CNN Legal analyst Elie Honig said Thursday there was a "big difference" between what President Donald Trump has been saying publicly to justify his deployment of National Guard troops in U.S. cities and what his lawyers are stating in legal documents submitted to the courts.
During an appearance on CNN to discuss a federal judge's order to temporarily block Trump from sending National Guard troops into Illinois, Honig noted, "The judge said the president's claim that it was necessary to deploy these troops in order to protect federal assets and federal resources was simply untrue, unverified and questionable. And the judge gave us one example. She said, 'the largest protest that we've had involved, 200 protesters, and there were 100 local cops.' So you have a 2 to 1 ratio there. No one got hurt, no one got injured.'"
He continued: "So this judge has put a pause on what the president has done now. And all of this that's happening in Oregon, California, here in Illinois, it's brand new. We have no history on this. We have no prior case law because no president has ever tried to use this emergency law in this way."
"So we're learning history as we go," he added.
Host Anderson Cooper commented that Trump "seems to be conflating a lot of things all into one."
"I mean, he talks about the city of Portland burning to the ground or, you know, it's unclear. Does he mean just the little area outside an ICE facility where some people get into scuffles and things like that?" Anderson asked.
Honig said Trump is justifying his deployment by saying that they are doing it to prevent crime, but his lawyers are stating that federal buildings need to be protected from anti-ICE protests.
"That's an important distinction," he said.