LA riots live updates: Los Angeles police begin ‘mass arrests’ after downtown curfew kicks in

Dozens have been arrested as LA police crack down on growing protest groups defying curfew orders. Follow for live updates.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass has imposed an emergency curfew, which will last several days, on downtown LA after five nights of unrest and vandalism.

“I have declared a local emergency and issued a curfew for downtown Los Angeles to stop the vandalism, to stop the looting,” she told reporters on Tuesday night.

Marines arrived in Los Angeles and rallies against immigration raids spread across the US as protesters clashed with police in New York and Chicago, where a car drove towards demonstrators.

Dozens of people were arrested as armed police and the mounted unit moved in from all sides, attempting to funnel the crowd through a small exit.

Thousands of law enforcement officers surrounded the blocks covered by the curfew.

As tensions soared, US President Donald Trump called protesters in Los Angeles “animals” and “a foreign enemy” in a speech at Fort Bragg army base in North Carolina as he defended deploying the military to the city, which he labelled a “trash heap”.

Asked earlier in the Oval Office if he intended to invoke the Insurrection Act, a mechanism that would allow active duty military to employ lethal force against Americans, Mr Trump said: “If there’s an insurrection, I would certainly invoke it. We’ll see.”

FOLLOW LIVE UPDATES BELOW:

Originally published as LA riots live updates: Los Angeles police begin ‘mass arrests’ after downtown curfew kicks in