For weeks, President Donald Trump had been threatening to deploy members of the United States military to San Francisco, California.
But on Thursday, Trump made a sudden about-face, announcing he would not push forward with a “surge” of troops to the Democratic stronghold – at least, for now.
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“The Federal Government was preparing to ‘surge’ San Francisco, California, on Saturday, but friends of mine who live in the area called last night to ask me not to go forward with the surge,” Trump wrote on his online platform, Truth Social.
The Republican leader credited Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and Salesforce cofounder Marc Benioff, two titans of the tech industry, with helping to convince him to reverse course.
Trump added that he had also spoken with San Francisco’s mayor, centrist Democrat Daniel Lurie. But in relaying their call, the president hinted that Thursday’s decision may not be his final word on the matter.
“He asked, very nicely, that I give him a chance to see if he can turn it around,” Trump said of Lurie in his post.
“I told him I think he is making a mistake, because we can do it much faster, and remove the criminals that the Law does not permit him to remove. I told him, ‘It’s an easier process if we do it, faster, stronger, and safer but, let’s see how you do?’”
‘Cruel, un-American tactics’
Since taking office for a second term in January, Trump has led a campaign of mass deportation that has prompted protests and concerns about human rights violations.
Trump has answered those protests, in part, by sending National Guard troops to major cities with the stated aim of protecting federal immigration agents.
But critics, including California Governor Gavin Newsom, have repeatedly warned that the military deployments not only ratchet up tensions but run afoul of the law.
Lurie, one of the heirs to the Levi Strauss jeans company fortune, was among those critics.
On Wednesday, bracing for an impending deployment, the mayor gave a news conference surrounded by city officials, calling on the residents of San Francisco to stand united.
“We have already seen this federal administration deploy cruel, un-American tactics to target immigrant communities in our city. If we see these kinds of tactics used again or escalated, we will protest,” Lurie said.
He emphasised that local law enforcement would not assist federal forces in carrying out immigration raids.
“San Francisco will never stand by as our neighbours are targeted, and neither will I,” Lurie continued.
The state government of California, meanwhile, had warned earlier in the week that it was prepared to sue as soon as any federalised National Guard troops arrived in San Francisco.
The Posse Comitatus Act, it pointed out, expressly prohibits federal troops from acting as civilian law enforcement, unless called upon by the state.
In a statement, Governor Newsom, who is considered a leading Democratic contender in the next presidential race, compared Trump’s actions to those of a “wannabe tyrant”.
“The notion that the federal government can deploy troops into our cities with no justification grounded in reality, no oversight, no accountability, no respect for state sovereignty – it’s a direct assault on the rule of law,” Newsom said.
Series of crackdowns
But despite outcry from states like California and Illinois, Trump has pushed ahead with National Guard deployments, leading to a spate of lawsuits.
California continues to be embroiled in a legal fight over Trump’s decision to send troops to Los Angeles in June, when the city convulsed with protests and outrage over immigration raids at workplaces, shopping centres and parks.
Demonstrations, the majority of them peaceful, spilled into the streets. Trump nevertheless accused protesters of being violent and sent as many as 4,000 members of the California National Guard to the city, over Newsom’s opposition.
While Newsom has argued that the deployment was a violation of the Posse Comitatus Act, the Trump administration has cited lines from the US Code as justification.
The US Code allows for the federalisation of state National Guard troops if there is the threat of invasion or rebellion, or if the federal government is unable to otherwise carry out its laws.
Though the Los Angeles protests have largely subsided, the Trump administration has proceeded to send National Guard troops to other Democrat-led jurisdictions, despite pushback from local leaders.
Earlier this month, for instance, Trump authorised the National Guard to go to Chicago, Illinois, prompting a lawsuit from that state.
And in late September, the president announced on Truth Social he would send troops to “war-ravaged” Portland, Oregon, a move that was blocked by an emergency court petition.
Meanwhile, Trump has touted the benefits of military deployments to Washington, DC, and Memphis, Tennessee, arguing that the presence of the troops lowered crime in both cities.
San Francisco on the radar
As a longtime left-wing bastion, San Francisco has long been a punching bag for Trump and other Republicans.
Even on the campaign trail, the president took shots at the city’s Democratic leadership, blaming it for San Francisco’s “destruction”.
But in recent weeks, Trump closed in on the city as the subject of his next crime and immigration crackdown.
“We’re going to go in San Francisco,” Trump told Fox News on October 19. “San Francisco was truly one of the great cities of the world. And then, 15 years ago, it went wrong. It went woke.”
Trump’s decision to reverse course on Thursday mirrored that of one of his supporters, Marc Benioff.
The billionaire’s software company, Salesforce, is based in San Francisco, and Benioff holds a weekend-long tech conference in the city every year.
But on the eve of this year’s event, Benioff told The New York Times that he would welcome the National Guard in San Francisco, echoing Republican calls to “clean” up the city.
“We don’t have enough cops, so if they can be cops, I’m all for it,” Benioff said.
Those comments drew instant backlash from city officials, and comedians slated to perform at his annual conference dropped out. Days later, Benioff took to social media to apologise for his comments.
“I do not believe the National Guard is needed to address safety in San Francisco,” Benioff wrote, citing his conversations with locals.
“My earlier comment came from an abundance of caution around the event, and I sincerely apologize for the concern it caused.”
Benioff was among the advisers Trump cited as an influence in Thursday’s decision to back down from his long-threatened deployment.
Already, protests had erupted outside the US Coast Guard facility in Alameda, part of the San Francisco Bay Area.
For his part, Mayor Lurie said he would welcome “continued partnerships” with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) or the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) as the city struggles to reduce accidental overdoses.
But, Lurie added, that invitation did not include military involvement.
“Having the military and militarized immigration enforcement in our city will hinder our recovery,” he said in a statement.