UNCONSTITUTIONAL. ILLEGAL. YOUR LEAST FAVORITE PRESIDENT, TRUMP, LOSES…AGAIN! THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER! www.cnbc.com/2025/09/02/t…
— Andy Ostroy (@andyostroy.bsky.social) September 2, 2025 at 8:40 AM
[image or embed]
That includes making arrests, searching locations and crowd control
The ruling came in connection with a lawsuit filed in early June by the state of California challenging Trump’s and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s deployment of the Guard to deal with protests in Los Angeles over the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement policies.
Judge Charles Breyer said that Trump’s deployment of the troops violated the federal Posse Comitatus Act, which bars U.S. Military forces from enforcing the law domestically.
Breyer’s ruling in U.S. District Court in San Francisco is limited to California, and the judge stayed the decision until Sept. 12 to give the Trump administration time to appeal it.
But it comes as Trump has considered deploying National Guard troops to other U.S. cities to deal with crime, including Oakland and San Francisco.
Breyer warned that it would create “a national police force with the President as its chief.”
Here’s the ruling by Justice Charles Breyer-I have excerpted parts but do READ THE WHOLE THING
Congress spoke clearly in 1878 when it passed the Posse Comitatus Act, prohibiting
the use of the U.S. military to execute domestic law. Nearly 140 years later, Defendants—
President Trump, Secretary of Defense Hegseth, and the Department of Defense—
deployed the National Guard and Marines to Los Angeles, ostensibly to quell a rebellion
and ensure that federal immigration law was enforced. There were indeed protests in Los
Angeles, and some individuals engaged in violence. Yet there was no rebellion, nor was
civilian law enforcement unable to respond to the protests and enforce the law.
Nevertheless, at Defendants’ orders and contrary to Congress’s explicit instruction,
federal troops executed the laws. The evidence at trial established that Defendants
systematically used armed soldiers (whose identity was often obscured by protective
armor) and military vehicles to set up protective perimeters and traffic blockades, engage
in crowd control, and otherwise demonstrate a military presence in and around Los
Angeles. In short, Defendants violated the Posse Comitatus Act.
Almost three months after Defendants first deployed the National Guard to Los
Angeles, 300 National Guard members remain stationed there. Moreover, President
Trump and Secretary Hegseth have stated their intention to call National Guard troops into federal service in other cities across the country—including Oakland and San Francisco,
here in the Northern District of California—thus creating a national police force with the
President as its chief. Because there is an ongoing risk that Defendants will act unlawfully
and thereby injure Plaintiffs, Governor Newsom and the State of California, the Court
ENJOINS Defendants from violating the Posse Comitatus Act as detailed below
In early June 2025, Immigration and Customs Enforcement initiated a series of
immigration enforcement actions in Los Angeles, California. Olmstead Decl. (dkt. 8-2)
¶ 6. ICE targeted “several locations in downtown LA and its immediate surroundings” that
are “known to have significant migrant populations and labour-intensive industries.”
Espíritu Decl. (dkt. 8-1) Ex. G. On June 6, the first day of the enforcement actions, ICE
detained between 70 and 80 people and arrested 44. Id. The next day, Customs and
Border Protection officers arrived from San Diego to assist with immigration enforcement
operations. Santacruz Decl. (dkt. 22-1) ¶ 18.
Public protests quickly followed. At the site of one of the June 6 enforcement
actions, a group of people gathered and tried to prevent ICE from leaving. Id. ¶ 7; Espíritu
Decl. Ex. D. That evening, crowds of people in downtown Los Angeles protested against
ICE’s enforcement actions. Espíritu Decl. Ex. D; Santacruz Decl. ¶¶ 9, 10. At the Roybal
Federal Complex—which houses the Metropolitan Detention Center—some protestors
threw “concrete chunks, bottles of liquid, and other objects” at Federal Protective Service
officers guarding a parking garage gate, while others tried “to use large rolling commercial
dumpsters as a battering ram to breach the parking garage gate.” Santacruz Decl. ¶ 11;
Trial Tr. Vol. I (dkt. 162) at 189:20–190:9. Protests continued downtown and in several
nearby cities on June 7. At protests in Paramount and Compton, some protestors threw
rocks and other objects (including mangos, fireworks, and a Molotov cocktail), burned a
vehicle, barricaded a street with shopping carts, briefly trapped an ICE agent in a car, and
vandalized property. Santacruz Decl. ¶ 20
The Los Angeles Police Department and Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department
responded to these protests and maintained control of the situation. Even before the
protests downtown on the evening of June 6, LAPD had reassigned additional officers to
the area. Olmstead Decl. ¶ 6. When some protestors acted violently at the Roybal
Complex, LAPD officers successfully pushed the crowd away. Santacruz Decl. ¶¶ 13, 15.
