A protester confronts a line of U.S. Nationwide Guard within the metropolitan detention heart of downtown Los Angeles on Sunday.
Eric Thayer/AP
disguise caption
toggle caption
Eric Thayer/AP
A 3rd day of protests Sunday turned Los Angeles right into a “tinderbox,” in line with Mayor Karen Bass, as regulation enforcement clashed with demonstrators over a collection of federal immigration raids.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement stated in a Saturday publish on X that it had arrested 118 immigrants throughout operations in Los Angeles final week. Since then, demonstrators protesting the raids have clashed with police in Los Angeles, Paramount and neighboring Compton.
Police deployed tear gasoline and pepper spray as protesters gathered exterior a detention heart on Sunday. Among the immigrants detained by ICE brokers have been initially held on the facility.
President Trump stated he would deploy 2,000 Nationwide Guard troopers in response to the protests. In a social media publish, Trump attacked what he referred to as “Radical Left protests” by “instigators and sometimes paid troublemakers.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom stated the Trump administration’s deployment of the Nationwide Guard was not essential and was “inflaming tensions.”
Elsewhere in California, police in San Francisco stated 60 folks had been arrested Sunday night time and no less than three officers have been injured when police clashed with protesters demonstrating in that metropolis’s downtown in help of the Los Angeles protests towards the immigration raids.
Here is what to learn about what occurred in Los Angeles over the weekend.
California Freeway Patrol officers work to clear protesters blocking the 101 freeway on June 8, 2025, in Los Angeles.
Mario Tama/Getty Photos North America
disguise caption
toggle caption
Mario Tama/Getty Photos North America
1: Protesters clashed with police and troops on Sunday
In downtown Los Angeles Sunday, two protests converged close to the Metropolitan Detention Middle, a federal jail the place immigrants have been held. The demonstrations grew rowdy and tense. NPR reporters say tear gasoline was deployed and an “illegal meeting” was declared from a Los Angeles Police Division helicopter.
The police wrote on X that they have been conducting arrests and other people have been throwing “concrete, bottles and different objects.” By Sunday night, LAist reported that Los Angeles police had arrested 10 and the California Freeway Patrol arrested one other 17 folks on the 101 Freeway.
The LAPD additionally licensed the use of “much less deadly munitions.” A number of vehicles have been burned within the streets in reference to the clashes.
Earlier within the day, demonstrators stated the protests had been principally peaceable.
“Everyone right here desires to be peaceable,” Anna Benedict instructed laist. “We have been standing right here for fairly some time, and nobody is menacing the Nationwide Guard. Everyone is simply standing up for their very own freedom.”
Demonstrators attended protests across the metropolis. Many have been responding to ICE actions from earlier days.
ICE operations focused a number of areas throughout the Los Angeles space, and in some circumstances demonstrators tried to dam the transport of detained immigrants. Authorities used flash bangs, pepper spray and tear gasoline to disperse crowds. One notably contentious confrontation occurred at a House Depot within the closely Latino metropolis of Paramount, simply exterior Los Angeles.
“We now have to face united towards the assaults on the immigrant neighborhood as a result of an assault on one in all us is an assault on all of us,” Eli Lockwood instructed laist.
2: Trump warned extra troops might come
By Sunday morning, round 300 California Nationwide Guard troops had been deployed at three websites round Los Angeles, Diana Crofts-Pelayo, deputy director of communications for Gov. Newsom, instructed NPR by e mail.
On Sunday night, Trump instructed reporters that the federal authorities would guarantee there’s “regulation and order.” He described the Los Angeles protests as a “riot” and stated that justified calling within the Nationwide Guard to help ICE brokers.
Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth stated in a publish on X Saturday that energetic responsibility Marines at Camp Pendleton additionally have been on excessive alert and would even be mobilized “if violence continues.”
Trump stated he might additionally deploy troops to extra cities. ICE actions sparked protests in a number of cities throughout the nation, together with Minneapolis and Chicago.
“We’ll have troops all over the place. We’re not going to let this occur to our nation. We’re not gonna let our nation be torn aside prefer it was beneath Biden and his autopen,” Trump stated Sunday. (The reference to an “autopen” comes after Trump final week ordered an investigation into whether or not his predecessor Joe Biden used an autopen to signal paperwork in workplace).
That is the primary time because the Nineteen Sixties that the federal authorities has referred to as up Nationwide Guard troops with out a governor’s consent.
Legislation enforcement conflict with demonstrators in entrance of a federal constructing throughout a protest in Los Angeles on Sunday.
Etienne Laurent/AFP by way of Getty Photos
disguise caption
toggle caption
Etienne Laurent/AFP by way of Getty Photos
3: Native authorities pushed again on Trump — laborious
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass stated on All Issues Thought of on Sunday that coordination with federalized Nationwide Guard troops is “collaborative, at this level” however she was important of Trump’s resolution to deploy them.
“I consider that these raids and now the federalization of troops to come back into Los Angeles is an intentional effort to sow chaos,” Bass stated. She referred to as town a “tinderbox” and stated, “I don’t need to see civil unrest happen on this metropolis and I feel bringing the Nationwide Guard in is provocative.”
Newsom stated on social media that he formally requested Trump to rescind the “illegal” deployment Sunday.
“We did not have an issue till Trump bought concerned,” Newsom wrote. “This can be a critical breach of state sovereignty — inflaming tensions whereas pulling sources from the place they’re truly wanted.”
The Democratic Governors Affiliation issued a press release calling Trump’s Nationwide Guard deployment “an alarming abuse of energy.”
“Governors are the Commanders in Chief of their Nationwide Guard and the federal authorities activating them in their very own borders with out consulting or working with a state’s governor is ineffective and harmful,” learn the assertion, which included the names of twenty-two Democratic governors.
4: It units the stage for extra clashes
President Trump and conservative media have labeled the protests in Los Angeles as a “riot” and stated that justified deploying the Nationwide Guard.
“I feel it was a riot. I feel it was very unhealthy. It was coated as a riot by nearly everyone,” Trump stated earlier than leaving for Camp David from New Jersey Sunday night. He questioned the flexibility of native officers to deliver the protests beneath management and stated the federal authorities would guarantee there’s “regulation and order.”
Trump seems prone to proceed his administration’s ramped up immigration enforcement in his second time period, after working on a promise to conduct mass deportations.
At Camp David, Trump stated he plans to fulfill with folks, together with generals and admirals. Requested about sending Marines and protests in different cities, Trump left open that chance.
“The bar is what I feel it’s. I imply, If we see hazard to our nation and to our residents, we’ll be very, very sturdy by way of regulation and order. It is about regulation and order,” Trump stated.
The Democratic governors, of their assertion, stated they’re able to sustaining order.
“It is vital we respect the chief authority of our nation’s governors to handle their Nationwide Guards — and we stand with Governor Newsom who has made it clear that violence is unacceptable and that native authorities ought to have the ability to do their jobs with out the chaos of this federal interference and intimidation,” they wrote of their assertion.
