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Editor’s Note: The commentaries we’re citing below were written in response to President Trump calling in the National Guard, and predate the additional demonstrations on Sunday.
“President Donald Trump is deploying 2,000 California National Guard troops to Los Angeles over the objections of Gov. Gavin Newsom after a second day of clashes between hundreds of protesters and federal immigration authorities in riot gear…
“Confrontations broke out on Saturday near a Home Depot in the heavily Latino city of Paramount, south of Los Angeles, where federal agents were staging at a Department of Homeland Security office nearby. Agents unleashed tear gas, flash-bang explosives and pepper balls, and protesters hurled rocks and cement at Border Patrol vehicles…
“Protests kicked off a day earlier in Los Angeles after federal authorities arrested 44 people for violating immigration law Friday. DHS later said recent ICE operations in Los Angeles resulted in the arrest of 118 immigrants, including five people linked to criminal organizations and people with prior criminal histories.” AP News
“Tensions in Los Angeles escalated Sunday as thousands of protesters took to the streets in response to President Donald Trump’s extraordinary deployment of the National Guard, blocking off a major freeway and setting self-driving cars on fire as law enforcement used tear gas, rubber bullets, and flash bangs to control the crowd… Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom requested Trump remove the guard members in a letter Sunday afternoon, calling their deployment a ‘serious breach of state sovereignty.’” AP News
The left is critical of deploying the National Guard, arguing that the unrest is being exaggerated.
“Of course people are going to get a bit rattled and pissed when dozens of armed men in military-style uniforms show up in a residential neighborhood and fire tear gas and other ‘less lethal’ munitions at folks… Trump is throwing himself a military parade on his birthday this week and sending in the military to quell a ‘rebellion’ in Los Angeles that the LAPD - no left wing organization - said was peaceful.”
Simon Rosenberg, Sunday Hopium
“California’s National Guard was federalized briefly during the Rodney King riots, in 1992, but that was with the blessing of then-Governor Pete Wilson and occurred when large parts of the city were aflame—conditions that clearly do not apply today… [White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller] declared that the government could either ‘deport the invaders, or surrender to insurrection.’…
“The men and women working in garment factories in LA and in restaurants in San Diego who have borne the brunt of ICE raids over the past week, plus the few hundred community members who have protested ICE’s brutal snatch-and-grab strategies—including SEIU local president David Huerta, injured in the clashes and now in federal custody—do not constitute a meaningful ‘insurrection.’…
“If Miller’s lunatic definition stands, then pretty much any political protest, no matter how small and no matter how nonviolent, no matter how outmatched by local law enforcement, now justifies military intervention by the federal government.”
Sasha Abramsky, The Nation
“Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has added gasoline to the fire by stating that active duty marines at nearby Camp Pendleton are ready to augment federal forces in Los Angeles should the ‘violence’ continue. That would be an unprecedented escalation, pitting actual marines intended for national defense against civilian protestors…
“The last time troops were deployed against the wishes of a state governor occurred 60 years ago [to protect civil rights marchers]… Today, Trump wants to accustom the American people to the sight of federal troops performing law enforcement activity so that, when he ultimately pulls the trigger on the Insurrection Act, there is less public resistance to the idea. That is why loud and sustained protest against the presence of federalized troops in a U.S. city must continue until the troops are gone.”
Jay Kuo, Status Kuo
The right supports deploying the National Guard, arguing that doing so is necessary to prevent violence.
The right supports deploying the National Guard, arguing that doing so is necessary to prevent violence.
“The mob was out blocking traffic… Someone set a fire in the street and burned a flag… A CPB truck [got] pelted with stones… People were breaking apart concrete so they could throw it… Things got bad enough that even the LA Times is calling it ‘a fiery and tumultuous clash.’…
“Newsom’s response, and that of LA Mayor Karen Bass, are an utter disgrace. The LAPD refused to control the activists that attacked ICE agents performing legitimate enforcement functions. They allowed the situation to get violent by taking almost no action at all, while Bass in particular issued inflammatory statements that only added to the momentum of violence…
“Trump watched this happen in 2020 and waited for governors to take action, and it ended up defining the election cycle. He’s not waiting around this time, and he shouldn’t. Los Angeles let the 1992 Rodney King riots get out of hand by having the police retreat, so this is a deliberate choice by Newsom and Bass to set the community on fire — and to intimidate ICE into retreating from their law-enforcement responsibilities.”
John Sexton, Hot Air
“In 1992, as a California Army National Guard captain, I patrolled LA’s scorched Crenshaw District during the Rodney King riots. Looters ran wild, businesses burned, and chaos reigned until Gov. Pete Wilson called up the National Guard and President George H.W. Bush invoked the Insurrection Act, sending 3,500 federal troops—active duty Army and Marines—to back 10,000 federalized Guardsmen. Order swiftly returned. It worked…
“These rioters aren’t protesters—they’re insurgents. Like Antifa in 2020, they’re attacking federal authority, targeting ICE agents enforcing laws Congress passed. Newsom and Bass coddle them. Since they won’t act, Trump must. The left will scream ‘tyranny,’ and some retired generals will fret about ‘politicizing’ the military. But anarchy is a brutal tyranny of its own kind.”
Chuck DeVore, Fox News
“The liberal media’s gaslighting has reached a new level of shamelessness. With violent mobs openly attacking law enforcement and torching the streets of Los Angeles, CNN and its ilk are tripping over themselves to insist it’s all ‘very peaceful.’ They’re not just ignoring the chaos—they’re covering for it. It’s the same playbook they used in 2020, and once again, they think if they repeat a lie enough times, it becomes truth.”
Matt Margolis, PJ Media
“Immigration-enforcement raids will continue so long as Trump is president and the law of the land is unchanged. Opponents of such actions, even those that are entirely lawful, have every right under the Constitution to peaceably assemble to protest them. Farsighted protest leaders should do everything in their power to keep those demonstrations law-abiding…
“Under the Trump administration, the rule of law is among the most precious safeguards Americans possess. Appealing to it, Trump critics have repeatedly prevailed in courtrooms, where Trump is least likely to succeed with his most dangerous gambits. In contrast, street violence gives Trump the ability to fight his enemies with the law on his side and with trained, armed personnel to enforce it.”
Conor Friedersdorf, The Atlantic
