Mere hours after a federal judge ruled that control of the National Guard was to be handed back to California Governor Gavin Newsom, an appeals court has blocked the order.
The initial ruling found that Trump had violated the Constitution when he deployed the National Guard to Los Angeles amid widespread anti-ICE protests. Governor Newsom and Mayor Karen Bass both took issue with the maneuver saying that it made the situation worse.
District Judge Charles Breyer said Trump violated the U.S. Constitution’s division of powers between the federal government and states. “His actions were illegal — both exceeding the scope of his statutory authority and violating the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution,” Breyer wrote.
However, several hours later, an appeals court judge, without addressing the merits of Judge Breyer’s ruling, placed the order on hold until a hearing can take place on Tuesday.
The Trump administration has long held that the president has the authority to basically act carte blanche. In fact, White House spokesperson Anna Kelly promised an appeal would come shortly after Breyer’s ruling.
“The district court has no authority to usurp the President’s authority as Commander in Chief,” she said according to the Associated Press. “The President exercised his lawful authority to mobilize the National Guard to protect federal buildings and personnel in Gavin Newsom’s lawless Los Angeles.”
Before the reversal, Newsom had planned to send the 4,000 National Guard troops to their regular posts, but instead, they are still facing off with protesters.
This was the first time in a 60 years that a president had deployed the National Guard. In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson deployed them to protect civil rights demonstrators in Alabama.
