National Guard troops will arrive in Los Angeles County within the next 24 hours, the Trump administration’s top law enforcement official in Southern California said, to quell protests over immigration enforcement that are “out of control.”
Bilal A. “Bill” Essayli, the interim U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, said in an interview on Saturday night that the 2,000 troops were needed to keep the peace in the sprawling region.
The demonstrations began on Friday after an immigration raid at a clothing wholesaler near downtown Los Angeles. Protests continued on Saturday in downtown and across the region. Federal agents responded with military-style rifles and flash-bang grenades, and then President Trump ordered the National Guard to be sent on Saturday.
More than 100 people were arrested on Friday, with at least 20 more arrests on Saturday, Mr. Essayli said, mostly in the largely Latino and working-class suburb of Paramount.
“They threw rocks at the officers,” Mr. Essayli said. “We had Molotov cocktails thrown. We had all kinds of assaults on agents. The state has an obligation to maintain order and maintain public safety, and they’re unable to do that right now in Los Angeles. So the federal government will send in resources to regain order.”
Local authorities did not ask for federal assistance, and California’s attorney general, Rob Bonta, said in a social media post that his office had been in touch with local law enforcement and had been told that “they have the resources they need to meet the moment.”
Gov. Gavin Newsom pushed back against the president’s order, calling it “purposefully inflammatory.” Mr. Trump had federalized the National Guard “not because there is a shortage of law enforcement, but because they want a spectacle,” Mr. Newsom said.
“The governor doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” said Mr. Essayli, a former Republican state legislator who before his federal appointment in April was a frequent critic of Mr. Newsom, a Democrat. “It’s all about a political narrative for him. But we’re not doing politics here, we’re doing public safety. We’re out arresting violent criminals, illegal aliens who are in the country unlawfully, who have criminal records.”
A spokesman for Mr. Newsom, Izzy Gardon, said Mr. Trump knew that California authorities had longstanding processes in place for handling civil unrest without military intervention.
“Mr. Essayli may still be learning the ropes of his new job, but even a rookie should know the president doesn’t need to commandeer 2,000 soldiers to respond to a few hundred protesters — especially before using the standard mutual aid process,” Mr. Gardon said.
Mr. Essayli blamed the Saturday protests on “false reporting” that federal agents were about to conduct a sweep at a Home Depot in Paramount and arrest those who could not prove they were in the country legally. He said the agents were setting up to work with a nearby Immigration and Customs Enforcement office to execute arrest warrants or judicial orders for removal for people who had been previously deported.
“We were staging for our operations and people spotted the vehicles there, and just made assumptions that weren’t true,” he said.
Mr. Essayli would not say where the National Guard troops would be sent when they arrive on Sunday. “But they’re going to primarily be focused on protecting federal property, so I think you can expect to see them at least in downtown L.A.”
He said much would depend “on where these agitators are congregating” and blamed the state’s “sanctuary” law for the public’s outrage and confusion. California law bars local law enforcement agencies from conducting federal immigration enforcement, but does allow them to detain undocumented criminals for federal deportation if the detainees have been convicted of any one of hundreds of serious offenses.
“The problem is, people have been conditioned to believe that there is an actual sanctuary from immigration laws in California,” Mr. Essayli said. “That is not true. Immigration laws are applicable and will be enforced.”
Shawn Hubler is The Times’s Los Angeles bureau chief, reporting on the news, trends and personalities of Southern California.
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