California Sues Trump Over National Guard Deployment

Jessica Levinson, director of the Public Service Institute at Layola Law School, breaks down the 'broad' presidential authority used to deploy the national guard to Los Angeles protests and the argument California Governor Gavin Newsom may use to fight the move.

California is suing the Trump administration for deploying the state’s National Guard in Los Angeles to quell unrest over the president’s immigration raids.

The move, announced at a press conference Monday, follows tensions over anti-deportation protests. Demonstrators have clashed with law enforcement, sometimes violently, while Governor Gavin Newsom and President Donald Trump trade blame over the responsibility for restoring order. The lawsuit hasn’t yet appeared on the court docket.

“We don’t take lightly to the president abusing his authority and unlawfully mobilizing California National Guard troops,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said at the conference.

The strife escalated Sunday night, as some demonstrators committed vandalism and violence, including burning cars. LA Police Chief Jim McDonnell said that many of the earlier protesters around the city had been peaceful but that conditions had deteriorated as others replaced daytime demonstrators.

“This violence that I’ve seen is disgusting,” McDonnell said at a press conference Sunday.

The strife escalated Sunday night, as some demonstrators committed vandalism and violence, including burning cars. LA Police Chief Jim McDonnell said that many of the earlier protesters around the city had been peaceful but that conditions had deteriorated as others replaced daytime demonstrators.

“This violence that I’ve seen is disgusting,” McDonnell said at a press conference Sunday.

Demonstrations

The president has called the demonstrations “migrant riots” and said on his Truth Social platform that federal agencies were to take “all such action necessary” to continue the operations. He has suggested Newsom should be arrested. A sweeping deportation was a hallmark of Trump’s presidential campaign.

Newsom has said order must be restored but that the scale of the violence didn’t warrant federalizing the California National Guard. Before filing the suit, he said he had formally asked the White House to retract the “unlawful” deployment and return the troops to his command, warning it would only inflame tensions.

Trump has directed the US Northern Command to assume control of the National Guard and dispatch 2,000 soldiers to the area “for 60 days or at the discretion of the secretary of defense,” the White House said. So far, about 300 soldiers have been deployed to three locations in greater LA, according to the Northern Command.

In calling up the troops, Trump issued a proclamation saying the protests “constitute a form of rebellion against the authority of the government of the United States.” He invoked a law giving the president authority to use the National Guard when there is a “rebellion or danger of rebellion” against the country or when he’s “unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the United States.”

At Monday’s press conference, Bonta said “it is a rarely used and invoked section of the law, but the language is clear in the law. One, you need to have a rebellion. There’s no rebellion.” He added, “Or two, you need to have an invasion. There’s no invasion. Three, you need to be unable, with the regular forces, to execute the laws of the United States.”

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