President Donald Trump and West Virginia Gov. Patrick Morrisey
CHARLESTON – A lawsuit has been filed meant to stop the deployment of West Virginia National Guard members to Washington, D.C.
West Virginia Citizens Action Group filed the complaint August 21 in Kanawha Circuit Court against Gov. Patrick Morrisey, Major General James Seward, the Office of the Adjutant General and West Virginia Military Authority.
Last weekend, Morrisey said he would send 300-400 Guard members to the nation’s capital as part of President Donald J. Trump’s administration takeover of the city’s law enforcement. Trump issued an executive order doing say, saying crime is out of control in the city despite reports showing it is actually at a 30-year low.
Morrisey is one of six Republican governors sending Guard members to aid the takeover.
In the complaint, WV CAG says the deployment exceeds Morrisey’s constitutional and statutory authority.
According to ACLU-WV Legal Director Aubrey Sparks, West Virginia law governing National Guard deployments was shaped by legal battles following the 1921 Battle of Blair Mountain, where National Guard troops were deployed against U.S. citizens.
“The Guard’s services are indispensable to West Virginia, and sending these vital resources out of state to participate in a political stunt by the President is unprecedented, unconscionable and unlawful,” Sparks said. “Neither state law nor our Constitution permits this deployment.”
The governor’s office stands by Morrisey’s decision.
“The West Virginia National Guard was mobilized at the request of the president under the authority in United States Code, Title 32 502(f),” Morrisey spokesman Drew Galang said. “West Virginia is proud to support our neighbors and the Commander-in-Chief when called upon.”
The lawsuit says the deployment violates established legal boundaries.
“This action challenges an unprecedented and unlawful deployment of West Virginia National Guard forces beyond our state's borders — not to defend against invasion, not to respond to natural disaster, not to assist a sister state's emergency request — but to serve as political props in a manufactured crisis that Washington, D.C., officials neither requested nor support,” the complaint states. “Governor Patrick Morrisey has exceeded his constitutional and statutory authority by ordering West Virginia service members to abandon their families, jobs and communities to police the streets of our nation's capital, where violent crime has reached its lowest level in thirty years.
“West Virginia law is clear: The governor may deploy the National Guard outside our borders only for specific, enumerated purposes — none of which exist here.”
The executive director of WV CAG agrees.
“West Virginia Citizen Action Group has deep concerns about the governor’s deployment of the West Virginia National Guard to Washington, D.C.,” Dani Parent said. “As an organization with over 50 years of advocating and organizing West Virginians for accountability, justice, and good governance, we believe that the use of West Virginia’s National Guard troops in this context is a clear misuse of power.
“The Guard exists to serve West Virginians in times of crisis, and this action appears to be motivated by partisanship and to appease the current federal administration. Sending our Guard out of state for political posturing serves only to divert critical resources needed here at home. The governor’s priority should be in serving West Virginians, not political grandstanding.”
WV CAG seeks to return the Guard members back to West Virginia through a declaratory judgment and injunctive relief.
The case has been assigned to Circuit Judge Richard Lindsay.
Kanawha Circuit Court case number 25-C-1007
