Los Angeles, June 14 (UNI) The US government has deployed over 200 Marines to Los Angeles to protect the Wilshire Federal Building following mass protests against the Trump administration’s immigration policy, said military officials.
As per CBS News, US Army Major General Scott Sherman, commander of the Task Force 51, which includes more than 4,000 California Army National Guard soldiers and about 700 marines, said at a press briefing that the marines had full training in containing civil disturbance.
However, they were deployed to protect the federal building and as such will only contain unrest to that point, and will not be participating in law enforcement activities.
Sherman confirmed that the National Guard soldiers who have been deployed since Sunday have also not participated in law enforcement activity. No troops have been injured since arriving in L.A.
"They have watched federal law enforcement arrest personnel as they were protecting," Sherman said. "They have not had to detain anyone at this point."
It's not yet clear what assignments the other 500 deployed Marines will receive in L.A. Sherman said he couldn't speculate on future operations, but recent training has centered around defending federal property.
"That's the mission we've really focused on them to do," he said. "They've already started with the Wilshire (Federal) Building today, and we will progress from there."
The 17-story federal building on Wilshire Boulevard is home to many of Los Angeles' federal offices, including the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Los Angeles field office.
President Donald Trump has made decisions to dispatch over 4,000 National Guard members and about 700 active-duty marines to the Los Angeles area despite the objection of California Governor Gavin Newsom and other local officials.
About 2,800 service members, including 2,100 National Guard soldiers and 700 Marines, were deployed to the greater Los Angeles area, said U.S. Northern Command in a news release on Wednesday, adding that the Marines had completed required training and would be serving alongside National Guard soldiers within the next 48 hours.
The Marines were reportedly undergoing civil disturbance training at Naval Weapons Station Seal Beach in Orange County, located south of Los Angeles.
The deployment comes amid Trump administration obtaining a swift legal victory on Thursday night when a federal appeals court blocked a lower court's order issued just hours earlier that would have returned 4,000 California National Guard troops to state control, allowing the military deployment in Los Angeles to continue, reports Guardian.
The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals issued an emergency stay just hours after U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer ruled Thursday evening that Trump had illegally federalised California's National Guard and violated the Constitution.
Trump’s use of the troops follows earlier, unfulfilled threats during the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests in his first administration, when he considered, but ultimately declined, to deploy federal troops and has since expressed regret about not cracking down more forcefully.
The president has defended his decision to send troops to LA claiming without any evidence that the city would have been “obliterated” and “burned to the ground” had he not initiated the deployment.
The appellate court's new order not only allows the National Guard troops to continue operating under federal command but also indicates that the legal battle between Washington and the Golden State will continue.
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