A federal appeals court has delivered what California officials are calling the final word in a roughly 16-month legal battle over control of the state's National Guard, ruling against the Trump administration's attempt to keep the troops under federal command. The decision caps a fight that began when President Trump moved to federalize California National Guard members in 2025 without the state's consent.
According to a statement from Gov. Newsom's office, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of Newsom and the State of California in the lawsuit filed by Attorney General Rob Bonta on behalf of the governor and the state against President Trump. California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who is based in Oakland, took to social media Friday to celebrate the outcome, writing that the Ninth Circuit had made clear that President Trump's 2025 deployment of California's National Guard was unlawful and unconstitutional.
In the same post, shared via his account on X
, Bonta said the court also blocked what he described as the Trump administration's transparent attempt to keep a pathway open to federalize the Guard over California's objections. The attorney general added that his office will fight to hold President Trump accountable whenever he tramples on the Constitution and Californians' rights, and will win.
A Legal Fight That Stretched Back to Last Year
The dispute traces back to a September 2025 order that barred the Trump administration from deploying, directing, training, or using the National Guard and other military troops in California to execute civilian law enforcement functions. As reported by the Governor's office, that order enjoined the federal government from using the troops then stationed in California for arrests, searches, seizures, security patrols, traffic control, crowd control, riot control, evidence collection, interrogation, or acting as informants.
The underlying legal question centered on the President's authority under 10 U.S.C. § 12406, the federal statute that allows a president to call National Guard members and units of any state into federal service in numbers deemed necessary to repel invasion, suppress rebellion, or execute federal laws, per the version of the statute published by the U.S. House of Representatives. Earlier Ninth Circuit proceedings examined whether that federalization decision was subject to judicial review at all, a question that shaped much of the litigation that followed.
By late December 2025, the legal pressure on the administration intensified. The Trump administration was ordered to return hundreds of California National Guard troops to Gov. Newsom's control, according to the New York Times, after a federal appellate court sided with the state.
Administration Backed Away From the Fight
California officials have described the case's final stretch as a steady retreat by the federal government. The state's Department of Justice said the Trump administration withdrew its motion to stay and allowed a lower-court order ending the extended federalization of the California National Guard to take full effect, following a Supreme Court decision, according to a press release from the California Attorney General's Office.
That same office had earlier noted that the Ninth Circuit's rejection of an emergency request to pause the restrictive order meant that, come the following Monday, there would be no National Guard troops deployed in California. Taken together, officials say the sequence shows the administration moving from an injunction, to a failed emergency appeal, to an outright withdrawal of its legal effort.
What Comes Next
With the National Guard case now resolved in the state's favor, Bonta has signaled the fight over federal overreach in California is far from finished. He said his office will continue working to hold the president accountable whenever constitutional or state rights are threatened, framing the Guard ruling as part of a broader pattern of pushback against federal actions in California.
