SAN FRANCISCO — A federal court hearing is scheduled for Thursday on whether the Trump administration can use the National Guard and Marines to assist with immigration raids in Los Angeles.
California Gov. Newsom has depicted the federal military intervention in the nation’s second largest city as the onset of a much broader effort by Trump to overturn political and cultural norms at the heart of the nation’s democracy. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass has echoed that, saying the deployment of troops was unnecessary and meant to undermine local jurisdictions and intimidate the city’s large immigrant population.
Newsom filed an emergency motion requesting the court’s intervention after President Donald Trump ordered the deployment of roughly 4,000 National Guard members and 700 Marines to Los Angeles following protests over his stepped-up enforcement of immigration laws.
The Trump administration called the lawsuit a “crass political stunt endangering American lives” in its official response on Wednesday.
The Democratic governor argued the troops were originally deployed to protect federal buildings and said sending troops to help support immigration raids would only promote civil unrest.
The protests over immigration raids in Los Angeles intensified after Trump called up the National Guard and have since spread to other cities, including Boston, Chicago and Seattle.
