The decision of President Trump to deploy hundreds of national guard troops in Washington has California officials on a maximum alert, with some concern that he intends to activate federal forces in the area of the Bay and southern California, especially during the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games.
Trump said its use of the National Guard to combat crime could expand to other cities, and suggested that the Local Police could not do the job.
Legal experts say that it is very unusual and worrying that forces are unpacked without an important crisis, such as civil disturbances or a natural disaster. Washington's deployment is another Trump example that seeks to use the army for domestic efforts, similar to its decision to send the National Guard to Los Angeles in June, in the midst of immigration repression that caused protests, experts said.
Washington has long fought with crime, but has seen great reductions in recent years.
Officials in Oakland and Los Angeles, two cities that the president mentioned by name, criticized Trump's comments on crime in their cities. The mayor of Oakland, Barbara Lee, said in a statement that the president's characterization was not in fact rooted, but “based on fear in an attempt to write down cheap political points.” The mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, described him as “performative” and a “trick.”
Trump has said that he would consider deploying the military in Los Angeles once again to protect the 2028 Olympic Games. This month, he signed an executive order that appointed him president of a White House working group at the Los Angeles Games.
The White House has not specifically said what role Trump would play in security arrangements.
The councilor of the city of Los Angeles, Imelda Padilla, who is in the city panel that supervises the games, recognized last week that the city is a “little nervous” about the plans of the federal government to ensure the event.
The Congress recently approved $ 1 billion for safety and planning for games. A representative of the National Security Department refused to explain the times how the funds will be used.
Padilla said that his concern was based on the unpredictable nature of the administration, as well as the recent immigration rags that have used masked and strongly armed agents to gather people in Home Depot parking lots and car washed.
“Everything we are seeing with the raids was a true curved ball for our city,” Padilla said during an event of the Los Angeles Current Affairs Forum. Treated “a true curved ball for [efforts] To concentrate on the things that people care, such as the lack of housing, such as transport … Economic development, “he said.
Bass, which appears in CNN this week, said that using the National Guard during the Olympic Games is “completely appropriate.” She said the city expects a “federal response when we have more than 200 countries here, which means heads of state of more than 200 countries. Of course, you have the army involved. That is routine.”
But Bass made a distinction between the safety of the Los Angeles Olympic Games and the “political trick,” said Trump managed to bring the National Guard and the Marines of the United States after protests for the repression of immigration of the federal government. This deployment faces continuous legal challenges, with a decision of the Court of Appeals that Trump had the legal authority to send to the National Guard.
“I believed then, and now I think the angels was a trial case, and I think DC is also a trial case,” Bass said. “To say, well, we can take his city whenever we want, and I am the commander in chief, and I can use the troops when we want.”
On Monday, Trump tied his action with what has been a family issue for him: perceived urban decline.
“You look at Chicago, how bad it is, you look at Los Angeles, how bad it is. We have other cities that are very bad. New York has a problem. And then, of course, Baltimore and Oakland. We don't even mention it, so far they have gone,” he said. “We are not going to let it happen. We are not going to lose our cities for this.”
The White House Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said that officers and agents deployed throughout the Columbia district have made 23 arrests for crimes, including homicide, possession with the intention of distributing narcotics, lascivious acts, reckless driving, evasion of rates and not having permits. Six illegal guns were taken, he said.
Citating crime as a reason to deploy National Guard troops without the support of a state governor is not preceded, experts said. The National Guard has been deployed in southern California before, especially during the riots of the 1992 angels and civil disturbances after the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020.
“It would be horrible because the governor and would certainly be clearly violating their legal authorities and, without a doubt, would sue for the mayors of Los Angeles de los Angeles and Oakland,” said William Banks, a law professor at the University of Syracuse. “Citizens in those cities would be in arms. They would be horrified that there are soldiers that patrol their streets.”
The Columbia district has no control over its national guard, which gives the President a great freedom to deploy those troops. In California and other states, the Head of the National Guard is the governor and there are legal limits on how federal troops can be used.
The POSSE Comitatus Law, approved in 1878 after the end of the reconstruction, largely prohibits federal troops to be used in the application of civil law. The law reflects a tradition that dates from the era of revolutionary war that sees military interference in American life as a threat to freedom and democracy.
“We have such a strong tradition that we do not use the army for the application of domestic law, and it is a characteristic of authoritarian countries to see that the military is used in that way,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the Law Faculty of the Law of the UC Berkeley and an expert in constitutional law. “That has never been so in the United States, and many are concerned about the way President Trump is acting as authoritarian rulers do.”
If the troops deployed in Los Angeles in June in the midst of federal immigration raids were used for the National Police in violation of the POSSE Committus Law is central in the current trial this week in a federal court in San Francisco.
If Trump sent troops to California, Banks said, the only legal lever I could throw would be to declare an insurrection and invoke the insurrection law.
Unlike DC, Trump could not federalize police departments in other parts of the country. There are circumstances in which the Federal Government has put the departments under consent decrees, a reform tool for agencies that have been involved in illegal practices, but in those cases the government alleged specific violations of civil rights, said Ed Obayashi, a legal advisor of the Sheriff of Northern California on surveillance.
“You will not be able to enter and assume because you say that the crime is increasing in a particular place,” he said.
Oakland Councilor Ken Houston, a third generation resident who was elected in 2024, said his city does not need the help of the federal government with public safety.
Oakland has fought with crime for years, but Houston cited progress. Violent crimes, including homicide, aggravated assault, violation and theft have dropped 29% so far this year since the same period in 2024. Real estate crimes, including theft, theft of motor vehicles and theft, are also lying, according to the city data.
“He is happening with old numbers and is making a point,” Houston said about Trump. “Oakland does not need the National Guard.”
The writer of Times, Noah Goldberg, contributed to this report.
