Daily Caller: Department Of Transportation Threatens To Defund Cities That Don’t Cooperate With ICE

Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy announced Monday that the Department of Transportation (DOT) will withhold funding from states and cities that do not work with the Trump administration on immigration enforcement and riot control.

“Rogue state actors who refuse to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement” will not receive funding from the DOT, Duffy said in a post on X.

“Don’t expect a red cent from DOT, either. Follow the law, or forfeit the funding,” Duffy said.

Yet another illegal withholding of funds that our courts will have to waste time on!

Trump accused these cities of being the “core of the Democrat Power Center,” as he says they “use Illegal Aliens to expand their Voter Base, cheat in Elections, and grow the Welfare State, robbing good paying Jobs and Benefits from Hardworking American Citizens.”

Goofy!

https://dailycaller.com/2025/06/16/dept-of-transportation-dot-defund-cities-ice-deportation-riots-los-angeles

Law & Crime: ‘Different in kind’: 4-star generals, admirals serving from JFK to Obama say Los Angeles ICE protests don’t warrant deployment of National Guard to California

4-star admirals, generals serving from JFK to Obama warn Trump’s deployment of National Guard poses ‘potentially grave risk’

Ahead of a Zoom hearing scheduled for Tuesday at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, a group of retired four-star generals and admirals who served under presidents ranging from John F. Kennedy to Barack Obama filed court documents warning that President Donald Trump’s federalization of the California National Guard and deployment of U.S. Marines poses “potentially grave risk of irreparable harm.”

Seeking the appellate court’s leave to file a brief and enter the case as amici curiae — Latin for “friends of the court” — the retired generals, admirals, and former U.S. Army and Navy secretaries did not explicitly take Gov. Gavin Newsom’s side in the case. They did suggest Sunday, however, that the Trump administration’s bid for an emergency stay of a lower-court ruling and continued push to quell “violent riots” in Los Angeles amid nationwide “No Kings” protests over ICE raids may not pass legal muster when compared to historical precedents.

Again, although the retired admirals and generals did not support either party to the case, they implicitly warmed to Breyer’s ruling that the definition of “rebellion” has not been met and that, in the proposed amici’s words, the “recent and ongoing situation” in Los Angeles “appears to be different in kind” from the “extreme circumstances” of the 1992 Rodney King riots and the times when state governors “openly” and defiantly stood against the end of racial segregation during the Civil Rights era.

The brief concluded that Trump’s injection of the military into “domestic political controversies” — “undermining its ability to achieve its core mission of protecting the nation” — is a case in point as to why troops “should be kept out of domestic law enforcement whenever possible.”

Mirror: Former US Navy vet slams Trump’s ‘stupid’ $45M birthday parade as ‘Nazi Germany’ stunt

A former US Navy veteran said President Donald Trump’s “stupid” military parade birthday bash is reminiscent of “Nazi Germany” as he slammed the White House’s egregious cuts to the US Department of Veterans Affairs and its unnecessary deployment of the National Guard and Marines to the immigration protests in Los Angeles.

“It’s a page out of a dictator’s playbook. It’s not America; it’s not what we do. Everybody knows we have the best trained, strongest and most lethal military in the world. We don’t need to have a parade about it. That’s what dictators like North Korea and Russia do. Even back to Nazi Germany and fascist Italy.” Embrich added President Trump wants the “world to be in terror of the US military” but it contradicts America’s reputation as a liberator.

The parade will likely cost upwards of $100 million if you take into account fuel for the tanks and aircrafts used in the event, the travel and meal expenses for soldiers, the inevitable damage the armored vehicles will do to the streets and “god knows what other incendiary problems will come from this,” he said.

https://www.themirror.com/news/politics/former-navy-vet-slams-trumps-1208597

Daily Beast: ‘No Kings’ Was Biggest Protest in U.S. History: Data Analyst

For reference, that’s between 1 and 2 percent of the total population of the United States.

The “No Kings” protests in every state may have been the biggest day of demonstrations in American history, a data analyst has suggested.

“Based on hundreds of crowd-sourced records of No Kings Day event turnout, and extrapolating for the cities where we don’t have data yet, it looks like roughly 4-6M people protested Trump across the U.S. yesterday,” independent data journalist G Elliott posted to X Sunday.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/data-guru-g-elliott-morris-says-up-to-6-million-people-attended-no-kings-anti-donald-trump-protests

Guardian: Troops and marines deeply troubled by LA deployment: ‘Morale is not great’

Several service members told advocacy groups they felt like pawns in a political game and assignment was unnecessary

California national guards troops and marines deployed to Los Angeles to help restore order after days of protest against the Trump administration have told friends and family members they are deeply unhappy about the assignment and worry their only meaningful role will be as pawns in a political battle they do not want to join.

Three different advocacy organisations representing military families said they had heard from dozens of affected service members who expressed discomfort about being drawn into a domestic policing operation outside their normal field of operations. The groups said they have heard no countervailing opinions.

“The sentiment across the board right now is that deploying military force against our own communities isn’t the kind of national security we signed up for,” said Sarah Streyder of the Secure Families Initiative, which represents the interests of military spouses, children and veterans.

“Families are scared not just for their loved ones’ safety, although that’s a big concern, but also for what their service is being used to justify.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/12/los-angeles-national-guard-troops-marines-morale

Washington Post: Trump plans broader use of National Guard in immigration enforcement

The White House wants the national guard to play a bigger role in immigration enforcement, Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, said in an interview Thursday.

