Chicago, Illinois - The state of Illinois filed suit on Monday to block President Donald Trump's deployment of hundreds of National Guard troops to Chicago.

The lawsuit comes one day after a federal judge in Oregon temporarily blocked the Republican from sending soldiers to the state's biggest city Portland as part of his crackdown on crime and undocumented migrants.

Trump over the weekend authorized the deployment of 700 National Guard soldiers to Chicago despite the opposition of elected Democratic leaders including the mayor and Governor JB Pritzker.

In a lawsuit filed in federal court in Illinois, the state Attorney General Kwame Raoul and counsel for Chicago Mary B. Richardson-Lowry accused Trump of using US troops "to punish his political enemies."

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"The American people, regardless of where they reside, should not live under the threat of occupation by the United States military, particularly not simply because their city or state leadership has fallen out of a president's favor," they said.

"Far from promoting public safety in the Chicago region," Trump's "provocative and arbitrary actions have threatened to undermine public safety by inciting a public outcry."

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem defended the plan to send troops to Chicago, claiming on Fox & Friends Weekend that the third-largest city in the US is "a war zone."

Pritzker, responding on CNN, accused Republicans of seeking to "create the war zone, so that they can send in even more troops."

A CBS poll released Sunday found that 58% of Americans oppose deploying the National Guard to US cities.

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But Trump – who spoke last week of using the military for a "war from within" – shows no sign of backing down.

On Sunday he claimed, falsely, that "Portland is burning to the ground. It's insurrectionists all over the place."

ICE raids around the country – primarily in cities run by Democrats – have seen groups of masked, armed men in unmarked cars target residential neighborhoods and businesses, sparking mass protests.

Days of tense scenes in Chicago turned violent Saturday when a federal officer shot a woman that the Department of Homeland Security said had been armed and rammed one of their vehicles.