Left: Calif. Gov. Gavin Newsom presents his revised state budget during a news conference in Sacramento, Calif., Wednesday, May 14, 2025 (Photo/Rich Pedroncelli). Right: US President Donald Trump converses with reporters regarding California Governor Gavin Newsom as he arrives at the White House on June 9, 2025, at the South Lawn in Washington, DC, USA (Photo by Lenin Nolly/NurPhoto via AP).
California Gov. Gavin Newsom escalated his dispute with President Donald Trump concerning the Los Angeles immigration protests by heading to federal court in San Francisco on Tuesday. Newsom requested that a judge “immediately” order the removal of U.S. military forces from the streets of Los Angeles.
The Democratic governor wants the court in question to act with haste — and without any input from federal authorities.
In a 28-page ex parte motion for a temporary restraining order, Newsom and California petition U.S. District Judge Charles R. Breyer, a Bill Clinton appointee and brother of former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, to prohibit the federal government from deploying the National Guard and U.S. Marines for immigration operations. Newsom seeks a swift court decision, ideally within two hours of the filing, which took place around 11 a.m. Tuesday morning.
“In the United States, the police — and not the military — enforce the law,” the motion begins. “This bedrock principle flows from the Founding, finds expression in Acts of Congress, and lives at the core of our civil society. Ours is a Nation of laws, enforced through even-handed justice, and not ruled by military decree. But Defendants, including President Trump and Secretary of Defense [Pete] Hegseth have sought to bring military personnel and a ‘warrior culture’ to the streets of cities and towns where Americans work, go to school, and raise their families.”
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The underlying lawsuit in the case was filed Monday after the 45th and 47th president mobilized the military — at first just the National Guard — on Saturday. Trump assumed control of reserve forces in response to multiple incidents of property destruction as waves of Angeleños sparred with law enforcement amid protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) actions that started on Friday throughout the city and county of Los Angeles.
Now, Newsom says he has learned that the situation is so dire that his state cannot wait for the typical speed or adversarial nature of the court system. By filing ex parte, the plaintiffs are essentially telling the court they do not need to wait for the government’s arguments.
“Defendants intend to use unlawfully federalized National Guard troops and Marines to accompany federal immigration enforcement officers on raids throughout Los Angeles,” the ex parte motion goes on. “They will work in active concert with law enforcement, in support of a law enforcement mission, and will physically interact with or detain civilians.”
The motion goes on to call such deployments “unlawful” due to their purported law enforcement component. Newsom also says such deployments “have already proven to be a deeply inflammatory and unnecessary.” The motion argues that using the military in such a fashion is “anathema” to U.S. laws.
“Federal antagonization, through the presence of soldiers in the streets, has already caused real and irreparable damage to the City of Los Angeles, the people who live there, and the State of California,” the filling continues. “They must be stopped, immediately.”
To hear the plaintiffs tell it, “immediately” in this case means by 1 p.m. Pacific Standard Time. If the requested injunction is not granted by then, Newsom argues, his state will suffer “immediate and irreparable harm.”
“Absent immediate injunctive relief, Defendants’ use of the military and the federalized National Guard to patrol communities or otherwise engage in general law enforcement activities creates imminent harm to State Sovereignty, deprives the State of vital resources, escalates tensions and promotes (rather than quells) civil unrest,” the motion reads. “Accordingly, the Plaintiffs seek a TRO [Temporary Restraining Order] and preliminary injunction to preserve the status quo.”
The California governor says Trump’s actions are precluded by the nation’s founding charter.
“The Constitution reserves to the States power over their respective state militias — now the National Guard — unless the State requests or consents to federal control,” the lawsuit reads. “Only under the most exigent of circumstances can the President, over the objections of a State, call the National Guard into federal service. The balance the Framers struck between the State’s power to control its own militia and the very narrow circumstances in which the federal government may take command and control of the militia serves as a vital check against federal overreach.”
The motion elaborates to argue that local and county law enforcement have, so far, adequately dealt with the immigration protests.
“Most protesters have exercised their First Amendment rights in a peaceful, non-violent, and legally compliant manner,” the motion goes on. “While incidents of unrest and violence have been reported, those incidents are the exception. And when protests have crossed the line from peaceful to destructive or violent, Governor Newsom and other state and local officials have unequivocally condemned that conduct and called for prosecution. And state and local law enforcement agencies have quickly and effectively responded to these limited incidents.”
The White House, of course, sees things quite a bit differently. At least 4,000 National Guard members have been put under the president’s direction — along with some 700 Marines.
Newsom says this also violates the law.
“All of this was unlawful,” the motion goes on. “The President purported to federalize the California National Guard under 10 U.S.C. § 12406, which authorizes him to call the Guard into federal service in only very narrow circumstances, none of which is present. To put it bluntly, there is no invasion or rebellion in Los Angeles; there is civil unrest that is no different from episodes that regularly occur in communities throughout the country, and that is capable of being contained by state and local authorities working together.”
As of this writing, the court did not indicate whether or not it would act on Newsom’s expedited request — but Breyer did set an initial conference in the case for the morning of June 19.
