Around 300 National Guard members were deployed around Los Angeles on Sunday morning after the Trump administration called in 2,000 troops to squash protests against recent immigration raids.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement has been conducting raids around L.A. over the past two days, and more are possible Sunday. L.A. County Supervisor Janice Hahn told KNX News she believes the deployment is “a huge overreach by the federal government” designed to intimidate residents.
“I lived through the Watts riots, I lived through the uprising in the early ‘90s, and the way it's supposed to work is when local law enforcement, our LAPD or our county sheriffs or the governor, you know, request National Guards because the local law enforcement agencies are unable to handle it,” she said. “I did not see that as being the problem this time.”
Instead, she said federal agents are the ones “inciting these kinds of protests and riots.” She pointed out that President Joe Biden deported over one million people during his term without sparking violent protests because it was done “in a dignified way,” targeting specific people rather than rounding up day laborers by the dozen.
“The way to solve this problem is for the federal government to back off, have a break, have a truce, and sit down with our local law enforcement officers to figure out who they’re going after and why,” Hahn said. “Our Sheriff Robert Luna has absolutely told the Board of Supervisors that if they come with a federal warrant and specifically are asking for us to turn over a criminal, a known convicted criminal in our jails, we will do so peacefully. But this sweeping targeting of people who are hardworking and really just trying to earn a living is unacceptable.”
Mayor Karen Bass also disavowed the National Guard deployment, telling KNX News’ Craig Fiegener she was “very concerned about the potential civil unrest” a federal intervention could bring.
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