Approximately 500 U.S. Marines are “prepared to deploy” to Los Angeles amid rising tensions between protesters and law enforcement over President Trump’s immigration policies, according to a statement from U.S. Northern Command.
The Marines are “in a prepared to deploy status should they be necessary to augment and support the [Defense Department’s] protection of federal property and personnel efforts,” reads the statement released Sunday.
The notice came a day after Trump announced he had authorized the deployment of approximately 2,000 California Army National Guard troops, 300 of whom were deployed Sunday at three locations in the Los Angeles area: Los Angeles, Paramount and Compton.
The federalization of the California National Guard represents a rare and legally murky step that bypassed the consent of California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), who said Sunday evening that he plans to bring a lawsuit against the Trump administration for bypassing him.
The last time the federal government mobilized National Guard members without the consent of a governor was in 1965, when former President Lyndon Johnson sent Guard members to Selma, Ala., to protect civil rights protesters there.
The National Guard is relatively limited in its scope, since members are deployed specifically to protect federal buildings, which includes the downtown Los Angeles detention center where much of the unrest centered.
The military is generally barred from carrying out domestic law enforcement duties. Declaring the Insurrection Act is seen as a potential path around those restrictions.
Trump did not rule out invoking the Insurrection Act during a gaggle with reporters before boarding Air Force One on Sunday, but he suggested the current protests against immigration raids had not yet risen to insurrection.
Shortly after the gaggle, Trump issued a statement on Truth Social claiming that “violent, insurrectionist mobs are swarming and attacking our Federal Agents to try and stop our deportation operations.”
He said he directed relevant Cabinet officials, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, “to take all such action necessary to liberate Los Angeles from the Migrant Invasion, and put an end to these Migrant riots.”
Hegseth on Sunday morning said Marines were ready to be deployed to Los Angeles if needed.
