SAN FRANCISCO — About 24 hours after President Trump declared San Francisco such a crime-ridden “mess” that he was recommending federal forces be despatched to revive order, Manit Limlamai, 43, and Kai Saetern, 32, rolled their eyes on the suggestion.
The pair — each within the software program business — had been with pals Thursday in Dolores Park, a vibrant inexperienced area with sweeping views of downtown, taking part in volleyball underneath a blue sky and shining autumn solar. Throughout them, individuals sat on benches with books, flew kites, performed with canines or in any other case lounged away the afternoon on blankets within the grass.
Each Limlamai and Saetern stated San Francisco in fact has points, and a few rougher neighborhoods — however that’s any metropolis.
“I’ve lived right here for 10 years and I haven’t felt unsafe, and I’ve lived all around the metropolis,” Saetern stated. “Each metropolis has its issues, and I don’t suppose San Francisco is any totally different,” however “it’s not a hellscape,” stated Limlamai, who has been within the metropolis since 2021.
Each stated Trump’s suggestion that he may ship in troops was extra alarming than reassuring — particularly, Limlamai stated, on high of his latest comment that American cities ought to function “coaching grounds” for U.S. navy forces.
“I don’t suppose that’s acceptable in any respect,” he stated. “The navy will not be educated to do what must be completed in these cities.”
Throughout San Francisco, residents, guests and distinguished native leaders expressed related concepts — if not a lot sharper condemnation of any troop deployment. None shied away from the truth that San Francisco has issues, particularly with homelessness. A number of additionally talked about a creeping city decay, and that the town wants a little bit of a polish.
However federal troops? That was a tough no.
A variety of individuals on Market Avenue in downtown San Francisco on Thursday.
“It’s simply extra of [Trump’s] madness,” stated Peter Hill, 81, as he performed chess in a barely edgier park close to Metropolis Corridor. Hill stated utilizing troops domestically was a fascist energy play, and “a nasty factor for the complete nation.”
“It’s fascism,” agreed native activist Wendy Aragon, who was hailing a cab close by. Her Latino household has been within the nation for generations, she stated, however she now fears talking Spanish on the road provided that immigration brokers have admitted focusing on individuals who look or sound Latino, and troops within the metropolis would solely exacerbate these fears. “My group is underneath assault proper now.”
State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) stated troop deployments to the town had been “fully pointless” and “typical Trump: petty, vindictive retaliation.”
“He needs to assault anybody who he perceives as an enemy, and that features cities, and so he began with L.A. and Southern California due to its massive immigrant group, after which he proceeded to cities with massive Black populations like Chicago, and now he’s transferring on to cities which might be simply perceived as very lefty like Portland and now San Francisco,” Wiener stated.
Abigail Jackson, a White Home spokesperson, defended such deployments and famous crime reductions in cities, together with Washington, D.C., and Memphis, the place native officers — together with D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat — have embraced them.
“America’s as soon as nice cities have descended into chaos and crime on account of Democrat insurance policies that put criminals first and law-abiding residents final. Making America Secure Once more — particularly crime-ridden cities — was a key marketing campaign promise from the President that the American individuals elected him to meet,” Jackson stated. “San Francisco Democrats ought to have a look at the large ends in DC and Memphis and hearken to fellow Democrat Mayor Bowser and welcome the President in to wash up their metropolis.”
A police officer shuts the door to his automobile after an individual was allegedly caught carrying a knife close to an indication selling an AI-powered museum exhibit in downtown San Francisco.
A presidential ‘ardour’
San Francisco — a bastion of liberal politics that overwhelmingly voted towards Trump within the final election — has been derided by the conservative proper for generations as an awesome American jewel misplaced to harmful progressive insurance policies.
With its tech-heavy financial system and downtown core hit exhausting by the pandemic and the nation’s shift towards distant work, the town has had a very tough go lately, which solely exacerbated its picture as a metropolis in decline. That it produced a few of Trump’s most distinguished political opponents — together with Gov. Gavin Newsom and former Vice President Kamala Harris — has solely made it extra of a punching bag.
In August, Trump instructed San Francisco wanted federal intervention. “You have a look at what the Democrats have completed to San Francisco — they’ve destroyed it,” he stated within the Oval Workplace. “We’ll clear that one up, too.”
Then, earlier this month, to the chagrin of liberal leaders throughout the town, Marc Benioff, the billionaire Salesforce founder and Time journal proprietor who has lengthy been a booster of San Francisco, stated in an interview with the New York Occasions that he supported Trump and welcomed Guard troops within the metropolis.
“We don’t have sufficient cops, so if they are often cops, I’m all for it,” Benioff stated, simply as his firm was getting ready to open its annual Dreamforce conference within the metropolis, full with tons of of personal safety officers.
The U.S. Structure usually precludes navy forces from serving in police roles within the U.S.
On Friday, Benioff reversed himself and apologized for his earlier stance. “Having listened carefully to my fellow San Franciscans and our native officers, and after the most important and most secure Dreamforce in our historical past, I don’t consider the Nationwide Guard is required to deal with security in San Francisco,” he wrote on X.
He additionally apologized for “the priority” his earlier help for troops within the metropolis had triggered, and praised San Francisco’s new mayor, Daniel Lurie, for bringing crime down.
Billionaire Elon Musk, the chief govt of Tesla, additionally referred to as for federal intervention within the metropolis, writing on his X platform that downtown San Francisco is “a drug zombie apocalypse” and that federal intervention was “the one answer at this level.”
