The Pentagon has announced it is releasing 2,000 National Guard troops from their federal mission to Los Angeles.
“Thanks to our troops who stepped up to answer the call, the lawlessness in Los Angeles is subsiding,” chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement to Fox News on Tuesday night. “As such, the Secretary has ordered the release of 2,000 California National Guardsmen (79th IBCT) from the federal protection mission.”
The Trump administration had federalized roughly 4,000 National Guard soldiers and deployed 700 Marines to Los Angeles in early June to quell anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) riots and protests.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass categorized the rescission of about half of the National Guard troops deployed to the city as a “retreat.”
“This happened because the people of Los Angeles stood united and stood strong. We organized peaceful protests, we came together at rallies, we took the Trump administration to court — all of this led to today’s retreat,” the Democratic mayor claimed in a statement, adding, “We will not stop making our voices heard until this ends, not just here in LA, but throughout our country.”
Bass said in a press conference that the National Guard’s primary mission has been to guard two buildings that “frankly didn’t need to be guarded.”
“I am hoping that this experiment with the lives of people ends here,” she said.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom previously sued the Trump administration for deploying California National Guard troops despite his opposition.
The deployment of National Guard troops was for 60 days, though Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had the discretion to shorten or extend it “to flexibly respond to the evolving situation on the ground,” the Trump administration’s lawyers wrote in a June 23 filing in the legal case.
On Tuesday afternoon, there was no visible military presence outside the federal complex downtown that had been the center of early protests and where National Guard troops first stood guard before the Marines were assigned to protect federal buildings.
The idiot mayor of LA and idiot governor of California have weighed in. They seem to know what buildings need or don’t need to be guarded. I don’t know how someone would know that in advance since protestors like to burn things and they usually don’t announce what they will be burning.