Posse Comitatus, which prohibits the deployment of military forces on US soil for internal security purposes.
However, Trump warned in early September that the National Guard could also intervene in Baltimore, Maryland, as well as New Orleans, Louisiana.
