The state of California will file suit against the Trump administration over its move to take control of the state’s National Guard and deploy its troops to Los Angeles to protect immigration enforcement agents, Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a social media post Monday.
The governor has argued that local law enforcement agencies were effectively managing the response to protests over recent immigration raids, and that there was no need for President Trump to call up the National Guard.
Before the lawsuit was filed, Mr. Newsom’s office appeared to foreshadow the litigation in a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Sunday.
“In dynamic and fluid situations such as the one in Los Angeles, state and local authorities are the most appropriate ones to evaluate the need for resources to safeguard life and property,” Mr. Newsom’s legal affairs secretary, David Sapp, wrote in the letter. “Indeed the decision to deploy the National Guard, without appropriate training or orders, risks seriously escalating the situation.”
Mr. Trump said on Saturday that he was imposing federal control over at least 2,000 National Guard troops for at least 60 days in order to quell the protests, and directed Mr. Hegseth to determine which ones to use. The order did not specify that the troops needed to come from California, but so far the California National Guard has been used, according to the U.S. Northern Command.
Mr. Trump’s order suggested that protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids and detention facilities were interfering with federal functions, and that they constituted a rebellion against the federal government’s authority and its ability to enforce federal law. That is the standard for invoking the Insurrection Act to use the military for domestic policing.
But the order did not invoke the Insurrection Act. Instead, it cited only a statute that allowed the president, under certain circumstances, to federalize a state’s National Guard. It also appeared to gesture toward a claim of inherent presidential power to use troops to protect federal functions.
The order raises many legal complexities, including whether a rebellion against federal authority is indeed taking place, and whether a court could reject a president’s claim that the situation rises to the level that would make it lawful to send in troops.
But there is also a basic procedural issue: whether it was lawful for Mr. Hegseth to cut Mr. Newsom out of the administration’s decision-making process.
Mr. Trump’s order instructed Mr. Hegseth to consult with state governors about calling up National Guard units, and the call-up statute Mr. Trump cited said that orders for National Guard call-ups “shall be issued through the governors of the states.” But Mr. Sapp’s letter complained that Mr. Hegseth had sent a directive to the general in charge of California’s National Guard informing him that the federal government was taking control of 2,000 of its troops without consulting Mr. Newsom or relaying the order through the governor.
In the letter to Mr. Hegseth on Sunday, Mr. Sapp focused on that procedural problem and added that local law enforcement authorities in Los Angeles had the matter in hand. He also invoked the principle of states’ rights.
“There is currently no need for the National Guard to be deployed in Los Angeles, and to do so in this unlawful manner and for such a lengthy period is a serious breach of state sovereignty that seems intentionally designed to inflame the situation, while simultaneously depriving the state from deploying these personnel and resources where they are truly required,” Mr. Sapp’s letter said.
Mr. Trump’s move was the first time in about 60 years that a president had sent troops under federal control into a state to quell unrest without a request from the state’s governor. That last happened during the civil rights movement, when state governors were resisting court orders to desegregate public schools.
The last time a president used military force to carry out police functions on domestic soil was in 1992, when President George H.W. Bush sent troops into Los Angeles to calm widespread rioting that followed a jury’s acquittal of police officers who had been videotaped beating a Black man, Rodney King. But in that case, both the California governor and the mayor of Los Angeles had requested the federal assistance.
Laurel Rosenhall is a Sacramento-based reporter covering California politics and government for The Times.
Charlie Savage writes about national security and legal policy for The Times.
The post California Lawsuit Will Challenge Trump’s Order Sending National Guard to L.A., Newsom Says appeared first on New York Times.
