A federal judge in Chicago on Oct. 22  said she would extend her order blocking President Donald Trump from deploying National Guard troops in the Windy City while awaiting the Supreme Court’s ruling on the dispute.

The plaintiffs—the state of Illinois and city of Chicago—filed a lawsuit on Oct. 6 after Secretary of War Pete Hegseth invoked Section 12406 of Title 10 of the U.S. Code to federalize up to 300 members of the Illinois National Guard and up to 400 members of the Texas National Guard for deployment in Chicago.

A president may take over, or federalize, state National Guard troops under certain emergency circumstances. The Trump administration argues the deployment is needed to help the federal government enforce federal immigration laws in Chicago.

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said on Oct. 5 that Trump’s deployment of the troops was an “invasion.”

“There is no reason a president should send military troops into a sovereign state without their knowledge, consent, or cooperation,” Pritzker said.

On Oct. 9, U.S. District Judge April Perry issued a temporary restraining order blocking the “federalization and deployment of the National Guard of the United States within Illinois.” The order was set to expire at 11:59 p.m. on Oct. 23.

After a status hearing on Oct. 22, the court said that the federal government, Illinois, and Chicago have agreed to extend the temporary restraining order “until a final decision on the merits is reached.”

The federal government is still free to seek relief from an appeals court, the docket entry said.

The time-extending order, which will be issued on Oct. 23, will give the parties the time they need to engage in fact-finding and prepare briefs and motions “on the complex and weighty topics raised in this matter,” the entry said.

The entry came after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit upheld part of Perry’s order on Oct. 11. The circuit court stayed part of her ruling that stated the president could not federalize the National Guard, but held that the troops could not be deployed in Illinois.

“Members of the National Guard do not need to return to their home states unless further ordered by a court to do so,” the circuit court said.

The Trump administration on Oct. 17 filed an emergency appeal of Perry’s Oct. 9 ruling, asking the Supreme Court to put the decision on hold. The application was directed to Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who handles emergency cases from Illinois.

In an Oct. 21 brief, Solicitor General D. John Sauer cited an Oct. 20 ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that allowed the president to deploy federalized Oregon National Guard troops to Portland, Oregon, to deal with violence directed against federal immigration facilities.

Sauer said in the brief that in that case, which is similar to the Illinois case, the Ninth Circuit stayed an injunction blocking deployment, finding the court had to adhere to a “highly deferential standard” that prevents a court from “substituting its own assessment of the facts for the President’s assessment of the facts.”

“The stark conflict between the Ninth and Seventh Circuits underscores the need for this Court to stay the order below,” the brief said.

On Oct. 22, the district court also directed the litigants to confer about a schedule for the fact-finding process, known as discovery, and file a joint status report by Nov. 4.

The Supreme Court could act on the Trump administration’s emergency application at any time.

This article by Matthew Vadum appeared Oct. 22, 2025, in The Epoch Times. It was updated Oct. 23, 2025.