Standoff with troops in Los Angeles reignites old feud as Newsom resists Trump's immigration raids
WASHINGTON (AP) — It was earlier this year that California Gov. Gavin Newsom was making nice with President Donald Trump as he sought help for his wildfire-battered state and moderating his approach ahead of a potential bid for the White House.
But now the gloves are off after Trump took the extraordinary step of federalizing the National Guard in Los Angeles over Newsom's objections and the governor responded by suing the administration, alleging abuse of power that marked an 'unmistakable step toward authoritarianism.'
The escalating clash pits the leader of the Republican Party against a Democrat with ambitions of leading his own party, with a striking backdrop of a domestic troop deployment meant to control a city in unrest and now to assist in arresting migrants — the centerpiece of the president's agenda.
For Trump, it's another chance to battle with Newsom, a frequent foil who leads a heavily Democratic state the president has long criticized. And for Newsom, the feud has handed him a national platform as a beleaguered Democratic Party seeks a leader able to resist Trump.
'He has shown he's not going to be intimidated, and we're all for that,' Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said of Newsom on Wednesday.
Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro, a former California resident, said Newsom's motivations for taking on Trump are clear.
'This is all about Gavin Newsom running for president in 2028, and what he is hoping is that becoming the face of a resistance to Trump is going to jog him to victory in Democratic primaries,' he said in his podcast 'The Ben Shapiro Show.'
Trump wages a war against California
Trump has long been a foe of California, which overwhelmingly rejected him in all three of his presidential campaigns.
Over the years, Trump has threatened to intercede in the state's long-running homeless crisis, vowed to withhold federal wildfire aid as political leverage in a dispute over water rights, called on police to shoot people robbing stores and warned residents 'your children are in danger' because of illegal immigration.
As a candidate in 2023, Trump said California was once a symbol of American prosperity but is 'becoming a symbol of our nation's decline.'
'This is not a great state anymore. This is a dumping ground,' Trump said at the time. 'The world is being dumped into California. Prisoners. Terrorists. Mental patients.'
Newsom would learn to balance the dueling imperatives of a governor who needs to work with the federal government with being one of the Democratic Party's most prominent figures.
As governor-elect, Newsom joined Trump in November 2018 as the then-president viewed wildfire damage in Paradise, California, and they pledged to put aside political differences to help the community recover. He was also overly complimentary of the Trump administration's assistance to California during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, praising Trump's 'focus on treatments' for the virus and thanking him for sending masks and gloves to his state.
But Newsom was also a top surrogate for Democrats in the 2024 campaign and frequently warned of the consequences of Trump's return to the White House.
Trump and Newsom make nice over wildfire catastrophe
There was a handshake and a warm pat on the back.
Newsom was there on the tarmac in Los Angeles in January, welcoming Trump and first lady Melania Trump, who had traveled west to survey the damage from the deadly wildfires in Southern California.
Then they spoke to reporters together, pledging cooperation to rebuild the area and appreciating each other's presence.
'You were there for us during COVID. I don't forget that,' Newsom said. 'And I have all the expectations that we'll be able to work together to get this speedy recovery.'
Trump added: 'We will. We're going to get it done.'
Newsom also traveled to Washington in February to press Trump and lawmakers for more federal wildfire relief. The governor called his meeting with Trump 'productive' and one that was marked with a 'spirit of collaboration and cooperation.'
The cordial attitude was part of Newsom's unmistakable appeal to the center, painting himself as a pragmatist to reach out to those who had fled from a party that had just lost all battleground states in the 2024 presidential election.
Newsom spoke to conservative allies of Trump on a new podcast the governor billed as a way for Democrats to learn from the political successes of Trump's 'Make America Great Again' movement. He voiced opposition to transgender athletes participating in female sports while shifting focus away from efforts in Sacramento to 'Trump-proof' California — which Newsom embarked on after Trump's victory in November — as the wildfires raged.
In an April interview with YouTube commentator Brian Tyler Cohen, Newsom acknowledged Trump's ability to appeal to the public.
'His success is his ability to win every damn news cycle and get us distracted and moving in 25 different directions,' he said.
Newsom warns of democracy 'under assault' as Trump sends troops
The Democratic governor and Trump have been feuding publicly about the response to protests, with Newsom claiming Trump didn't warn him he'd deploy troops in a Friday phone call and Trump claiming the conversation was about that.
Newsom has taunted Trump administration officials with arresting him, and Trump first appeared receptive to the idea and then walked back earlier remarks.
