A showdown between President Donald Trump and the governor of California over Trump’s use of the military to assist federal immigration raids in Los Angeles was headed for a courtroom Thursday, almost a week after the sweeps ignited a series of sometimes violent protests.
U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer will hear Gov. Gavin Newsom’s motion for a temporary restraining order that would limit the activities of 4,000 National Guard members and 700 Marines to protecting federal buildings in a small area of downtown where most of the protests have taken place.
The military’s mission in recent days has been expanded to include protection of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers conducting the raids prompted by Trump’s directive to find immigrants living in the U.S. without legal status. The sweeps have fueled six days of protests resulting in hundreds of arrests in Los Angeles − and the demonstrations and rallies have spread across the nation.
Newsom has decried the military intervention as an illegal waste of resources and is asking the court to block the troops’ participation in law enforcement activities. He ultimately wants the National Guard returned to state control and Trump’s actions declared illegal.
“If I didn’t act quickly on that, Los Angeles would be burning to the ground right now,” Trump said at an event at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on Wednesday.
State and local leaders have disputed Trump’s claims, saying the decision has only provoked the unrest, likening the president’s actions to “authoritarian regimes.”
Some former military leaders siding with Newsom
Former secretaries of the Army and Navy, three retired admirals and two retired generals banded together to file an amicus brief in the Trump-Newsom litigation citing what they describe as “critical national security risks” inherent in Trump’s deployment of military forces in Los Angeles.
Amicus briefs are filed by people or organizations not directly involved in litigation but who take a position in the case. The group includes former Army Secretary Louis Caldera, a Democrat, and former Navy Secretary Sean O’Keefe, a Republican.
The brief says deploying the military for domestic law enforcement diverts them from their primary mission of national security and disaster response, that National Guard personnel and active duty Marines are not properly trained for such law enforcement operations, and that such a use of the military should be a “last resort to avoid the politicization of the military, which inevitably erodes public trust, impacts recruitment, and undermines troop morale.”
Protesters throw fireworks, rocks at officers, police say
A one-square-mile of downtown Los Angeles remained under a curfew Thursday after days of demonstrations led to hundreds of arrests. The unrest continued Wednesday night, when police said demonstrators at one location threw “commercial-grade fireworks and rocks” at officers, resulting in a number of arrests.
The protests broke out on June 6 in response to ongoing ICE raids that have sparked fear among immigrant communities. While many protests have been relatively peaceful, some have turned into scenes of chaos as police fired “with “less lethal” munitions such as tear gas and flash-bangs to disperse crowds.
Marines could be on the streets Thursday
The 700 active-duty Marines had completed their training for the Los Angeles mission, which included de-escalation and crowd control, U.S. Northern Command announced. The Marines were expected to be deployed Thursday or Friday to protect federal officers and property, the command said in a statement.
The Marines won’t conduct “civilian law enforcement functions” but may temporarily detain people to stop an assault, to prevent harm to others, or to prevent interference with federal agents performing their duties, the statement said.
“Any temporary detention will end immediately when the individual(s) can be safely transferred to the custody of appropriate civilian law enforcement personnel.”
Some governors ‘draw the line’ on aiding ICE
Three Democratic governors are expected to tell Congress in a June 12 Thursday that they coordinate with federal immigration authorities to deport convicted criminals but can’t afford to shoulder the burden of tracking down and detaining undocumented immigrants. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said in testimony prepared for the House Oversight and Accountability Committee the state transferred more than 1,300 convicts to Immigration and Customs Enforcement since she took office in August 2021.
“But we have to draw a line somewhere,” Hochul said. “New York cannot deputize our state officers to enforce civil immigration violations, such as overstaying a visa.”
− Bart Jansen
Walz, Hochul, Pritzker to criticize immigration enforcement in House hearing
Hundreds of protests planned for June 14
Protests are planned for 1,800 communities across the country on June 14, the same day Trump holds a military parade in Washington, D.C. For decades, the GOP has claimed most of the symbols of patriotism, including the American flag, but the people protesting Trump, a Republican, say they are the true patriots now.
The rallies, named “No Kings Day” to oppose what they see as Trump’s power grab, are expected to be the largest and most numerous protests since Trump’s second term began, dwarfing the Hands Off protests in early April that drew as many as 1 million Americans to the streets at more than 1,000 rallies.
No Kings Day was organized by grassroots groups in cities and towns of all sizes to coincide with the U.S. Army’s 250th anniversary celebration, which is also Trump’s 79th birthday and Flag Day. Administration officials insist it is a coincidence that the parade falls on Trump’s birthday. Read more here.
Contributing: Reuters
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: LA protests live: Newsom v. Trump heads to court over use of military
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