With every cellphone name dwelling, the troops describe a mission in contrast to every other.
One soldier from Tennessee informed his father that from 4 p.m. to 4 a.m. on daily basis, his solely process is to stroll round Chinatown. Another service member from Mississippi informed a beloved one which she’d been repeatedly cursed at whereas on patrol. During a name to his spouse, a guardsman from Louisiana mentioned there was confusion about what the army was truly doing there.
“We haven’t gotten critically low on morale, but we’re falling fast,” mentioned one soldier who, like others quoted in this story, spoke to NCS on the situation of anonymity as a result of they’re not approved to communicate to the media and feared reprisal.
Of the greater than 2,200 National Guard troopers President Donald Trump deployed to Washington, DC, final month, in addition to a wave of federal regulation enforcement, roughly 1,300 are from out of state. Guardsmen on the DC mission and their family who spoke to NCS mentioned they left behind civilian jobs and youngsters to serve – a sacrifice they understood after they enlisted.
And whereas home missions usually have National Guard troops responding to crises like hurricanes or wildfires, in DC, a lot of their work has concerned extra mundane duties – patrolling widespread vacationer locations and aiding with “beautification projects” together with choosing up trash, raking leaves and laying mulch.
Most of that beautification work has been assigned to troopers from the DC National Guard to keep away from angering GOP governors who’ve despatched their troops.
For some, the mundane orders aren’t a difficulty. One father of a Guardsman joked that this is sort of a trip for his son. But the mom of one other soldier from Mississippi mentioned her daughter is lacking out on “a lot of first events with her child” to serve in Washington.
It’s additionally unclear how lengthy the deployment will final. A senior official acquainted with the planning informed NCS army orders for Guardsmen on the mission are expected to be extended by way of the end of December, although the official pressured that was largely to make sure the continuity of their advantages like well being care protection, and never essentially to point out the mission will proceed by way of 12 months’s end.
Trump has additionally threatened to mobilize the National Guard to different cities, together with Chicago, Baltimore and New Orleans, as a part of his administration’s crackdown on crime. He’s mentioned he may hold National Guard members in Washington “as long as I want” by declaring a nationwide emergency.
For a mission that already carries a price ticket of about $1 million a day, prices are persevering with to mount. Expenses embody an estimated $7 million in catered meals for the primary 10 weeks and $5 million for 18 weeks of laundry companies, in accordance to a NCS assessment of contracts.
An extra $5 million for a tent metropolis has additionally been authorized, the contracts present, alongside with $600,000 in air con rental and greater than $500,000 for land cellular radios.
The troops are assigned to keep in motels, most of that are positioned in suburban Virginia. Housing is among the many largest expenditures. Hotel rooms are offered for out of city troops, whereas housing allowances are given to DC National Guard members.
Though a few of the National Guard and their households contacted by NCS expressed help for Trump and his resolution to ship troops to DC, they acknowledged the private sacrifices for troopers on the mission. In many instances, the usual army pay is lower than what a soldier or airmen could also be incomes in their civilian careers. Some have had to make particular preparations for childcare whereas they’re away.
“I don’t know what he thought he’d be doing, but I really don’t think he thought he’d just be walking around for 12 hours every day,” mentioned the daddy of a Guardsman from Tennessee.
“When I talked to him, he was just like, ‘Yeah, this is crazy,’” the daddy added. He mentioned his son, a automotive salesman, is making much less cash now whereas deployed.
Typically, Guardsmen solely obtain full army advantages like a housing allowance or well being care protection after they’re on energetic orders for greater than 30 days.
An announcement on Monday from Joint Task Force-DC, which is overseeing the DC mission, acknowledged there had been “concerns about the pay and benefits” for service members on the mission, however mentioned “the majority of service members are mobilized on orders extending beyond 30 days, ensuring they qualify for full benefits.”
“I mean, we’ve got to get these cities cleaned up,” mentioned the mom of 1 Guardsman from Tennessee. “We’re very much pro boots on the ground. If that’s what it takes, we back the troops.”
In conditions when the National Guard has been deployed for an emergency, reminiscent of in the wake of a serious hurricane, their presence is often welcome and applauded. But in Washington, some troopers have obtained a cold reception from locals, members of the family mentioned. City residents who disagree with Trump’s federal interference have hung posters on avenue corners calling for the troopers to go away.