Shortly thereafter, LAPD declared an unlawful assembly, and most protestors departed the
area by 11:00 p.m. Id. ¶¶ 16–17. As for the June 7 protests, LASD dispatched 200
deputies to Paramount and Compton, including a team with specialized training in
handling civil unrest, and LAPD was “fairly in control” of the protests downtown.
Olmstead Decl. ¶¶ 7, 9.
As a result of the protests on June 6 and 7, two federal buildings were vandalized
and sustained minor damage, and a DHS fence and three government vehicles were also
damaged. Santacruz Decl. ¶¶ 17, 21. These protests led to one recorded injury to a law
enforcement officer—a CBP officer whose wrist was struck by a thrown object. Id. ¶¶ 7–
- LAPD made 29 arrests on June 7. Olmstead Supp. Decl. (dkt. 39-3) ¶ 14
On June 7, President Trump issued a memorandum to the Secretary of Defense, the
Attorney General, and the Secretary of Homeland Security in which he called the National
Guard into federal service. June 7 Presidential Memo (Trial Ex. 17). President Trump’s
memorandum cited 10 U.S.C. § 12406 as his legal authority for federalizing the National
Guard and stated as a factual basis that:
Numerous incidents of violence and disorder have recently
occurred and threaten to continue in response to the enforcement
of Federal law by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
(ICE) and other United States Government personnel who are
performing Federal functions and supporting the faithful
execution of Federal immigration laws. In addition, violent
protests threaten the security of and significant damage to
Federal immigration detention facilities and other Federal
property.
Id. at 1. President Trump did not invoke the Insurrection Act, 10 U.S.C. §§ 251–255
n other words, the Insurrection
Act sets a default presumption that state and local officers will be able and willing to
protect a right, privilege, or immunity secured to the people. But President Trump did not
rely on the Insurrection Act when he federalized the California National Guard. See June
7 Presidential Memo. Defendants again disclaimed reliance on the Insurrection Act at
trial. Trial Tr. Vol. III (dkt. 164) at 369:15–16. This is, perhaps, a tacit admission that
President Trump would be unable to make the showing, required under the Insurrection
Act, to rebut the presumption that state and local officials in Los Angeles were unable or
unwilling to act. (Of course, neither the California Legislature nor Governor Newsom
requested troops, and there is no court order to enforce here, so those provisions of the
Insurrection Act do not apply.)
Defendants mention that only 300 National Guard troops remain stationed in Los
Angeles, suggesting that injunctive relief is unwarranted because their footprint is smaller
than it was in early June. Their point is not well taken. Those 300 National Guard troops
are set to remain deployed through November, see Aug. 5 Activation Order, and they have
already been improperly trained as to what activities they can and cannot engage in under
the Posse Comitatus Act. Further, President Trump’s recent executive orders and public
statements regarding the National Guard raise serious concerns as to whether he intends to
order troops to violate the Posse Comitatus Act elsewhere in California. See, e.g., Exec.
Order No. 14,339, § 2(d)(ii), 90 Fed. Reg. 42121 (Aug. 25, 2025) (ordering the Secretary
of Defense to ensure that state National Guard units are trained “in quelling civil
disturbances and ensuring the public safety and order whenever the circumstances
necessitate”); C-SPAN, President Trump Holds Cabinet Meeting at 3:12:29–40 (Aug. 27,
2025), available at https://tinyurl.com/bb6sa5bp (regarding deployment and use of the
National Guard in Chicago: “I have the right to do anything I want to do. I’m the
President of the United States. If I think our country is in danger, and it is in danger in
these cities, I can do it.”). Injunctive relief is therefore appropriate
For the foregoing reasons, the Court ORDERS that Defendants29 are enjoined from
deploying, ordering, instructing, training, or using the National Guard currently deployed
in California, and any military troops heretofore deployed in California, to execute the
laws, including but not limited to engaging in arrests, apprehensions, searches, seizures,
security patrols, traffic control, crowd control, riot control, evidence collection,
interrogation, or acting as informants, unless and until Defendants satisfy the requirements
of a valid constitutional or statutory exception, as defined herein, to the Posse Comitatus
Act. The Court STAYS this injunction until 12:00 noon on Friday, September 12, 2025.
