LA Set for Fourth Day of Unrest as Newsom Resists National Guard
By and John Gittelsohn
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Los Angeles is heading into a fourth day of unrest with California Governor Gavin Newsom vowing to sue to block the Trump administration's deployment of National Guard troops in the city, escalating a standoff over immigration raids that sparked protests over the weekend.
Overnight, looting broke out in several areas of LA, including downtown, after demonstrators shut down a major freeway. Authorities made dozens of arrests including for assault with a deadly weapon and arson, according to local news station KTLA. Crowds clashed with law enforcement and at least five self-driving Waymo cars were set on fire.
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Yahoo
17 minutes ago
- Yahoo
L.A. immigration protests latest: California sues Trump admin. over National Guard deployment, president says he would support arresting Newsom
California is suing the Trump administration over its National Guard deployment in Los Angeles without the consent of the state's governor amid immigration protests that escalated over the weekend, leading to dozens of arrests. The Los Angeles Police Department has since declared all of downtown L.A. an unlawful assembly area. The lawsuit was filed Monday by California Attorney General Rob Bonta and accuses President Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth of "unlawfully" federalizing the state's National Guard, and infringing on California Gov. Gavin Newsom's authority as commander-in-chief of the state's military reserve force. "Every governor, red or blue, should reject this outrageous overreach," Bonta said. "It is an unmistakable step toward authoritarianism. We will not let this stand.' Bonta also alleged in a televised statement Monday that protests escalated after National Guard troops arrived on Sunday. 'We'll never know what might have been had the president left our state and local authorities to continue the important work they were already doing and were more than capable of doing,' Bonta said. Before the lawsuit was announced, Trump on Monday said he would support his border czar arresting Newsom over possible obstructions to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) actions in the state amid protests. At least 44 people were arrested by federal ICE agents during a raid at several locations around Los Angeles on Friday, including Ambiance Apparel in the garment district and a Home Depot in the Westlake District. These areas are known to have significant migrant populations and labor-focused industries. Protests then erupted in Los Angeles in response to Trump's immigration crackdown that has seen federal agents arrest a student on his way to volleyball practice and erroneously deport a man to El Salvador. Sunday marked the third straight day of protests over the wave of immigration raids. Crowds gathered in downtown Los Angeles and Boyle Heights. Protesters marched from Boyle Heights to the Metropolitan Detention Center, a federal building in downtown L.A. This led to the LAPD declaring the area an unlawful assembly. Protesters moved from outside the federal building and walked onto the 101 Freeway around 3:30 p.m. local time. Police fired tear gas and other projectiles into the crowd and cleared the area by 5 p.m. Meanwhile, another protest started on Sunday outside of Los Angeles City Hall Protesters outside the city's prison in the Alameda neighborhood of L.A. were arrested, according to the LAPD. Around 300 National Guard troops arrived in Los Angeles County on Sunday after Trump deployed them to protect federal property and personnel, without the consent of Newsom, a Democrat with whom he often spars. As governor, Newsom would normally retain control and command over the California National Guard. The White House said the deployment was necessary to 'address the lawlessness' in the state, and initially stated that 2,000 troops were being deployed. About 500 Marines are also prepared to deploy to the area, the Northern Command said. It's the first time in nearly 60 years that a president has called in the National Guard without a state's request or consent. The last time was when President Lyndon Johnson sent the Guard to protect a 1965 civil rights march in Alabama. Newsom said California is suing the Trump administration over the federal mobilization of the National Guard. Newsom told MSNBC that Trump's federal mobilization of the National Guard was 'an illegal act, an immoral act, an unconstitutional act.' The governor also alleged that Trump is the one to blame for the escalation in California, saying, 'He's exacerbated the conditions. He's lit the proverbial match. He's putting fuel on this fire.' Tom Homan, Trump's border czar, told NBC News that anyone who obstructs immigration enforcement would be arrested. When asked if that would include Newsom or Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, he replied, 'I'll say it about anybody. … You cross that line, it's a felony to knowingly harbor and conceal an illegal alien. It's a felony to impede law enforcement doing their job.' Newsom responded to Homan's NBC interview on Sunday by saying: 'He knows where to find me.' Homan later clarified those remarks in an interview with Fox News. 