• On 6 June, Ice carried out a series of arrests targeting alleged undocumented migrants in Los Angeles.
• Residents and activists took to the streets to protest, and law enforcement responded with a heavy crackdown on the demonstrations.
• The situation soon returned to calm, but Trump dispatched 4,000 reservists and 700 marines to Los Angeles.

Over the past few days, protests have erupted in Los Angeles and other American cities against the immigration crackdown and the repressive drift of the Trump administration. It all began on 6 June, when Ice, the federal agency responsible for border security and immigration enforcement, carried out a series of arrests targeting alleged undocumented migrants in a brutal manner and allegedly outside the bounds of the law. Residents, activists, legal representatives and NGO members took to the streets to protest, and law enforcement responded with a harsh crackdown on the demonstrations. In the days that followed, protests continued in Los Angeles, spreading to the rest of the country, while Donald Trump responded by mobilising the military and overriding California's state authority. This led to a bitter clash with Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, who announced a lawsuit against the American president.

The protests in Los Angeles

On Friday 6 June, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents carried out raids across several areas of Los Angeles, focusing primarily on businesses with a high concentration of immigrant workers, such as clothing stores and warehouses. The operation is part of the immigration crackdown implemented by the Trump administration, which in recent months has intensified deportations and arrests, even going so far as to block visas for foreign students at Harvard University.

According to eyewitness accounts, workers who were stopped were pushed against walls and interrogated for extended periods. Over the course of the day, at least 44 arrests were made and, as the Immigrant Defenders Law Center (ImmDef) denounced, these individuals were held for long periods in the basement of a federal building, without being provided food, water or other basic necessities.

The operations sparked outrage among residents, many of whom are of Latin origin. The demonstrations, which in several cases featured Mexican flags alongside those of the United States, began peacefully and were attended by legal representatives with expertise in immigration law. However, riot-gear-clad law enforcement then intervened, deploying tear gas, pepper spray and rubber bullets, and striking an Australian journalist in the process. This escalated tensions, and in the hours that followed protesters threw stones and set vehicles on fire, organising pickets outside the facilities where those arrested were being held. Protests also took place in the neighbouring cities of Paramount and Compton.

The arrival of the military

By the morning of Saturday 7 June, the situation in Los Angeles was peaceful, as declared by local police. Despite this, President Donald Trump ordered the deployment to the Californian city of 2,000 National Guard soldiers, the primary reserve force of the American military. Normally it is state governors who request the intervention of the National Guard in emergency situations, and only in rare cases does such a mobilisation occur directly at the president's behest. The last such instance had occurred in 1992 during the large-scale Los Angeles riots, which bear no comparison to the sporadic protests of recent days.

Oss Repressione @OssRepressione

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8 giugno 2025 LOS ANGELES BRUCIARivolta contro le deportazioni a Los Angeles. Terzo giorno di guerriglia.

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Trump's unilateral move — justified as necessary to restore order and accompanied by accusations against California Governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass of having failed to adequately manage the situation — raised tensions further. Over the course of the weekend, new protests broke out in Los Angeles with dozens of arrests. The demonstrations then spread to San Francisco, New York, Dallas, Austin and other American cities, becoming a widespread wave of protest against President Donald Trump's policies and his authoritarian methods. The president responded by sending additional National Guard soldiers to Los Angeles, bringing the total to 4,000 troops. And on Monday 9 June, he also dispatched 700 marines to the Californian city.

California vs Trump

In recent days, Donald Trump has described the situation in Los Angeles in terms that bear little resemblance to reality. The protests, which began peacefully and turned violent due to the brutal methods of repression employed by law enforcement, were attended by a few hundred people. The White House's narrative, however, portrayed a city in chaos, overrun by "hordes of violent migrants" and in the grip of a serious emergency. A strategy aimed at escalating tensions and justifying the deployment of troops to a Democrat-governed state, as Trump has repeatedly insinuated in the past when denouncing the rival party's supposed inability to guarantee order and security.

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NOW: Over ten thousand march against ICE through downtown Los Angeles, demanding an end to the raids and calling for the National Guard to leave the city.

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California Governor Gavin Newsom condemned the actions of the Trump administration, accusing it of "sowing chaos" and violating the civil rights of Californians. He filed a lawsuit against the federal government to halt the use of the National Guard in policing operations without state consent, emphasising that California has the right to protect its citizens and to independently manage its own security forces. The lawsuit specifically highlights that President Trump "used a protest that local authorities had under control to carry out another unprecedented power grab at the expense of California's sovereignty, disregarding the authority and role of the governor as commander-in-chief of the state's national guard". Newsom also criticised Ice's modus operandi, noting that the agency failed to coordinate its operations with local police and employed repressive methods against protesters.