US cities are braced for more protests, with parts of Los Angeles under curfew

LOS ANGELES - Several US cities braced themselves for protests on June 11 against President Donald Trump’s sweeping immigration raids, as parts of the country’s second-largest city Los Angeles spent the night under curfew in an effort to quell five days of unrest.

Officials were also preparing for nationwide anti-Trump demonstrations on June 14, when tanks and armoured vehicles will rumble down the streets of Washington in a military parade marking the US Army’s 250th anniversary and coinciding with the President’s 79th birthday.

The Governor of Texas, Republican Greg Abbott, said he will deploy the National Guard this week, ahead of planned protests. Protesters and police in Austin clashed on June 9.

Already this week, demonstrations have broken out in Austin, New York, Atlanta and Chicago, among other cities.

Mr Trump’s extraordinary measures of sending the National Guard and Marines to quell protests in Los Angeles has sparked a national debate on the use of the military on US soil and pitted the Republican President against California’s Democratic Governor, Mr Gavin Newsom.

Mr Trump has claimed that the deployment prevented the violence from raging out of control, an assertion Mr Newsom and other local officials said was the opposite of the truth.

“This brazen abuse of power by a sitting president inflamed a combustible situation, putting our people, our officers and even our National Guard at risk. That is when the downward spiral began,” Mr Newsom said in a video address on June 10.

“He again chose escalation. He chose more force. He chose theatrics over public safety... Democracy is under assault.”

Mr Newsom – widely seen as preparing for a presidential run in 2028 – and the state of California sued Mr Trump and the Defence Department on June 9 to block the deployment of federal troops. Mr Trump, in turn, has suggested Mr Newsom should be arrested.

Hundreds of US Marines arrived in the Los Angeles area on June 10 under orders from Mr Trump, after he also ordered the deployment of 4,000 National Guard troops to the city. The Marines and National Guard are to be used in the protection of government personnel and buildings, and not in police action.

About 700 Marines were in a staging area in the Seal Beach area, about 50km south of Los Angeles, on June 10, awaiting deployment to specific locations, a US official said.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said the deployments were not necessary as police could manage the protests, the majority of which have been peaceful and limited to about five streets. However, due to looting and violence at night, she imposed a curfew over one square mile of the city's downtown, starting from the night of June 10. The curfew will last several days.

Police said multiple groups stayed on the streets in some areas despite the curfew, and “mass arrests” were initiated.

Democratic leaders have raised concerns over a national crisis in what has become the most intense flashpoint in the Trump administration’s efforts to deport migrants living in the country illegally, and then to crack down on opponents who take to the streets in protest.

Mr Trump, voted back into office in 2024, largely for his promise to deport undocumented immigrants, used a speech honouring soldiers on June 10 to defend his decision.

He told troops at the army base in Fort Bragg, North Carolina: “Generations of army heroes did not shed their blood on distant shores only to watch our country be destroyed by invasion and third-world lawlessness.”

Full-blown assault

“What you are witnessing in California is a full-blown assault on peace, on public order and on national sovereignty, carried out by rioters bearing foreign flags,” Mr Trump said, adding that his administration would “liberate Los Angeles”.

Demonstrators have waved the flags of Mexico and other countries in solidarity with the migrants rounded up in a series of intensifying raids.

Homeland Security said on June 9 that its Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) division had arrested 2,000 immigration offenders per day recently, far above the 311 daily average in fiscal year 2024 under former president Joe Biden.

Protests have also taken place in other cities, including New York, Atlanta and Chicago, where demonstrators shouted at and scuffled with officers. Some protesters in Chicago climbed onto the Picasso sculpture in Daley Plaza, while others chanted that ICE should be abolished.

Texas Governor Abbott said late on June 10 that he will deploy the National Guard, which “will use every tool and strategy to help law enforcement maintain order”.

“Texas National Guard will be deployed to locations across the state to ensure peace and order. Peaceful protest is legal. Harming a person or property is illegal and will lead to arrest,” Mr Abbott posted on X.

South Texas organisations are expected to hold anti-ICE rallies on June 11 and June 14, CNN reported local media as saying.

California Attorney-General Rob Bonta told Reuters the state was concerned about allowing federal troops to protect personnel, saying there was a risk that could violate an 1878 law that generally forbids the US military, including the National Guard, from taking part in civilian law enforcement.

“Protecting personnel likely means accompanying ICE agents into communities and neighbourhoods, and protecting functions could mean protecting the ICE function of enforcing the immigration law,” Mr Bonta said.

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement on June 10 posted photos on X of National Guard troops accompanying ICE officers on an immigration raid. Trump administration officials have vowed to redouble the immigration raids in response to the street protests.

The last time the military was used for direct police action under the Insurrection Act was in 1992, when the California governor at the time asked then President George H.W. Bush to help respond to Los Angeles riots over the acquittal of police officers who beat black motorist Rodney King. REUTERS