After Newsom filed an emergency request in federal court Tuesday to block the Trump administration from using the National Guard and Marines to assist with immigration raids in Los Angeles, he gave a public address accusing Trump of going beyond arresting criminals.
'California may be first, but it clearly will not end here,' he warned. 'Other states are next. Democracy is next. Democracy is under assault before our eyes.'
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt dismissed Newsom's speech as performative.
'I know Gavin Newsom had a big address to the nation last night — I guess he thought that's what it was for maybe his future political ambitions,' Leavitt said Wednesday. 'But he spoke a lot of words. We haven't seen action.'
The filing this week wasn't the first time this year that California had sued the Trump administration. In April, Newsom filed a lawsuit that challenged Trump's authority to impose sweeping tariffs that the governor asserted would inflate prices and inflict billions of dollars in damage to California, which has the nation's largest economy.
And California — not just Newsom — continues to be a foil.
Just this month, the Trump administration signaled that it intends to cut off federal funding for a long-delayed California high-speed rail project plagued by multibillion-dollar cost overruns. He's threatened to pull federal funding in California if the state did not bar transgender students from participating in girls sports. The Justice Department warned districts they could face legal trouble if they don't bar trans athletes from competition.
And on Thursday, he's expected to sign a measure blocking California's vehicle emissions rules.
___
Gomez Licon reported from Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Blood from Los Angeles. Associated Press writer Kevin Freking in Washington contributed.
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Toronto Star
34 minutes ago
- Toronto Star
Canadians favour other countries over Donald Trump's America, survey suggests
As G7 leaders gather in Kananaskis, Alta., a new poll suggests Canadians are souring on the U.S. and embracing relations with other world powers. The Pollara Strategic Insights survey found net impressions of the U.S. have plunged since President Donald Trump returned to office in January. At the same time, Canadians are feeling positive about the other G7 member nations: Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, France and Germany. ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW 'We've kind of lost our best friend in the United States and maybe, as a country, Canada is now looking toward some of its older friends to reconnect with as a result of that,' said Dan Arnold, Pollara's chief strategy officer, referring to Trump's tariffs on Canadian goods that have led to a trade war between the neighbouring countries. Indeed, the firm polled people in Canada and the U.K. and found similar results on both sides of the Atlantic. Five out of six Canadians — 83 per cent — said the bilateral relationship with Britain was 'important' with only 17 per cent saying it wasn't. Across the pond, 76 per cent of Britons said their country's relationship with Canada was 'important' while about one in four said it was not. The British have a more positive view of Canada (+78 per cent) than any other country in the poll — ahead of Japan (+61 per cent), Germany (+60 per cent), France (+50 per cent) and Ukraine (+47 per cent). But the poll found they have a negative view toward India (-1 per cent), the U.S. (-3 per cent), China (-24 per cent) and Russia (-63 per cent). ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW Among Canadians, Italy has a +66 per cent favourability rating followed by Japan at +64 per cent, the U.K. at +59 per cent, France at +57 per cent, Germany at +54 per cent and Ukraine at +41 per cent. China was at -27 per cent, India at -29 per cent, the U.S. at -47 per cent and Russia at -63 per cent. That's a 60 percentage point drop in Canadian sentiment toward the American since Pollara's survey last year when Joe Biden was U.S. president. Using online panels, Pollara surveyed 3,400 Canadians on May 16-20. While opt-in polls cannot be assigned a margin of error, for comparison purposes, a random sample of this size would have one of plus or minus 1.7 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. Similarly, the firm polled 2,511 Britons on May 2-16. The margin of error for comparable surveys is within 1.9 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. 'If the Americans aren't going to be the number-one ally in many respects for the next three years (of Trump's presidency) … then the Canada-U.K. relationship is something that bears some noting,' said Arnold, pointing out Canada's recently elected Prime Minister Mark Carney used to be governor of the Bank of England. ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW Because of that, 60 per cent of Britons are familiar with him, and of those, 80 per cent had a positive view of Carney, who succeeded Justin Trudeau as Liberal leader on March 9 and was elected April 28. Just seven per cent had a negative view and the rest had no opinion. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer is not as well known among Canadians. Only 26 per cent were familiar with him. Of those, 58 per cent had a positive view with 30 per cent negative and the remainder had no opinion. That's an overall +28 per cent for Starmer, who won power last summer. The most admired foreign leader among Canadians was Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who will attend the G7 summit that begins Sunday. Zelenskyy, whose country was invaded by Russia in 2022, was at +53 per cent, ahead of French President Emmanuel Macron (+46 per cent), German Chancellor Friedrich Merz (+33 per cent), Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba (+31 per cent) and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni (+29 per cent). On the negative side of the ledger, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who will also be at the G7, was at -17 per cent, ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping (-52 per cent), Trump (-66 per cent) and Russian President Vladimir Putin (-69 per cent). Neither Xi nor Putin was invited to Kananaskis. Politics Headlines Newsletter Get the latest news and unmatched insights in your inbox every evening Error! Sorry, there was an error processing your request. There was a problem with the recaptcha. Please try again. Please enter a valid email address. Sign Up Yes, I'd also like to receive customized content suggestions and promotional messages from the Star. You may unsubscribe at any time. By signing up, you agree to our terms of use and privacy policy. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google privacy policy and terms of service apply. Politics Headlines Newsletter You're signed up! You'll start getting Politics Headlines in your inbox soon. Want more of the latest from us? Sign up for more at our newsletter page.