'The reporter asked me, well, could Governor Newsom or Mayor Bass be arrested? I said, 'Well no one's above the law — if they cross the line and commit a crime, absolutely they can.'' He added: 'There was no discussion about arresting Newsom.' Meanwhile, Trump said he would support the arrest of Newsom. "I would do it if I were Tom. I think it's great. Gavin likes the publicity but I think it would be a great thing," Trump said Monday. In response, Newsom said: "This is a day I hoped I would never see in America." "I don't care if you're a Democrat or a Republican this is a line we cannot cross as a nation — this is an unmistakable step toward authoritarianism," he wrote on X. The peaceful protests escalated into vandalism, autonomous cars set ablaze, fireworks and other objects thrown at law enforcement, police firing rubber bullets (including at an Australian journalist), and dozens of arrests by the LAPD. 'In recent days, many protests across the city have been peaceful and we thank the community for expressing their views and their frustration in a responsible manner,' LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell said in a Sunday news conference. 'However, when peaceful demonstrations devolve into acts of vandalism or violence, especially violence directed at innocent people, law enforcement officers and others, we must respond firmly.' McDonnell said that a total of 39 people had been arrested — 29 on Saturday and 10 on Sunday. He also said the LAPD was not given advance notice that federal operations would occur in the area. On Sunday, several Waymo driverless vehicles were vandalized and set on fire in downtown Los Angeles. A Waymo spokesperson told USA Today Monday morning that its autonomous vehicles have been removed from the area and the company has temporarily suspended its ride-hailing service 'out of an abundance of caution.' Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass told CNN on Monday that the situation has since calmed in the city. 'If you dial back time and go to Friday, if immigration raids had not happened here, we would not have had the disorder that went on last night,' Bass said. 'We do not know where and when the next raids will be. That is the concern because people in this city have a rapid response network.' 'If they see ICE, they go out and they protest, and so it's just a recipe for pandemonium that is completely unnecessary,' she added.
Yahoo
19 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Kristi Noem defends the deployment of National Guard troops to Los Angeles protests
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in an interview over the weekend that National Guard troops deployed amid protests in the Los Angeles area are for "the safety of the communities that are being impacted by these riots." "They're there at the direction of the president in order to keep peace and allow people to be able to protest, but also to keep law and order," Noem told Margaret Brennan, moderator of "Face the Nation" on CBS News. President Donald Trump ordered about 2,000 National Guard troops to be deployed as police in riot gear clashed with protesters opposed to the actions his administration has taken against undocumented immigrants. However, California Gov. Gavin Newsom formally requested that Trump withdraw the troops, writing that their deployment "seems intentionally designed to inflame the situation." "We didn't have a problem until Trump got involved," Newsom said in a June 8 X post. "This is a serious breach of state sovereignty – inflaming tensions while pulling resources from where they're actually needed." In response to a question about Newsom's criticism of Trump, Noem said that "if (Newsom) was doing his job, then people wouldn't have gotten hurt the last couple of days." "The president knows that (Newsom) makes bad decisions, and that's why the president chose the safety of this community over waiting for Governor Newsom to get some sanity," she said. "That's one of the reasons why these National Guard soldiers are being federalized, so they can use their special skill set to keep peace." Noem, though, previously threatened then-President Joe Biden when Democrats said he should federalize the National Guard in Texas in response to the state's anti-immigration efforts, USA TODAY reported. "If Joe Biden federalizes the National Guard, that would be a direct attack on states' rights," Noem said in an X post on Feb. 6, 2024, when she was still governor of South Dakota. In the CBS News interview, Noem also criticized Minnesota's response to the George Floyd protests in 2020. "We're not going to let a repeat of 2020 happen," she said. Noem, 53, began her political career in 2006 when she was elected to the South Dakota House of Representatives. She served two terms. In 2010, she successfully ran for South Dakota's lone seat in the U.S House of Representatives. Noem served four terms in the House before taking on another role: South Dakota's governor. She was elected as the state's first female governor in 2019. Noem was confirmed as Homeland Security secretary on Jan. 25. This article originally appeared on Sioux Falls Argus Leader: What did Kristi Noem say about the Los Angeles protests?
Bloomberg
20 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
Newsom Tells Trump's Border Czar to 'Arrest Me, Let's Go'
Civil rights lawyer Robert McWhirter weighs in on the legal basis for President Donald Trump sending in National Guard troops to handle the anti-deportation violent protests in Los Angeles. California Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, dared Trump's border czar to "arrest me, lets go." McWhirter says he'd take Newsom's case. (Source: Bloomberg)
