The long-simmering feud between Donald Trump and liberal leaders of California escalated into a dangerous power play over the weekend as the president ordered 2,000 National Guard troops to Los Angeles – against the wishes of both the city’s mayor and Gov. Gavin Newsom.
About 300 troops showed up in downtown Los Angeles on Sunday after isolated protests turned violent following raids by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the area on Friday. The clashes, which stretched into a third day and resulted in dozens of arrests as of Sunday evening, represent more than just a personal rivalry, or even a Trump-against-California clash that can be cordoned off from the rest of the country.
Democrats worry that the White House’s showdown marks a serious turn toward authoritarianism, with the unusual use of military force against the civilian population. Republicans, on the other hand, cheered at what they saw as a president moving to get illegal immigration and urban disorder under control.
Why We Wrote This
Tensions in Los Angeles reflect larger divisions over President Trump’s immigration policy. They also reveal an escalating rift between the White House and California.
“It could be a foretaste of actions in other cities across the country, particularly if the disorder begins to spread,” says John Pitney, a longtime observer of California and national politics professor at Claremont McKenna College. “Given that people all over are paying attention to it, I think that’s what Trump wants,” he adds, noting the president’s penchant for television spectacle and the military.
The big, blue Golden State is also “a very convenient target” as a political punching bag for the president and Republicans generally, Mr. Pitney says.
The Trump-California feud
Republican actions and threats against California have been piling up since the GOP took control of the federal government in January – going after the state’s electric vehicle mandate, transgender protections, water policy, and immigration “sanctuary” status. Trump tariffs also loom in California, which serves as an import juggernaut for goods arriving from Asia.
ICE agents arrested at least 40 people in Los Angeles on Friday, just as local political leaders were hearing reports of White House plans to cut off federal grants to the state – about $170 billion.
“Californians pay the bills for the federal government. We pay over $80 BILLION more in taxes than we get back. Maybe it’s time to cut that off, @realDonaldTrump,“ Governor Newsom posted on X Friday afternoon.
By Saturday, the anti-ICE demonstrations, initially in downtown Los Angeles, had spread to Paramount and Compton. Some turned violent.
But with the White House deployment of California National Guard troops on Sunday, the situation in Los Angeles escalated dramatically. Thousands of anti-ICE protesters rallied, blocking off a freeway and setting self-driving vehicles on fire. Local law enforcement officers, some on horseback, used tear gas, rubber bullets, and flash bangs to control the crowd. Law enforcement repeatedly told protesters they were assembled unlawfully.
In a letter to U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Governor Newsom formally requested the administration “rescind” its order. “We didn’t have a problem until Trump got involved,” Newsom wrote on social media. “This is a serious breach of state sovereignty — inflaming tensions while pulling resources from where they’re actually needed.”
In a press conference Sunday afternoon, LA Mayor Karen Bass said she also asked administration officials to rescind the order, saying the Guard’s presence was producing “chaos.” After January’s fires, the city needs to rebuild, she said. Like the governor, she emphasized the need for peaceful protest.
Things had not reached the point at the start of the protests that it was necessary to call in the National Guard, said Los Angeles Police Chief Jim McDonnell at a press conference on Sunday night. But the current dangerous conditions would warrant a reassessment of that, he said.
“It’s disgusting,” he added, saying that some people were shooting commercial-grade fireworks at officers and using hammers to break concrete blocks into pieces to be thrown at law enforcement. By Sunday evening, a total of at least 56 people had been arrested during the protests, according to authorities.
How the most recent conflict started
President Trump ordered the troops in response to clashes over immigration enforcement actions throughout LA County late last week.
Using a disparaging nickname he likes to give to his rival, Mr. Trump wrote on Truth, his social media platform, on Saturday that if Governor Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass “can’t do their jobs, then the federal government will step in and solve the problem.’’
Paramount, a city south of downtown LA with a large Hispanic community, was the site of much of the unrest. ICE agents were seen Saturday morning driving near a Home Depot, where day laborers gather in the mornings to pick up work. Word spread on social media that there was going to be an immigration raid, and protesters started showing up in opposition.
The conflict escalated throughout the day at an office park where the ICE agents were gathered and spilled into surrounding streets. Agents wearing riot gear and gas masks fired tear gas and flash-bang rounds to push back protesters, who threw objects and yelled at the officers. Sheriff’s deputies and U.S. Marshals were brought in as law enforcement. The unrest spread to nearby Compton.
President Trump called the protesters “violent, insurrectionist mobs” trying to prevent lawful deportations.
The president federalized California’s National Guard based on a part of Article 10 of the Constitution, which allows the president to command National Guard troops if a foreign nation invades the U.S., if there’s a rebellion against the federal government, or if Washington can’t enforce federal laws with its own regular forces.