National Observer
38 minutes ago
- National Observer
How the US became the biggest military emitter and stopped everyone finding out
This story was originally published by The Guardian and appears here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration T he climate impact of Donald Trump's geopolitical ambitions could deepen planetary catastrophe, triggering a global military buildup that accelerates greenhouse gas emissions, a leading expert has warned. The Pentagon – the US armed forces and Department of Defense (DoD) agencies – is the world's largest institutional greenhouse gas emitter, accounting for at least 1% of total US emissions annually, according to analysis by Neta Crawford, co-founder of the Costs of War project at Brown University. Over the past five decades, US military emissions have waxed and waned with its geopolitical fears and ambitions. In 2023, the Pentagon's operations and installations generated about 48 megatons of carbon dioxide equivalent (MtCO 2 e) – more planet-warming gases than emitted by entire countries including Finland, Guatemala and Syria that year. Now, once again, the US military carbon footprint is on the cusp of rising significantly as Trump upends the old geopolitical order in his second presidency. In the first 100 days of his second term, Trump threatened military action in Panama, Greenland, Mexico and Canada, dropped bombs on Yemen and increased military sales to Israel, which has intensified its military assault on Gaza, the West Bank, Yemen and Lebanon. Trump has also aligned the US with former adversaries including Russia, while hurling direct or thinly veiled threats at former allies including Ukraine and the entire Nato alliance. Relations with China have sunk amid Trump's chaotic trade war. 'If Trump follows through with his threats, US military emissions will absolutely rise, and this will cause a ripple effect,' said Crawford, author of the book The Pentagon, Climate Change, and War: Charting the Rise and Fall of US Military Emissions. 'We're already seeing lots of escalatory rhetoric, with fewer off-ramps and less commitment to resolving conflicts. The allies or former allies of the US have increased their military spending, so their emissions will go up. As adversaries and potential adversaries of the United States increase their military activity, their emissions will go up. It's very bad news for the climate.' The Pentagon is the largest single fossil fuel consumer in the US, already accounting for about 80% of all government emissions. In March, the defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, wrote on X: 'The @DeptofDefense does not do climate change crap. We do training and warfighting.' Trump has promised $1tn in defence spending for 2026 – which if approved by Congress would represent a 13% rise on the 2025 Pentagon budget amid unprecedented cuts to almost every other federal agency, including those that research and respond to the climate crisis. His military ambitions sit alongside orders to terminate climate research at the Pentagon and a broader assault on climate action across government, while also taking steps to boost fossil fuel extraction. 'No one spends like the US on the military and they want to spend even more. If they neglect education, health and infrastructure and their economy weakens, they will get paranoid about rivals, let's say China, and this fear will cause even more spending. It's an escalatory downward spiral, which often doesn't end well – especially for the country doing the escalating,' said Crawford. 'Of course, it depends on what they do and how they do it, and the DoD may slow-roll some of this, because it is, frankly, provocative, stupid and unnecessary, but we're going exactly the wrong way. Emissions go up in step with military spending, and this is exactly the wrong time to do this.' In 2024, worldwide military expenditure had its steepest rise since the end of the cold war, reaching $2.7tn as wars and rising tensions drove up spending, according to a recent report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. US military spending – and emissions – are both the highest in the world, by a long way. And it is thanks to the US that states are not required to account for military emissions to the UN. In the run-up to the Kyoto protocol, the 1997 international treaty that set binding targets for greenhouse gas reductions, the Pentagon lobbied the Bill Clinton White House to push for a blanket exemption for emissions generated by military fuel use. US pressure on its friends and foes worked, and Kyoto was celebrated as a win for American ambitions. 'We took special pains … to fully protect the unique position of the United States as the world's only superpower with global military responsibilities,' Stuart Eizenstat, undersecretary of the state department, told Congress. 'The Kyoto protocol did not limit the US.' Crawford's research began more than a decade ago after discovering there was no data to share with her undergraduate climate change students – despite the Pentagon having warned for decades about the threat of climate change to US national security. She found that military spending and emissions rise when the US is directly at war or preparing for war. During Ronald Reagan's anti-communism buildup in the 1980s, spending surged and with it fuel use and emissions. After the end of the cold war, spending and emissions fell throughout the 1990s, apart from a spike during the first Gulf war. After the 9/11 attacks, emissions again surged as the US launched wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. From 1979 to 2023, the Pentagon generated almost 4,000 MtCO 2 e – about the same as the entire 2023 emissions reported by India, a country of 1.4 billion people. Its installations and 700 bases account for about 40%, while 60% are operational