Gabe Murphy, a policy analyst from the nonpartisan budget watchdog Taxpayers for Common Sense, said the deployments’ multimillion-dollar price tag shouldn’t be overlooked.

“ No one wants to see their tax dollars wasted,” he said.

Murphy argued that using federalized Guard members to tackle crime, like in D.C. and Memphis, is not cost-effective since they are not allowed to conduct actual law enforcement duties, such as performing arrests or searches. He added that deploying the Guard is not a long-term solution to reducing crime.

“It would be far more cost effective to invest in local law enforcement,” he said.