California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s lawsuit challenging the Trump administration from using the military to enforce federal immigration laws is a “crass political stunt endangering American lives,” Department of Justice lawyers said.
The lawyers asked a federal judge to deny Newsom’s request for a temporary restraining order that would limit the military to protecting federal buildings, arguing such an order would amount to a “rioters’ veto to enforcement of federal law.”
Members of the California National Guard conduct exercises after being deployed to the Los Angeles protests June 11, 2025, in Los Alamitos, Calif.
Jae C. Hong/AP
“The extraordinary relief Plaintiffs request would judicially countermand the Commander in Chief’s military directives — and would do so in the posture of a temporary restraining order, no less. That would be unprecedented. It would be constitutionally anathema. And it would be dangerous,” they argued.
In Newsom’s request for an emergency order blocking the troops from assisting in federal law enforcement, he argued Trump failed to meet the legal requirements for a federal deployment of the National Guard. Title 10 of the U.S. Code on Armed Services allows a federal deployment in response to a “rebellion or danger of a rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States.”
Los Angeles Metro Police officers stand on the road in front of the City Hall after a curfew was put into effect following days of protests in response to federal immigration operations in Los Angeles on June 10, 2025.
Apu Gomes/AFP via Getty Images
“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,” Newsom argued.
In response, lawyers with the Department of Justice argued that California should not “second-guess the President’s judgment that federal reinforcements were necessary” and that a federal court should defer to the president’s discretion on military matters.
-ABC News’ Peter Charalambous
