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The state of California is suing the Trump administration for deploying the state’s National Guard in Los Angeles amid protests against federal immigration raids, the state's attorney general, Rob Bonta, said Monday. He accused the Trump administration of infringing on California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s authority as commander-in-chief of the California National Guard.
“President Trump’s order calling federalized National Guard troops into Los Angeles — over the objections of the Governor and local law enforcement — is unnecessary and counterproductive,” Bonta said in a statement Monday.
He continued, “Let me be clear: There is no invasion. There is no rebellion. The President is trying to manufacture chaos and crisis on the ground for his own political ends. Federalizing the California National Guard is an abuse of the President’s authority under the law — and not one we take lightly. We’re asking a court to put a stop to the unlawful, unprecedented order.”
At least 56 people were arrested during the protests over the weekend in California’s second-largest city, NBC News reports.
Trump ordered the deployment of 2,000 California National Guard troops to the city for 60 days to disperse protesters. Newsom swiftly condemned the move, saying it would serve only to inflame the situation.
In a news conference announcing the lawsuit on Monday, Bonta said the protests had “mostly dissipated” and that the city’s streets were “mostly quiet and calm” by the time the first few hundred troops arrived in Los Angeles on Sunday.
“Since Trump announced his plan to deploy troops, the situation on the ground has escalated quickly, with unrest growing overnight, causing highways to close and putting people in danger,” Bonta said. “This wasn’t the case on Saturday or Sunday morning. This was not inevitable.”
He added, “Trump and [Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth] jumped from zero to 60, bypassing law enforcement expertise and evaluation. They threw caution to the wind and sidelined strategy in an unnecessary and inflammatory escalation that only further spurred unrest.”
In its lawsuit, Bonta said the state of California accuses Trump of violating the Constitution’s 10th Amendment, which states “the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Minutes after the California attorney general announced his lawsuit, Trump posted on social media that his administration would “hit” back if protesters “spit” at National Guard members. “I promise you they will be hit harder than they have ever been hit before,” he wrote. “Such disrespect will not be tolerated!”
The president — who famously pardoned hundreds of Jan. 6 rioters, including some convicted of assaulting police officers — said previously on Sunday that “nobody’s going to spit on our police officers” while discussing the Los Angeles protests.
As NBC News reports, a president deploying the National Guard over objections from a state’s governor is “historically rare.”
Trump has described the protesters as “professional agitators” and “insurrectionists,” prompting some to suggest that Trump might be preparing to invoke the 1807 Insurrection Act to mobilize active-duty U.S. military members to quash dissent.
Several demonstrations against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids and subsequent deployment of the National Guard were planned for Monday. Despite unrest the night before, things appeared to remain calm during the day on Monday. Nonetheless, roughly 700 Marines have been temporarily mobilized to support the National Guard in protecting federal personnel and property, two defense officials told NBC News on Monday afternoon.
Newsom’s press office said the mobilization meant Marines were not being “deployed” at this time, but were being moved from “one base to another base.” Still, the office wrote in a post on X, the “level of escalation is completely unwarranted, uncalled for, and unprecedented — mobilizing the best in class branch of the U.S. military against its own citizens.”
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.