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A federal judge has shot down California Governor Gavin Newsom’s emergency request to immediately block President Trump’s deployment of US Marines and National Guard troops to Los Angeles.
Some shit you should know before you read: If you’re unaware, Governor Newsom recently filed a federal lawsuit alongside California Attorney General Rob Bonta challenging President Trump’s federalization of the state’s National Guard and deployment of US Marines to LA. The lawsuit argues that the Trump administration violated the Constitution by bypassing the governor’s authority and using state military forces without consent. In their lawsuit, they claimed that Trump planned to use “unlawfully federalized National Guard troops and Marines to accompany federal immigration enforcement officers on raids throughout Los Angeles” and claimed that these troops “will physically interact with or detain civilians.” Newsom and Bonta requested an emergency order to halt the deployments, calling them “unnecessary” and warning that they had already “caused real and irreparable damage” to the state and its residents. In response, the Pentagon asked the court to grant ample time to prepare a full legal rebuttal.
What’s going on now: In a notable development, US District Judge Charles Breyer declined to grant Governor Newsom’s emergency request for a temporary restraining order. While Breyer did not rule on the broader merits of the case, he refused to intervene on an emergency basis, stating that such a significant constitutional dispute required proper deliberation and input from both sides. Instead, he ordered the Trump administration to submit a formal legal response within 24 hours. California will then be given until June 12th to file a reply. A hearing on the matter has been scheduled for that same day, where the court will consider whether to grant a preliminary injunction halting the military deployments.
This comes as the Trump administration has defended the use of federal troops in Los Angeles, claiming the move was necessary to suppress what they characterized as violent unrest and protect ICE officers from what the president called “an out-of-control mob.” In public remarks, President Trump described the protests as an “invasion,” vowing to “liberate Los Angeles and make it free, clean, and safe again.”
Trump insists that California’s state and local officials had failed to provide adequate security, justifying the federal action as a last resort to prevent chaos. Vice President JD Vance also backed the deployment, blaming California’s leadership for policies that he claimed had turned the city into a “war zone.”
To the contrary, Governor Newsom argues that Trump is weaponizing the military against civilians in an overreach of federal power. He alleges that the president is using the National Guard and Marines not to restore order but to intimidate communities, suppress lawful dissent, and carry out immigration enforcement under the guise of riot control. Echoing those concerns, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said in a press conference that the deployment feels like “a test run for authoritarianism,” and called it “a dangerous experiment using our city as the proving ground.”
