Gov. Gavin Newsom filed a request Sunday searching for information from the Trump administration to clarify why a phalanx of Border Patrol brokers confirmed up outdoors a information convention held by main California Democrats final week.
Newsom filed a Freedom of Data Act request with the U.S. Division of Homeland Safety asking for “all paperwork and information” associated to the Aug. 14 Border Patrol operation in downtown Los Angeles, which occurred outdoors the Japanese American Nationwide Museum in Little Tokyo. On the information convention, Newsom introduced a marketing campaign to hunt voter approval to redraw California’s congressional maps to spice up Democrats’ possibilities of retaking the Home and stymieing Trump’s agenda within the 2026 midterm elections.
“Trump’s use of the army and federal legislation enforcement to attempt to intimidate his political opponents is yet one more harmful step in the direction of authoritarianism,” Newsom posted Sunday on X. “That is an try and advance a playbook from the despots he admires in Russia and North Korea.”
Newsom introduced on the press occasion the “Election Rigging Response Act” — which might scrap independently drawn congressional maps in favor of these sketched by Democratic strategists in an try and counter strikes by Republicans in Texas and different GOP-led states to gerrymander their very own districts to favor Republicans within the 2026 midterms. In the meantime, dozens of armed federal brokers massed within the adjoining streets sporting masks, helmets and camouflage.
Newsom and different main Democrats, together with L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, dismissed the Border Patrol motion as an intimidation tactic. In response to questions from The Instances on Sunday, Division of Homeland Safety spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin mentioned the brokers had been “centered on implementing the legislation, not on [Newsom].”
McLaughlin mentioned two individuals had been arrested throughout the Little Tokyo operation. One was a drug trafficker, in accordance with McLaughlin, who mentioned the opposite was a member of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang that has been a spotlight of the Trump administration’s efforts to make use of the Alien Enemies Act to hurry up deportation efforts.
She didn’t reply to questions on what number of brokers had been deployed or what particular businesses had been concerned within the Aug. 14 operation. Border Patrol Sector Chief Gregory Bovino, who has been main the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration operations in California, was on the scene and briefly spoke to reporters.
McLaughlin didn’t title both particular person arrested or reply to a request for additional data or proof of hyperlinks between the arrests and the Venezuelan gang.
“Below President Trump and [Department of Homeland Security] Secretary [Kristi] Noem, should you break the legislation, you’ll face the implications,” she wrote in an e-mailed assertion. “Prison unlawful aliens should not welcome within the U.S.”
The White Home didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
On Thursday, witnesses on the scene recognized one of many males arrested as Angel, a supply employee who was carrying strawberries when he was captured.
“He was simply doing his regular supply to the courthouse,” mentioned the person’s colleague, Carlos Franco. “It’s fairly unhappy, as a result of I’ve bought to go to work tomorrow, and Angel isn’t going to be there.”
Within the FOIA request, Newsom’s authorized affairs secretary, David Sapp, known as the Border Patrol deployment an “try and intimidate the individuals of California from defending a good electoral course of.”
Along with paperwork associated to the planning of the raid, the FOIA request additionally seeks “any information referencing Governor Newsom or the rally that was scheduled to happen” and communications between federal legislation enforcement officers and Fox Information, which allowed the Trump-friendly media outlet to embed a reporter with Border Patrol that day.
Trump’s elevated use of the army and federal legislation enforcement in opposition to his political rivals has drawn rising concern in latest months. The president deployed the Nationwide Guard and U.S. Marines to quell protests in opposition to immigration raids in Los Angeles earlier this 12 months. Simply final week, Trump despatched swarms of federal legislation enforcement officers to Washington, D.C., to fight what he sees as out-of-control crime, even supposing most crime statistics present violence within the nation’s capital is at a 30-year low.
Though Newsom demanded a solution by early September, the federal authorities is notoriously gradual in responding to FOIA requests and can usually delay responses for years. A spokesman for Newsom didn’t instantly reply to questions on Sunday about what, if any, different authorized steps the governor was ready to take.
Voters must approve Newsom’s plan to redraw the congressional maps in a particular election in November. The brand new maps, drawn by Democratic strategists and lawmakers behind closed doorways as a substitute of the impartial fee that voters beforehand selected, would focus Republican voters in a number of deep-red pockets of the state and eradicate an Inland Empire district lengthy held by the GOP.
In complete, Democrats would doubtless choose up 5 seats in California within the midterms beneath the redrawn maps, probably countering or outpacing Republican efforts to tilt their map crimson in Texas. Different states have already begun to think about redrawing their maps alongside extra partisan traces in response to rising anxieties over the combat to manage the Home of Representatives in 2026.
Instances employees author Seema Mehta contributed to this report.
