‘Assault on peace’: Trump derides LA protesters in speech to troops

Donald Trump tells army troops the protesters demonstrating over immigration enforcement are animals and professional agitators.

Donald Trump addresses troops at Fort Bragg. Picture; Getty Images/AFP.

President Trump derided protesters demonstrating over immigration enforcement in California, calling them animals and professional agitators, as he stood in front of uniformed Army soldiers, who at times cheered and applauded during the speech.

The politically charged remarks on Tuesday came one day after U.S. Marines were deployed to the Los Angeles area, where days of protests over the president’s immigration-enforcement crackdown have engulfed parts of the city. About 4,000 National Guard troops have been mobilised as well.

“What you’re witnessing in California is a full-blown assault on peace, on public order and on national sovereignty carried out by rioters bearing foreign flags with the aim of continuing a foreign invasion of our country,” Trump said at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. “We’re not going to let that happen.”

Donald Trump speaks at Fort Bragg. Picture: AFP.

The speech was billed as a salute to the U.S. Army as it celebrates its 250th anniversary, but the president’s remarks veered toward other subjects, including the protests. “We will not allow federal agents to be attacked and will not allow an American city to be invaded and conquered by a foreign enemy. That’s what they are,” Trump said.

He added of the protesters: “These guys are professionals. These are not amateurs.” As he spoke, dozens of Army soldiers assembled behind him signalled their approval of the president’s remarks. The soldiers booed the media, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, transgender athletes and former President Joe Biden.

The Defence Department has historically frowned upon such behaviour by troops in its bid to keep the military apolitical.

“All members of the Armed Forces should always avoid actions that could reasonably be perceived as implying DoD sponsorship, approval, or endorsement of partisan political activity,” the Pentagon advises. A Fort Bragg spokeswoman said the troops standing behind the president were told not to be demonstrative or show any political leanings during the president’s speech.

Los Angeles Police Department officers push away a camera crew during a protest on Monday. Picture: Stephen Lam/San Francisco Chronicle via AP

The decision to deploy active-duty troops was the first time in more than three decades that Marines have been sent into a U.S. city to address civil unrest.

Local elected officials have said that Trump’s response has at times caused the protests to intensify. California officials on Tuesday urged a federal judge in San Francisco to quickly intervene and block the National Guard or Marines from being used for law enforcement.

“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. They must be stopped, immediately,” the state said in a court filing. A hearing has been set for Thursday.

Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, in a hearing before the House Appropriations Committee, also defended the deployment on Tuesday, describing protesters as “rioters, looters and thugs” who endangered federal agents.

The mission will cost the Pentagon at least $134 million for additional troop pay, food, transportation and other logistics, according to Bryn MacDonnell, the Pentagon’s acting comptroller, who testified alongside Hegseth.

The president, wearing a maroon hat in a nod to the Airborne forces, said in Tuesday’s speech he decided to deploy thousands of National Guard troops and Marines to protect law enforcement from what he described as “attacks of a vicious and violent mob, and some of the radical left.”

The protesters, he said, “are animals.”

“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 here at home like is happening in California,” Trump said. “As commander-in-chief I will not let that happen.” Earlier on Tuesday, the president warned that any protesters who show up at the military parade to celebrate the Army’s anniversary in Washington, D.C., on Saturday “will be met with very heavy force” as well.

Newsom, a Democrat, has criticised the use of the Marines, writing on X on Monday that Hegseth “is illegally deploying them onto American streets so Trump can have a talking point at his parade this weekend.” The protests, which began in Los Angeles on Friday, continued over the weekend and into the week, and have spread to other cities as well. The Los Angeles Police Department said more than 100 people were arrested during protests that lasted into the early hours of Tuesday. Nearly all of those arrested were accused of failure to disperse.

California National Guardsmen remained stationed in downtown Los Angeles on Tuesday afternoon. They stood with riot shields in a ring outside the Metropolitan Detention Center, where union leader David Huerta had been held until Monday. Los Angeles police declared an unlawful assembly and issued a dispersal order for a small area next to the detention centre, saying projectiles had been thrown at officers. Less-lethal munitions have been authorised in the area and officers have begun making arrests, officials said in a post on X.

At a federal building nearby, maintenance workers cleaned graffiti such as “Kill all ICE agents” and “When tyranny becomes law, rebellion becomes duty”.

Though U.S. officials have said the role of the National Guard and Marines in Los Angeles will be limited, the broad nature of the order has spurred concerns that it could be laying the foundation for future military actions against protesters elsewhere in the U.S.

“I feel like we’ve all been, in Los Angeles, a part of a grand experiment to see what happens when the federal government decides they want to roll up on a state, or roll up on a city, and take over,” Mayor Karen Bass said at a news conference on Tuesday.

Police officers in riot gear stand during a demonstration in LA. Picture: AFP

Peaceful demonstrations

Flare-ups continued across Los Angeles overnight after a day of mostly peaceful demonstrations over immigration enforcement that saw the Trump administration take the rare step of deploying active-duty Marines to the area.

Mayor Karen Bass called on the federal government to stop the Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids that spurred the protests and condemned demonstrators who damaged the city. “Let me be clear: ANYONE who vandalised Downtown or looted stores does not care about our immigrant communities. You will be held accountable,” she said in an X post.

California officials have filed a lawsuit challenging the deployments, and on Tuesday they urged a federal judge in San Francisco to quickly intervene and block troops from being used for law enforcement.

“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. They must be stopped, immediately,” the filing said.

Police officers in riot gear clash with protesters. Picture: AFP

In New York City, police arrested about two dozen protesters after they refused to leave the lobby of Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue.

Earlier on Monday in Los Angeles, a confrontation occurred between a group of protesters and law-enforcement officials. Officers guarding a federal building in the city’s downtown moved to disperse a crowd that had faced off against the National Guard and police for several hours.

Protesters in the crowd began throwing objects at officers, Los Angeles police said. Officers used their shields to advance in a line and pushed the crowd back.

Thousands of people also gathered for a rally organised by the California chapter of the Service Employees International Union to call for the release of its president, David Huerta.

Rally attendees, many wearing union shirts, chanted “They come for one, they come for us all,” and “Todos somos Huerta” — or “We are all Huerta” — in Spanish. There was little police presence at the event.

Huerta was released on bail in the afternoon and charged with conspiracy to impede an officer after being arrested while protesting a raid by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the city’s downtown on Friday.

The unrest that has gripped the city since Friday started when federal agents arrested several immigrants during a targeted operation, igniting protests that spread quickly across the city into neighbouring Paramount, Calif., where agents conducted more arrests. ICE says it made more than 100 arrests last week.

Trump, who won his re-election campaign on a pledge to crack down on illegal immigration, has embraced fights with Democrats who have said his tactics go beyond his constitutional limits.

Though US officials have said the role of the National Guard and Marines in Los Angeles will be limited, the broad nature of the order has spurred concerns that it could also be laying the foundations for future military actions against protesters elsewhere in the country.

Wall Street Journal