OAN Staff Katherine Mosack
7:25 AM – Thursday, December 11, 2025
A judge ruled that the Trump administration cannot deploy the California National Guard in Los Angeles and must return the troops to the state’s control.
U.S. District Court Judge Charles Breyer made the order on Wednesday, rejecting the administration’s claim that the rising number of immigration demonstrations in the city constituted a “rebellion.” He also signed a temporary restraining order requiring the administration to return control of the guard to California Governor Gavin Newsom.
In June, the federal government had directed 2,000 guardsmen to be stationed in Los Angeles to respond to large anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) protests. Under U.S.C. Section 12406, a sitting president may federalize the National Guard in cases of a foreign invasion or when the president is “unable to execute the law.”
California sued over the deployment, arguing that the president was using the guard as his own personal police force in violation of a law limiting the use of the military for domestic affairs.
In a 35-page order, Breyer said that the deployment is “contrary to law,” however, and risks “creating a national police force made up of state troops.”
“The founders designed our government to be a system of checks and balance,” Breyer said on Wednesday. “Defendants, however, make clear that the only check they want is a blank one.”
President Donald Trump argued that the federal government’s intervention was necessary due to Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass’s inaction in the face of rioting and looting.
“If Governor Gavin Newscum, of California, and Mayor Karen Bass, of Los Angeles, can’t do their jobs, which everyone knows they can’t, then the Federal Government will step in and solve the problem, RIOTS & LOOTERS, the way it should be solved!!!” the president said in a Truth Social post, referring to a derogatory nickname for the governor.
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