emissions, resulting from fuel use in war, training and exercises with other countries, according to Crawford's analysis. In addition, the military industry – US-based companies manufacturing weapons, planes and other equipment for warfare – generates more than double the greenhouse gases emitted by the Pentagon each year. Still, the known US military climate impact is probably a significant undercount. Crawford's figures do not account for greenhouse gases generated by dropping bombs, destroying buildings and subsequent reconstruction. The additional CO 2 released into the atmosphere as a result of destroying carbon sinks such as forests, farmland and even whales killed during naval exercises are also not included, nor are those generated by burning oil fields or blowing up pipelines during conflicts. Significantly, the ripple effect of increased militarisation and operations by allies and enemies is also not counted. For instance, the emissions generated by the armed forces and death squads of Argentina, El Salvador and Chile during the US-backed dirty wars are not accounted for, nor those from China increasing its military exercises in response to US threats. Jet fuel shipped to Israel and Ukraine can be counted if transported on a military tanker, while commercial shipments of crude used for warfare are not. 'These are important but, as yet, not well understood climate consequences of military spending and war,' Crawford said. 'We've long underestimated the impact of mobilisation, war and reconstruction.' Yet the Pentagon has long warned that water scarcity, sea level rise and desertification in vulnerable regions could lead to political instability and forced migration, framing climate change as a 'threat multiplier' to US interests. In 1991, former president George HW Bush formally acknowledged climate change as a national security threat. More recently, the direct threat posed by floods, wildfires and land degradation to US military capabilities has become clear. In 2018, during the first Trump administration, flood water from Hurricane Michael destroyed an air force base in Florida, and then a few months later another storm significantly damaged the Strategic Command base in Nebraska, headquarters of the nation's nuclear arsenal. Overall, the US military has reduced its fuel use and emissions since 1975, thanks to base closures, fewer and smaller exercises, switching from coal, and increasingly efficient vehicles and operations. But according to Crawford, this is driven by improving fighter efficiency – not the environment. 'The Pentagon has framed migration from climate change as a threat in order to get more money, which shows a lack of compassion and a failure to think ahead. If they really believed their own rhetoric, they would of course work to reduce their contribution to climate change by reducing emissions. The irony is difficult to stomach,' she said. The military ripple effect is playing out. In response to Russia's ground invasion of Ukraine – and more recently, Trump's shift towards authoritarianism and anti-Ukraine, anti-Europe rhetoric – the UK, Germany and other Nato countries have increased military spending. Here lies a fundamental problem, Crawford argues. 'We can't let Ukraine fall, but that doesn't mean you have to mobilise all of Europe's militaries in this way and spend this much. Russia is not the threat that they were years ago, yet the current response is based around the same old aggressive military doctrine. It's just nonsensical and bad news for the climate. 'There's a less expensive, less greenhouse gas-intensive way of standing up to the Russians, and that would be to support Ukraine, and directly,' said Crawford, an expert in military doctrine and peace building, and the current Montague Burton professor of international relations at the University of Oxford. Another global military trend that could have significant climate and environmental costs is the expansion of nuclear forces. The US and UK are considering modernising their submarine fleets, while China's expanding nuclear force includes a growing arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles. The production of nuclear weapons is energy- and greenhouse gas-intensive. 'Nuclear modernisation is supposed to be making us safer, more stable, but usually leads to adversaries also increasing conventional forces as well,' said Crawford. 'It's part of a broader militarisation, all of which leads to an upward spiral in emissions. The threat inflation always leads to emissions inflation.' The total military carbon footprint is estimated at about 5.5% of global emissions – excluding greenhouse gases from conflict and war fighting. This is more than the combined contribution of civilian aviation (2%) and shipping (3%). If the world's militaries were a country, this figure would represent the fourth largest national carbon footprint in the world – higher than Russia. The global military buildup could be catastrophic for global heating, at a time when scientists agree that time is running out to avoid catastrophic temperature rises. And despite growing calls for greater military accountability in climate breakdown, Crawford fears the Trump administration will no longer publish the fuel data that she relies on to calculate Pentagon emissions. In addition to withdrawing from the Paris agreement, the Trump administration has failed to report the US's annual emissions to the UN framework convention on climate change for the first time and has erased all mention of climate change from government websites. 'Getting a handle on the scale, scope and impact of the world's military emissions is extremely important, so that there is accountability and a path toward reduction … but the US is shutting things down,' said Crawford. 'It's becoming a black hole of information. It's authoritarianism.'
