Roving Periscope: In LA, its Trump’s National Guards v/s California Police
Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: A day after Donald Trump deployed National Guards to secure federal government buildings and quell the immigrants’ protests in Los Angeles, California’s Democrat Governor Gavin Newsom called on the Republican US President to withdraw troops, and deployed police which ordered protesters to return home on their third day of agitation.
The California Police declared all of downtown Los Angeles an unlawful assembly area and ordered protesters to go home on Sunday night after a third day of violence-hit demonstrations against Trump’s immigration policy, the media reported on Monday.
The Governor called Trump’s deployment of National Guard troops at the weekend as “unlawful.”
The immigrants’ unrest in Los Angeles has become a major flashpoint in Trump’s signature effort to clamp down on illegal immigration.
He has pledged to deport record numbers of illegal immigrants and to lock down the US-Mexico border, setting the border enforcement agency, the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), a daily goal of arresting at least 3,000 migrants.
California state and local officials, mainly Democrats, accuse Trump of inflaming initially small-scale protests by mounting a federal response. Trump called the protesters ‘insurrectionists.’
On Sunday evening, the protesters set ablaze several self-driving cars from Alphabet’s newly-opened laboratory Waymo on a downtown street.
Los Angeles police said some protesters had thrown concrete projectiles, bottles and other items at police. Police declared several rallies unlawful assemblies and later extended that to include the whole downtown area.
Police on horseback tried to control the rampaging crowds.
Demonstrators shouted “Shame on you!” at police and some appeared to throw objects, video images showed. One group blocked the 101 Freeway, a major downtown thoroughfare.
City Police Chief Jim McDonnell told the media on Sunday evening that people had a right to protest peacefully but the violence he had seen by some was “disgusting” and the protests were getting out of control.
Police said they had arrested 10 people on Sunday and 29 the previous night, adding arrests were continuing.
California Governor Newsom, a Democrat, said he requested the Trump administration to withdraw its order to deploy 2,000 National Guard troops in Los Angeles County, calling it unlawful.
In a media interview, he said he planned to sue the administration over the deployment, adding that Trump “has created the conditions” around the protests. He accused the President of trying to manufacture a crisis and of violating California’s state sovereignty.
Asked if the National Guard was needed, the police chief, Jim McDonnell, said police would not “go to that right away,” but added, “Looking at the violence tonight, I think we’ve got to make a reassessment.”
In a social media post, Trump called on McDonnell to do so.
“He should, right now!!!” Trump added. “Don’t let these thugs get away with this. Make America Great Again!!!”
The White House disputed Newsom’s characterization, saying in a statement, “Everyone saw the chaos, violence and lawlessness.”
Earlier on Sunday, about a dozen National Guard members, along with Department of Homeland Security personnel, pushed back a group of demonstrators outside a federal building in downtown Los Angeles, video showed.
The US Northern Command said 300 members of the California National Guard had been deployed to three spots in the Los Angeles area.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem told CBS that the National Guard would provide safety around buildings to people engaged in peaceful protest and to law enforcement.
In a social media post on Sunday, Trump called the demonstrators “violent, insurrectionist mobs” and said he was directing his cabinet officers “to take all such action necessary” to stop what he called “riots.”
Despite Trump’s language, he has not invoked the Insurrection Act, an 1807 law that empowers a President to deploy the US military to suppress events like civil disorder.
Asked on Sunday whether he was considering doing so, he said, “It depends on whether or not there’s an insurrection.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Saturday the Pentagon is prepared to mobilize active-duty troops “if violence continues” in Los Angeles, saying Marines at nearby Camp Pendleton were on high alert.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass blamed the Trump administration for inciting tension by sending in the National Guard. She also condemned protesters who became violent.
“I don’t want people to fall into the chaos that I believe is being created by the administration completely unnecessarily,” she told a press conference.
Vanessa Cardenas, head of the immigration advocacy group America’s Voice, accused the Trump administration of “trumping up an excuse to abuse power, and deliberately stoke and force confrontations around immigration.”