“Go home,” a crowd of individuals chanted two weeks in the past to some troops standing outdoors the Columbia Heights metro.
“The president is driving a wedge between the people and the military,” Retired Army Maj. Gen. Randy Manner, the previous performing vice chief of the National Guard Bureau from 2011-2012, mentioned in an interview with NCS.
“Our military’s duty is to defend our nation overseas and to be there to save lives in times of a natural disaster,” Manner added. “So this idea that the National Guard are there to watch us and to intimidate us, if it is continued over the next months and years, will absolutely drive this feeling that those men and women in uniform are not us, and they are against us.”
The contingent of greater than 2,000 National Guard troopers has been divided into serving the “safe and secure mission” and a “beautification task force.” The troops engaged on the safe mission are assigned to help federal and native regulation enforcement efforts, whereas the beautification challenge is essentially designed to clear up nationwide park properties in the town.
The senior official acquainted with the DC mission mentioned that whereas morale amongst these deployed is usually good in the meanwhile, that might change if their orders are prolonged and individuals are saved from their households and civilian careers. The particular person added that senior leaders in the DC Guard have made a degree in taking part in the “beautification projects” – largely trash pickup – to make sure the duties don’t fall to simply junior troopers or airmen.
An out-of-state Guardsman standing outdoors a metro station throughout Labor Day weekend informed NCS that the response to his presence there may be “50-50.” Some folks have stopped to take images with him and have thanked him for serving. Others leveled disapproving seems to be, he mentioned.
He added that he could be in Washington “until they tell us we can go home.”
Trump officers have mentioned the troops are there to set up a presence at varied places – principally federal monuments and metro stations – and act as a criminal offense deterrent. The intention is to unencumber regulation enforcement brokers to deal with crime elsewhere in the town. The senior official acquainted with the mission mentioned the Guard has heard from native regulation enforcement that their presence has in truth been a deterrent to crime they may often see in the world.
As of Tuesday night, Joint Task Force-DC mentioned there had been a 37% drop in carjackings in DC, a 50% lower in robberies, and a 23% drop in violent crime because the mission started. Though Trump justified the troop surge to Washington by saying that crime was “out of control” in the town, violent crime declined in 2024 and has declined once more to date in 2025. The Justice Department has mentioned it’s investigating whether or not that knowledge from the DC Metropolitan Police Department was manipulated.
Social media pages for the state National Guard items a part of the DC mission have posted images of smiling troopers across the metropolis. Family members and mates commented wishing for the troops to keep secure.
Some troopers have additionally been doing issues like replanting grass. Manner mentioned that some are actually referring to the troops as “National Gardeners,” which he believes can also be “very deflating” for them.
“To date, Guardsmen have cleaned more than 3.2 miles of roadways, collected more than 500 bags of trash, and disposed of three truckloads of plant waste in coordination with the U.S. National Park Service,” the Joint Task Force-DC mentioned in an replace on Monday.
Trump’s executive order in March, titled “Making the District of Columbia Safe and Beautiful,” ordered federal companies to restore federal monuments which have been defaced or broken, take away graffiti from native areas, and “uplift and beautify public spaces and generate in the citizenry pride and respect for our Nation.”
A South Carolina National Guard officer who is aware of troopers deployed to Washington mentioned that each one servicemembers should obey lawful orders, however “the problem is, this is not a clear set mission.”
“If you wanted to be smart about it, then you might send a water purification unit to DC to help them with purifying water, or you could’ve sent an agriculture unit to help with farming,” the officer mentioned. “But an infantry unit to rake? That doesn’t make any sense.”
On Labor Day, some National Guard stood beside armored army autos at Washington’s Union Station as a small variety of protesters holding the other way up American flags and indicators gathered in entrance of them. Other troopers walked across the metropolis’s baseball stadium whereas the Nationals performed that afternoon.
The spouse of 1 Guardsman deployed to Washington mentioned extra readability on the mission’s timeline would assist. She and her husband have three kids with one other on the best way. Just like previous deployments, she’d prevented asking when he’ll be dwelling.
“It’s a little unusual in terms of what National Guard are usually deployed for, but I mean, I guess I would say I’m open to it,” the spouse mentioned. “I feel like maybe they would get a little boost in morale if they could just get a little bit more details.”
NCS’s Julia Benbrook, Veronica Stracqualursi and Max Rego contributed to this report.