Winnipeg Free Press
an hour ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Defence spending boost can only go so far to lessen U.S. reliance: experts
MONTREAL – In early 2002, Glenn Cowan touched down in Kandahar province as part of the first wave of regular Canadian Army troops deployed to Afghanistan, serving in a U.S.-led brigade combat team. After joining Canada's elite special operations unit Joint Task Force 2 in 2003, he spent the next 13 years collaborating with American soldiers on raids, rescues and reconnaissance missions. 'If you're going to get into a fight with someone, you want the Americans on your side,' said Cowan, founder of ONE9. His Ottawa-based venture capital firm focuses on national security investments. The same might be said of the gear Canadian troops use, and the industry behind it. An infusion of fresh defence funding is poised to flood parts of Canada's aerospace, manufacturing and information technology sectors in a bid to reduce reliance on the United States, but experts say this country will remain firmly fastened to its neighbour as a military-industrial partner by necessity. While not a military powerhouse, Canada has expertise in areas ranging from flight simulation and shipbuilding to armoured vehicles and artificial intelligence. The $9.3-billion in additional defence spending announced by Prime Minister Mark Carney on Monday is poised to boost those sectors, with the goal of greater procurement from domestic companies. 'We're too reliant on the United States,' Carney said. 'We will ensure that every dollar is invested wisely, including by prioritizing made-in-Canada manufacturing and supply chains. We should no longer send three-quarters of our defence capital spending to America.' But a massive cash injection means Canada will have to scale up fast, including via foreign suppliers, said Jim Kilpatrick, in charge of global supply chain and network operations at Deloitte. 'Defence supply chains can often go 10 or 11 tiers deep,' he said, stressing their complex international reach. 'Canada will not be self-sufficient in defence products required by our military.' The country's relatively small production capacity means it will continue to shell out money on American equipment, technology and aircraft, including 88 U.S.-built F-35 fighter jets at a cost of tens of billions of dollars, experts say. However, some of that spending will go to American military giants that have a big presence on Canadian soil, even if the profits end up in pockets south of the border. General Dynamics churns out light armoured vehicles bristelling with turreted mortars and assault guns in London, Ont., as well as tactical communications systems in Ottawa. Lockheed Martin works on 'advanced technology systems' such as naval command software in five provinces. Defence contractor Raytheon counts 8,500 employees and 2,500 suppliers in Canada. 'The wider Canadian economy features a lot of branch plants,' noted David Perry, CEO of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute. While high-tech weapons and machinery come to mind at the mention of defence procurement, much of the extra funding this year may well go to more mundane items. Housing and infrastructure upgrades for Canadian troops make up some of the biggest priorities for Chief of the Defence Staff Gen. Jennie Carignan, she told Quebec radio host Patrick Lagacé on Thursday. Perry also highlighted the ripple effects of that spending for myriad business types beyond the purely military realm. 'Some of it is done through the big stuff — we think about fighter jets. But a lot of it pays for office furniture, software licenses, electricity contracts, snow removal, grass cutting.' Taking a step back, Perry framed defence investment in terms the prime minister, formerly the head of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, could appreciate. 'If you think of our defence relationships as an investment portfolio, the PM is saying we're way over-indexed in the Dow Jones and the S&P,' he said. 'Diversify.' This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 13, 2025.
