A day after the Pentagon ordered the withdrawal of half of the National Guard troops deployed in Los Angeles, Gov. Gavin Newsom criticized President Trump for wasting hundreds of millions of dollars to appear “tough” by punishing immigrants.
Newsom also accused the president of trying to preserve Republican power in Washington by pressuring Texas to redraw congressional districts to elect GOP representatives. The governor repeated a threat to launch a similar effort in California to favor Democrats.
“Everything has changed, and it’s changing in real time,” Newsom told reporters Wednesday. “I’m not going to be the guy that said I could have, would have, should have. I’m not going to be passive at this moment. I’m not going to look at my kids in the eyes and say I was a little timid.”
The comments came at a news conference outside Downey Memorial Christian Church, where Newsom met with the Rev. Tanya Lopez, the senior pastor, to discuss an incident in June where she watched as plainclothes federal agents swarmed and detained a constituent in the parking lot of her church.
Newsom criticized the administration’s immigration crackdown, saying its only goal was to terrorize families and communities — not to pursue violent criminals, which Newsom said he would support. Newsom said the crackdown was also harming family-owned businesses as immigrants who work and shop at stores stay home out of fear.
The governor called the president’s decision to deploy about 4,000 National Guardsmen part of Trump’s “rule of cruelty” and said the decision to remove half the troops came after the Pentagon realized the absurdity of its deployment.
The government wasted of hundreds of millions of dollars on the deployment, Newsom said. He added that the “utilization rate” of the National Guard troops was only about 5%, meaning only that percentage was actively engaged with duties while the rest were held in reserve.
“They’re a solution right now in search of a problem,” he said of the National Guard.
The move to send home some of the troops comes after a legal battle over whether the administration could deploy the troops. A federal appeals court ruled that the president had broad — though not “unreviewable” — authority to deploy the military in American cities.
State and local leaders said the National Guard was not needed to deal with protests over immigration raids that have led to around 3,000 arrests.
On a separate issue, Newsom repeated the threat that California could redraw its electoral maps to help Democrats pick up more congressional seats in response to Trump’s call for Texas and other states to redistrict to benefit Republicans in the 2026 midterm elections. Republicans currently hold power in both the Senate and House of Representatives, which have been instrumental in enacting the president’s policy agenda, including cuts to healthcare and food assistance for Americans in need.
“They can’t win by the traditional games, so they want to change the game,” Newsom said. “We can act holier-than-thou. We can sit on the sidelines, talk about the way the world should be, or we can recognize the existential nature that is this moment.”
California voters in 2010 gave an independent Citizens Redistricting Commission the power to determine the boundaries of state voting districts for the U.S. House of Representatives instead of leaving that authority with the state Legislature.
Newsom said the California Legislature could pass a bill in the regular session or in a special session that places a proposed constitutional amendment before voters to change state redistricting laws through a special election held in a tight window before the 2026 primaries.
The governor said he’s also exploring a potential legal loophole that could allow the California Legislature to redraw the congressional maps themselves now with a two-thirds vote and avoid going to the ballot.
“That is an option that is also being considered and both of those are being advanced in real time, not only with members of the Legislature, but others that are interested, because they feel the same pressures I do about the existential threat of what Donald Trump and some of these Republican states are trying to do,” Newsom said.
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