US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered the withdrawal of two,000 National Guard troops from Los Angeles, roughly halving the contentious deployment within the metropolis, the Pentagon mentioned Tuesday.
President Donald Trump ordered hundreds of National Guard and a whole lot of Marines into Los Angeles final month in response to protests over federal immigration sweeps — a transfer opposed by metropolis leaders and California’s Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom.
“Thousands of members are still federalized in Los Angeles for no reason and unable to carry out their critical duties across the state,” Newsom wrote on X, referring to the Guard’s help of firefighting missions throughout the state.
“End this theater and send everyone home,” Newsom mentioned.
Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell on Tuesday confirmed the discharge “of 2,000 California National Guardsmen (79th IBCT) from the federal protection mission,” including “the lawlessness in Los Angeles is subsiding.”
Mayor Karen Bass credited peaceable protests and authorized motion for the withdrawal, which she termed a “retreat.”
“This happened because the people of Los Angeles stood united and stood strong. We organized peaceful protests, we came together at rallies, we took the Trump administration to court — all of this led to today’s retreat,” the Democratic mayor mentioned.
As a so-called “sanctuary city” with a whole lot of hundreds of undocumented folks, Los Angeles has been within the crosshairs of the Trump administration for the reason that Republican returned to workplace in January.
After immigration enforcement raids spurred unrest and protests final month, Trump — who has repeatedly exaggerated the dimensions of the unrest — dispatched the National Guard and US Marines to quell the disruption.
It was the primary time since 1965 {that a} US president deployed the National Guard in opposition to the desires of a state governor.
Newsom has mentioned the troops weren’t mandatory to deal with the principally peaceable protests.
In late June, his workplace reported California National Guard firefighting crews have been “operating at just 40% capacity due to Trump’s illegal Guard deployment” as fires have been “popping up across the state.”
California is preventing the Trump administration in courtroom over the deployment, arguing that the president overstepped his authority, although the troops have been allowed to stay for now.
Source: www.anews.com.tr