The following is written testimony that Libertarian Institute Executive Director Scott Horton submitted to the Oregon Senate on February 27, 2025 in support of S.B. 667, the Defend the Guard Act. You can watch the bill’s hearing here.
Big changes are going on in the country today. As everyone knows, MAGA—make America great again—includes America First. And America First is not just a Donald Trump movement, but it’s really a reorientation of the entire American right towards patriotism and away from globalism and interventionism.
America First does not mean selfishness and belligerence; it means defend America first, take care of the American people first, and stop trying to be the policeman of the world and an empire that controls the Middle East, Europe, and East Asia but can barely control all of the chaos in our own country.
President Trump is obviously making major changes in his first weeks back, suspending all foreign aid and threatening to shake up America’s posture around the world. We know from last time he was in office that the permanent government will be against him. He’s just the White House. He’s got an entire executive branch to rule, including all of the national security establishment and the military.
President Trump is going to need our support out here in the country. It has to be an inescapable fact for all members of the news media that there is a real movement among Republicans in this country to end the wars and to come home. Let’s have four years in a row of no wars at all! Let’s start with that. That’s what Donald Trump campaigned on, and it’s clearly how he won the election. It’s a big part of why a lot of Democrats crossed the aisle to support him.
That’s what the American people want. And it’s a movement that already exists, represented by the great Dan McKnight and other veterans. They’re the ones spearheading S.B. 667, and they’re all veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the recent wars of our generation that we all regret now and wouldn’t have happened if we’d listened to those same people in the first place.
That’s what’s going on here. President Trump needs our support; this Defend the Guard movement is a giant parade he can jump in front of. Even Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth supports this legislation! And if the Oregon Adjutant General opposes this legislation, he might want to call his boss’ office and check in and make sure whether he’s out of line or not.
You may hear from opponents today about the Supremacy Clause. Well, that clause does not say that whatever the national government says goes, and the states always have to give in. It says that the U.S. Constitution is the highest law of the land. That’s what James Madison, the author of that document, intended. And that’s what S.B. 667 fulfills.
You may take S.B. 667 to be an extreme measure. Maybe you’re unsure whether you want to go this far; but that is the point. What are these veterans asking you to do? They’re asking you to demand that the president obey the U.S. Constitution. Of course he can have his National Guard forces as a reserve if he needs them. And if he does, he can go to Congress and get a declaration of war. That’s the law. It’s the same those veterans took, it’s the same you one took, and it’s the same one the president took. Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 says only Congress can declare war. And S.B. 667 is the constitutional mechanism to make that happen.
I encourage every member of this committee to vote in favor of S.B. 667, the Defend the Guard Act.
