Minutes after Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth trumpeted plans to “flood” Washington with Nationwide Guard members, a senior U.S. navy official took the stand in federal courtroom in California to defend the controversial deployment of troops to Los Angeles.
The transfer throughout protests this summer time has since develop into the mannequin for President Trump’s rising use of the navy to police American streets.
However the trial, which opened Monday in San Francisco, activates the argument by California that troops referred to as up by Trump have been illegally engaged in civilian regulation enforcement.
“The navy in Southern California are so tied in with ICE and different regulation enforcement businesses that they’re virtually indistinguishable,” California Deputy Atty. Gen. Meghan Sturdy advised the courtroom Tuesday.
“Los Angeles is only the start,” the deputy lawyer normal mentioned. “President Trump has hinted at sending troops even farther, naming Baltimore and even Oakland right here within the Bay Space as his subsequent potential targets.”
Senior U.S. District Decide Charles R. Breyer mentioned in courtroom that Hegseth’s statements Monday may tip the scales in favor of the state, which should present the regulation is more likely to be violated once more as long as troops stay.
However the White Home hasn’t let the pending case stall its agenda. Nor have Trump officers been fazed by a choose’s order limiting so-called roving patrols utilized by federal brokers to indiscriminately sweep up suspected immigrants.
After Border Patrol brokers final week sprang from a Penske shifting truck and snatched up employees at a Westlake Dwelling Depot — showing to overtly defy the courtroom’s order — some attorneys warned the rule of regulation is crumbling in plain sight.
“It’s simply breathtaking,” mentioned Mark Rosenbaum of Public Counsel, a part of the coalition difficult using racial profiling by immigration enforcement. “Someplace there are founding fathers who’re turning over of their graves.”
The chaotic immigration arrests that swept by Los Angeles this summer time had all however ceased after the unique July 11 order, which bars brokers from snatching folks off the streets with out first establishing affordable suspicion that they’re within the U.S. illegally.
An Aug. 1 ruling within the U.S. ninth Circuit Court docket of Appeals appeared to guarantee they may not resume once more for weeks, if ever.
For the Division of Justice, the ninth Circuit loss was the most recent blow in a protracted judicial beatdown, as lots of the administration’s most aggressive strikes have been held again by federal judges and tied up in appellate courts.
Trump “is shedding constantly within the decrease courts, virtually 9 occasions out of 10,” mentioned Eric J. Segall, a professor at Georgia State College School of Legislation.
Within the final two weeks alone, the ninth Circuit additionally discovered Trump’s government order ending birthright citizenship unconstitutional and signaled it might most likely rule in favor of a bunch of College of California researchers hoping to claw again funding from Trump’s struggle on variety, fairness and inclusion insurance policies.
Elsewhere within the U.S., the D.C. Circuit Court docket appeared poised to dam Trump’s tariffs, whereas a federal choose in Miami quickly stopped development on the migrant detention heart generally known as Alligator Alcatraz.
California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta has famous that his Division of Justice had sued the administration practically 40 occasions.
However even the breakneck tempo of present litigation is glacial in contrast with the actions of immigration brokers and federalized troops.
Federal officers have publicly relished big-footing California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, who’ve repeatedly warned the town is getting used as a “petri dish” for government drive.
On Monday, the White Home appeared to vindicate them by sending the Nationwide Guard to Washington.
Talking for greater than half an hour, Trump rattled off a listing of American cities he characterised as beneath siege.
Requested whether or not he would deploy troops to these cities as properly, the president mentioned, “We’re simply gonna see what occurs.”
“We’re going to have a look at New York. And if we have to, we’re going to do the identical factor in Chicago,” he mentioned. “Hopefully, L.A. is watching.”
This picture taken from video reveals U.S. Border Patrol brokers leaping out of a Penske field truck throughout an immigration raid at a Dwelling Depot in Los Angeles on Aug. 6, 2025.
(Matt Finn / Fox Information through Related Press)
The U.S. Division of Justice argues that the identical energy that permits the president to federalize troops and deploy them on American streets additionally creates a “Constitutional exception” to the Posse Comitatus Act, a nineteenth century regulation that bars troops from civilian police motion.
California attorneys say no such exception exists.
“I’m this case and attempting to determine, is there any limitation to using federal forces?” Decide Breyer mentioned.
Even when they maintain taking losses, Trump administration officers “don’t have a lot to lose” by selecting fights, mentioned Ilya Somin, regulation professor at George Mason College and a constitutional scholar on the Cato Institute.
“The bottom likes it,” Somin mentioned of the Trump’s most controversial strikes. “In the event that they lose, they’ll contemplate whether or not they defy the courtroom.”
Different specialists agreed.
“The larger query is whether or not the courts can really do something to implement the orders that they’re making,” mentioned David J. Bier, an immigration professional on the Cato Institute. “There’s no indication to me that [Department of Homeland Security agents] are altering their habits.”
Some students speculated the losses in decrease courts would possibly really be a strategic sacrifice within the struggle to increase presidential energy within the Supreme Court docket.
“It’s not a method whose major ambition is to win,” mentioned professor Mark Graber of the College of Maryland Francis King Carey College of Legislation. “They’re shedding circumstances proper and left within the district courtroom, however constantly having district courtroom orders stayed within the Supreme Court docket.”
Win or lose within the decrease courts, the political attract of focusing on California is potent, argued Segall, the regulation professor who research the Supreme Court docket.
“There’s an emotional hostility to California that individuals on the West Coast don’t perceive,” Segall mentioned. “California … is deemed a separate nation virtually.”
A good ruling within the Supreme Court docket may pave the way in which for deployments throughout the nation, he and others warned.
“We don’t need the navy on America’s streets, interval, full cease,” Segall mentioned. “I don’t assume martial regulation is off the desk.”
Pedro Vásquez Perdomo, a day laborer who is among the plaintiffs within the Southern California case difficult racial profiling by immigration enforcement, has mentioned the case is greater than him.
He took to the rostrum outdoors the American Civil Liberties Union’s downtown places of work Aug. 4, his voice trembling as he spoke concerning the non permanent restraining order — upheld days earlier by the ninth Circuit Court docket of Appeals — that stood between his fellow Angelenos and unchecked federal authority.
“I don’t need silence to be my story,” he mentioned. “I need justice for me and for each different individual whose humanity has been denied.”