The Department of Defense order justifying the California deployment cites “numerous incidents of violence and disorder” and protests that “constitute a form of rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States.’’
California’s politicians and protesters are defending “heinous illegal alien criminals at the expense of Americans’ safety,” said Assistant Homeland Security Secretary Tricia McLaughlin in a statement Sunday. “Instead of rioting, they should be thanking ICE officers every single day who wake up and make our communities safer.” The statement listed nearly a dozen of those arrested in last week’s sweep as criminals.
What makes the situation so unusual, says Jessica Levinson, director of Loyola Law School’s Public Service Institute, is that local leaders said they didn’t want or need National Guard support.
Typically, the Guard is mobilized by the state’s governor to support state or local law enforcement. If local officials feel they need federal support, they ask for it. This happened in 1992, for instance, during the days-long, widespread LA riots. Mayor Tom Bradley and California Governor Pete Wilson requested military support from then-President George H. W. Bush, which included Army, Marine, and National Guard troops.
By contrast, President Trump’s order bypasses Governor Newsom’s wishes and authority.
Raising stakes on ongoing battles
This tension raises the stakes in the ongoing battle between California and the Trump administration over policies and funding. In the case of immigration, California’s Sanctuary Law – enacted during the first Trump presidency – forbids state and local police from interrogating or deporting people for purposes of immigration enforcement, although it does not prevent federal agents from doing so.
“In some ways, California wants to position itself as the epicenter of the resistance to the Trump administration,” says Professor Levinson. “We’ve seen the governor and the president butt heads on a number of different issues, and we can see this as yet another escalation of that conflict.”
Further escalation could lead to invocation of the Insurrection Act, which gives Washington broader powers to use military force against citizens to suppress a state revolt against the federal government or when violence prohibits normal law enforcement.
Use of the Insurrection Act, explains Professor Levinson, requires a much higher bar than Title 10. But that higher bar also gives California greater legal recourse to resist.
At a news conference on Sunday, President Trump declined to answer whether he planned to declare the protests an insurrection, instead saying, “We’ll send whatever we need to make sure there’s law and order.”
But the troop deployments have sent a message to other states – and Democratic governors are on alert.
“President Trump’s move to deploy California’s National Guard is an alarming abuse of power,” the Democratic Governors Association said in a statement Sunday. “Governors are the Commanders in Chief of their National Guard, and the federal government activating them in their own borders without consulting or working with a state’s governor is ineffective and dangerous.”
Politics at play
James Gallagher, the minority Republican leader in the California State Assembly, is nonplussed about the president’s Guard deployment.
“It looks like he’s just responding to what looks like a pretty chaotic situation,” he says.
Like others, he also sees politics at play. But instead of blaming President Trump, he points to Governor Newsom, who is expected to run for president when his term ends in two years. Mr. Gallagher recites challenges facing the state – housing costs and homelessness, cost of living, high gas prices, and crime.
“Newsom has nothing under control, as much as he wants to portray that he does,” says the sixth-generation Californian. “If this guy wants to be president, this is what you have coming.”
The governor, for his part, has begun to amend some of his more liberal positions. His new podcast has included MAGA guests like Steve Bannon. He has said that allowing transgender girls to compete in girls’ sports is “deeply unfair.” More recently, he’s begun pushing cities and towns to clear homeless encampments.
The state’s electorate is also shifting. Voters have rejected some progressives in recent years, ousting the mayor and district attorney in San Francisco, as well as the district attorney in Los Angeles County last year.
In the crowded field of candidates for governor, Democrats are running to the right of the Bernie Sanders wing of the party, bemoaning business regulations and the cost of living. “If Republicans had a candidate with statewide visibility and credibility, they would have a shot,” says Mr. Pitney, the Claremont McKenna politics professor.
And yet, Governor Newsom loses no opportunity to brag on the wonders of what is now the world’s fourth-largest economy and national leader in Fortune 500 companies. A recent statement from the governor’s office listed California as “number 1” in the nation for new business starts, access to venture capital funding, manufacturing, high-tech, and agriculture.
“The simple truth is, California is one of the most successful states in the Union, if not the most successful state,” says Henry Brady, former dean of the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley.
And that success, he says, is a threat to Mr. Trump’s policies and reputation.
“They have to find a way to vilify us to make sure that nobody thinks that somehow California is a success, because that would be an indication that maybe MAGA is not the only route.”
As for what might happen next with the Guard, Dr. Brady says that he is concerned. If the president invokes the Insurrection Act, he says, that gets “close to martial law, and that gets to very authoritarian tendencies.”