Trump made his newest remarks bashing San Francisco on Wednesday, once more from the Oval Workplace.
Trump stated it was “one among our nice cities 10 years in the past, 15 years in the past,” however “now it’s a large number” — and that he was recommending federal forces transfer into the town to make it safer. “I’m gonna be strongly recommending — on the request of presidency officers, which is at all times good — that you simply begin San Francisco,” he stated to main members of his regulation enforcement group.
Trump didn’t specify precisely what kind of deployment he meant, or which sorts of federal forces is perhaps concerned. He additionally didn’t say which native officers had allegedly requested assist — a declare Wiener referred to as a lie.
“Each American deserves to dwell in a group the place they’re not afraid of being mugged, murdered, robbed, raped, assaulted or shot, and that’s precisely what our administration is working to ship,” Trump stated, earlier than including that sending federal forces into American cities had turn into “a ardour” of his.
Kai Saetern, 32, was taking part in volleyball in Dolores Park on Thursday. Saetern stated he has by no means felt unsafe residing in neighborhoods all around the metropolis for the final 10 years.
Crime is down citywide
The responses from San Francisco, each to Benioff and Trump, got here swiftly, starting from calm discouragement to full-blown outrage.
Lurie didn’t reply immediately, however his workplace pointed reporters to his latest statements that crime is down 30% citywide, homicides are at a 70-year low, automobile break-ins are at a 22-year low and tent encampments are at their lowest quantity on report.
“We’ve quite a lot of work to do,” Lurie stated. “However I belief our native regulation enforcement.”
San Francisco Dist. Atty. Brooke Jenkins was rather more fiery, writing on-line that Trump and Homeland Safety Secretary Kristi Noem had turned “so-called public security and immigration enforcement right into a type of authorities sponsored violence towards U.S. residents, households, and ethnic teams,” and that she stood able to prosecute federal officers in the event that they hurt metropolis residents.
Attendees exit the Dreamforce conference downtown on Thursday in San Francisco.
“For those who come to San Francisco and illegally harass our residents … I can’t hesitate to do my job and maintain you accountable similar to I do different violators of the regulation each single day,” she stated.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) — whose seat Wiener is reportedly going to hunt — stated the town “doesn’t need or want Donald Trump’s chaos” and can proceed to extend public security regionally and “with out the interference of a President looking for headlines.”
Newsom stated the usage of federal troops in American cities is a “clear violation” of federal regulation, and that the state was ready to problem any such deployment to San Francisco in court docket, simply because it challenged such deployments in Los Angeles earlier this 12 months.
The federal appellate court docket that oversees California and far of the American West has to this point allowed troops to stay in L.A., however is about to proceed listening to arguments within the L.A. case quickly.
Trump had used anti-immigration enforcement protests in L.A. as a justification to ship troops there. In San Francisco, Newsom stated, he lacks any justification or “pretext” in any way.
“There’s no current protest at a federal constructing. There’s no operation that’s being impeded. I suppose it’s only a ‘coaching floor’ for the President of United States,” Newsom stated. “It’s grossly unlawful, it’s immoral, it’s quite delusional.”
Nancy DeStefanis, 76, a longtime labor and environmental activist who was at San Francisco Metropolis Corridor on Thursday to complain about Golden Gate Park being shut to common guests for paid occasions, was equally derisive of troops getting into the town.
“So far as I’m involved, and I believe most San Franciscans are involved, we don’t need troops right here. We don’t want them,” she stated.
Passengers stroll previous a cracked window from the Civic Heart BART station in downtown San Francisco.
‘A picture I don’t wish to see’
Not distant, throngs of individuals sporting Dreamforce lanyards streamed out and in of the Moscone Heart, heading forwards and backwards to close by Market Avenue and pouring into eating places, espresso retailers and take-out joints. Town’s issues — together with homelessness and related grittiness — had been obvious on the corners of the crowds, at the same time as chipper conference ambassadors and safety officers moved would-be stragglers alongside.
Not everybody was eager to be recognized discussing Trump or security within the metropolis, with some citing enterprise causes and others a worry of Trump retaliating towards them. However a number of individuals had opinions.
Sanjiv, a self-described “techie” in his mid-50s, stated he most popular to make use of solely his first identify as a result of, though he’s a U.S. citizen now, he emigrated from India and didn’t wish to stick his neck out by publicly criticizing Trump.
He referred to as homelessness a “rampant drawback” in San Francisco, however much less so than up to now — and hardly one thing that will justify sending in navy troops.
“It’s completely ridiculous,” he stated. “It’s not like the town’s underneath siege.”
Claire Roeland, 30, from Austin, Texas, stated she has visited San Francisco a handful of occasions lately and had “blended” experiences. She has household who dwell in surrounding neighborhoods and discover it fully protected, she stated, however when she’s on the town it’s “predominantly within the enterprise district” — the place it’s exhausting to not be disheartened by the apparent struggling of individuals with habit and psychological sickness and the grime that has amassed within the emptied-out core.
“There’s quite a lot of unlucky city decay taking place, and that makes you are feeling extra unsafe than you truly are,” she stated, however there isn’t “any practical have to ship in federal troops.”
She stated she doesn’t know what troops would do apart from confront homeless individuals, and “that’s a picture I don’t wish to see.”
Occasions workers author Dakota Smith contributed to this report.
