US President Donald Trump said he was abandoning – for now – his push to deploy National Guard troops to Chicago, Los Angeles and Portland, Oregon, a move that came after legal roadblocks halted the effort.

Trump said in a social media post on Wednesday that he was removing the guard for now. “We’ll be back, maybe in a much different and stronger form, when crime starts to rise again – It’s only a matter of time!” he wrote.

The troops have already left Los Angeles after the president deployed them earlier this year as part of a broader crackdown on crime and immigration. They were sent to Chicago and Portland, but were never on the street while the legal challenges unfolded.

The president has made cracking down on urban crime a centerpiece of his second term — and has toyed with the idea of ​​invoking the Sedition Act to prevent his opponents from using the courts to block his plans.

He said he sees his tough-on-crime approach as a winning political issue ahead of next year’s midterm elections.

In November, US Northern Command said it was “shifting and/or resizing” operations in Portland, Chicago and Los Angeles, but there would be a “constant, permanent and long-term presence in each city”.

Trump’s push to deploy troops in Democratic-led cities has faced legal challenges at nearly every turn.

In December, the Supreme Court refused to allow the Trump administration to deploy National Guard troops to the Chicago area as part of its crackdown on immigration. The order was not a final ruling, but it was a significant and rare high court blow to the president’s efforts.

In the state capital, District of Columbia Attorney Brian Schwalb sued to stop the deployment of more than 2,000 Guardsmen.

Hundreds of troops from California and Oregon were deployed to Portland, but a federal judge banned them from the street. A judge permanently blocked the deployment of National Guard forces in November after a three-day trial.

California National Guard soldiers were removed from the streets of Los Angeles until December 15 after court verdict. But an appeals court paused a separate part of the order that called for control of the Guard to be returned to Gov. Gavin Newsom.

In a court filing Tuesday, the Trump administration said it was no longer seeking a stay on that part of the order. That clears the way for California National Guard troops to return fully to state control after Trump federalized the Guard in June.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta called the development a “major litigation victory” in a press release Wednesday.

“For six months, California National Guard soldiers have been used as political pawns by a president desperate to become king,” Bonta said. “There is a reason our founders decided that military and civilian affairs must be kept separate; a reason our military is, by design, apolitical.”

Trump also ordered the deployment of the Tennessee National Guard to Memphis in September to fight crime, a move supported by Republican Gov. Bill Lee and senators. A Tennessee judge blocked the Guard’s use, siding with Democratic state and local officials who sued.