WASHINGTON — For three weeks, former Chicagoan Nick Albano has watched thousands of National Guardsmen walk, and in some cases, beautify the streets of Washington, D.C.
He’s also amassed chilling tales of ICE enforcements — rideshare drivers plucked from their cars, leaving their passengers across town. Albano describes the tension in the nation’s capital from President Donald Trump’s crime and immigration mission as a growing “powder keg,” and he’s anxiously watching to see what may happen in his former hometown of Chicago.
“In Chicago, it feels like the powder keg is there. In D.C., I think the powder keg is growing. I’ve had friends who have been in Ubers or have been in situations where people around them have been stolen and arrested and taken to who knows where, and you can feel there’s tension building,” said Albano, 30. “But it does not quite feel as intense of a tension as how the activists and organizers in Chicago are planning to protect immigrant communities and their families and loved ones.”
It’s unclear what a National Guard deployment would look like in Chicago, and it may be a very different approach than what troops have experienced in both Los Angeles and D.C. But National Guardsmen are nearing the end of a 30-day order to guard D.C., and their stay is likely to be extended. Guardsmen have accompanied ICE enforcements, laid down mulch and picked up trash. They’ve milled around metro stations, residential parks and federal buildings, guns in tow. Soldiers from South Carolina on Wednesday circled the Washington Monument, with many tourists and passersby ignoring their existence.
They’re frequently asked what state they came from — and how long they’ll be there.
“It’s up to that guy,” one South Carolina guardsman said, pointing to the White House.
‘Unprecedented and scary’
Albano, a former Kane County resident who went to DePaul University, is nervous about a potential deployment in Chicago — but he’s encouraged by the city’s activism and Democratic solidarity when it comes to protesting the president, citing Trump’s canceled 2016 UIC rally as hard proof.
Albano blames D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, in part, for a lack of cohesion when it comes to uniting protesters in the nation’s capital. He said trust with the mayor soured after she removed the Black Lives Matter Plaza near the White House in May. That trust has dissipated even more as Bowser continues to coordinate with the Trump administration on federal deployment.
That’s a key difference he sees in Illinois, with Gov. JB Pritzker and Mayor Brandon Johnson helping to lead the resistance against a potential deployment.
“There are people in D.C. who are standing up and being martyrs in many ways…but there isn’t a single individual calling for more. They’re doing everything they can to just hope that it goes away,” Albano said. “And that’s not how Chicagoans act. It’s not the political scene there to just let totalitarian power run rampant on them.”
Chava Sonnier, another former Chicagoan living in Washington, spotted the Guard almost immediately, with military planes and helicopters circling her Navy Yard neighborhood. Guardsmen have been clustered in the neighborhood for weeks.
Sonnier, 42, said she has great respect for people who serve in the National Guard, especially since her husband is active military. But she said she finds their presence “unprecedented and scary.”
“As individuals, I see them as someone who could be my husband’s colleague, but in terms of why they’re here, is very scary, because it’s not the intended purpose of the National Guard,” Sonnier said. “The intended purpose of the National Guard is to provide local emergency state level assistance when needed. D.C. is not a state. We don’t get representation like we’re a state, and I’m not aware of us gaining statehood anytime in the past few weeks. D.C. is not a state, and yet we have National Guard deployed here on the federal level.”
Sonnier, too, is watching for a potential guard deployment in Chicago — and she’s encouraged by the mass response so far.
“I’m so proud of Chicago in terms of the large scale protests that have been organized, and, you know, continue to rise up Chicago,” Sonnier said. “We the nation need to hear your voice. And this is definitely a time for non-violent direct action.”
‘Not a permanent fix’
U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly (D-Ill.) is among the members of Congress returning to Washington this week after the summer recess. She said she was fearful for her son, “her roommate” in D.C., when the guard was first deployed.
“I said to him, ‘Be careful.’ Because I didn’t know what to expect,” Kelly said. “I just wanted him to be careful for his own safety.”
Now after seeing that guardsmen are in large part patrolling tourist areas, Kelly called the deployment “ridiculous” and a temporary fix.
“ [Trump is] spending a million dollars a day on the National Guard,” Kelly said. “That is not a permanent fix. I would imagine if the mayor even got half that amount of money to add more police, more mental health counselors, more social workers, more violence prevention programs, that that will go a longer way and be more foundational and be permanent.”
U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), who also returned to Washington this week, said a congressional colleague spotted National Guardsmen with M4 rifles, a military standard, as he dined in D.C’s Wharf area. He called the deployment “jarring” and “disturbing.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth last month signed an order allowing the guard in D.C. to carry weapons. But they have been told to use their weapons only for self-defense or as a last resort. Guard personnel in the deployment come from D.C., as well as Louisiana, Ohio, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee and West Virginia.
“Essentially what he was very concerned about is what if some violence were to erupt? Would they actually use those weapons of war? And if so, what would be the calamity that ensued at that point? Because D.C. cops, most law enforcement, have a ladder of escalation in terms of what types of force they would use in a certain moment,” Krishnamoorthi said “...But if these National Guard troops only have this, what would happen if they were to actually open fire using what they had at their disposal? This seems bonkers to have National Guards, people who are not trained in domestic law enforcement policing these areas and being made to handle situations they weren’t trained for.”
‘This is a show for the tourists’
A group of former service members is maintaining a 24-hour presence outside Union Station in Washington, where military tanks and guardsmen have been met with protesters of multiple issues, including some seeking the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files and others protesting the war in Gaza. As Vice President JD Vance and Hegseth walked through Union Station last month, some onlookers shouted expletives at Vance. Others screamed, “Get out of our streets.”
Leilana Brandt, a six-year Army National Guard veteran, is among service members who began organizing the group, Remember Your Oath, last month. The group put a call out for all veterans to help maintain a presence and to hand out cards to guardsmen to inform them of their right to refuse “unlawful orders” and remember their oath in the Constitution.
“It is clearly just political theater. They’ll come and they’ll park their vehicles out here for a couple of days, stand in front of them and that’s basically it. Then they’re on the [National] Mall. They’ll be stationed every block or so. They’re not really out in the city doing much at all. It’s really just having a military presence,” Brandt said. “The fact that they’re armed, it seems very strange and intimidating. I think a lot of the D.C. residents that we’ve spoken to, they don’t feel like they’re being protected in any way. This is a show for the tourists.”
Brandt, who served the guard in Colorado and was deployed several times for forest fires, said the D.C. deployment has “stuck in our craw as a group of veterans.” She said the group will have a presence in Chicago should Trump deploy guardsmen there.
“We’ll be there too. We’ve already had people from Chicago that said, ‘If they come there, we will help get that started,’” Brandt said. “...This is just a grassroots thing. It is just veterans, if they come to your area, stand up.”
The next deployment is on the minds of guardsmen in Washington, who have been cordial with those who approach them. They won’t give out their names, as is protocol, but they answer questions. When a Sun-Times reporter asked if they’d soon see them in Chicago, a group of five soldiers belted out a laugh in unison — an admission that they’re not really sure where the path will lead them next.