The Trump administration wants to use the National Guard more broadly to enact the president’s immigration agenda, according to border czar Tom Homan, documents and people familiar with plans.

“They can’t make immigration arrests, but they can certainly augment for security, transportation, infrastructure, intelligence,” Homan said in an interview with The Washington Post.

A month before President Donald Trump federalized the California National Guard and sent them to Los Angeles as part of the government’s response to protests over immigration enforcement, the Department of Homeland Security requested more than 20,000 National Guard to aid U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The National Guard would be tasked with helping ICE catch fugitives as well as guard detention centers, process and transport migrants and other tasks, according to a memo obtained by The Washington Post. Pentagon officials say they are looking into the request but have not yet decided on the number of troops it will send.

Homan said he is also open to using the National Guard to respond to protests in other places, if the situation on the ground resembles Los Angeles. The protests there have been limited to a few locations, with local leaders saying they did not think a federal response was necessary, but the Trump administration has painted a different picture.

It sounds as though Trump & Homan are intent on using the National Guard against Americans. This will not turn out well.

There’s a lot more in the article:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/06/12/trump-miller-national-guard-ice

Also here:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-plans-broader-use-of-national-guard-in-immigration-enforcement/ar-AA1GBVYk

Newsweek: Did Senator ID himself when Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem’s guards wrestled him?

Video footage posted to Padilla’s account on X, formerly Twitter, showed the senator identifying himself, but he appeared to do so after he began approaching the podium and was blocked by agents.

“I am Senator Alex Padilla. I have questions for the secretary,” Padilla said before agents pushed him into a hallway, where FBI agents forced him to the ground and placed him in handcuffs. The senator was released shortly after.

The customary lies and misrepresentations from Bimbo #2 Noem:

In an interview with Fox News, [Bimbo #2] Noem said Padilla “did not identify himself and was removed from the room.”

“This man burst into the room, started lunging toward the podium, interrupting me and elevating his voice and was stopped,” [Bimbo #2] Noem said. “Did not identify himself and was removed from the room. So as soon as he identified himself, you know, appropriate actions were taken.”

“I had a conversation with the senator after this,” she continued. “We sat down for 10 to 15 minutes and talked about the fact that nobody knew who he was. He didn’t say who he was until he already had been lunging forward, and people were trying to detain him for quite a period of time.”

[Bimbo #2] added, “He was never arrested. Nobody knew who he was when he came into the room creating a scene.”

But:

Padilla said in a video posted on his social media channels: “I introduced myself. ‘I’m Senator Alex Padilla, and I have a question.’ And it took all of a second for multiple agents to forcibly remove me from the room, to pin me on the ground and handcuff me.”

https://www.newsweek.com/did-senator-alex-padilla-id-himself-kristi-noem-guards-wrestled-2085009

Newsweek: Gavin Newsom accuses Trump administration of spreading fake protest images

On X, formerly Twitter, the Department of Defense’s Rapid Response account posted a video that appeared to show burning, graffitied police cars during protests in Los Angeles this week.

However, the fact-checking website Snopes said the image showed protests in Los Angeles following the death of George Floyd in May 2020.

The governor’s office wrote on X on Friday: “HUGE DEVELOPMENT: An official Department of Defense account is spreading fake images—from old protests—to justify Trump’s illegal militarization of Los Angeles. This isn’t just disinformation. It’s a propaganda campaign from the Pentagon.”

https://www.newsweek.com/gavin-newsom-trump-fake-protest-images-2085492

Rolling Stone: ‘L.A. Was Not on Fire’: Angelenos Speak on Trump’s ICE Raids and ‘Escalation’

Several Angelenos talked to Rolling Stone to dispel Trump’s bluster about the recent protests against ICE and his militarized crackdown

Last week, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers swarmed Southern California in concentrated raids of undocumented citizens that are still ongoing. Thousands of protesters have taken to the streets in Los Angeles (and in solidarity nationwide), giving President Donald Trump an excuse to send National Guard troops last weekend and move to deploy Marines to L.A.. 

Trump baselessly implied the protesters are “paid insurrectionists” during a press conference where he revealed he told California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) that “He’s doing a bad job, causing a lot of death and a lot of potential death. If we didn’t send out the National Guard – and last time, we gave him a little additional help – Los Angeles would be burning right now.” (No one has died during the L.A. protests.) 

Newsom has said the “chaotic” sweeps “to meet an arbitrary arrest quota are as reckless as they are cruel,” and that, “Donald Trump’s chaos is eroding trust, tearing families apart, and undermining the workers and industries that power America’s economy.” On June 10, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass (D) instituted an 8 p.m. curfew in downtown L.A. 

Rolling Stone spoke with several on-the-ground Angelenos, who dispute the notion that L.A.’s “on fire” or being overrun by vandals. 

Katharine Shropshire is the board chair of the grassroots organization Community Coalition. She says the Trump administration and allied politicians are spewing propaganda that inflames tension between citizens and law enforcement. 

“When you have federal national leaders from this administration talking about arresting our mayor, arresting our governor, when you have the president himself using the kind of rhetoric describing a reality that is nothing like what is happening on the ground right now, it just increases the tension,” she says. “Nothing here that they’re doing is about de-escalation. It is all about escalating a confrontation with the people of Los Angeles.”

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/los-angeles-not-on-fire-trump-ice-protests-national-guard-1235363990

Raw Story: ‘Dystopian’: Expert slams ICE for demanding attorney ‘make a Sophie’s Choice’

A prominent immigration expert was horrified at the latest report on how Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers are going about their jobs.

The incident, caught on an Instagram reel, took place in San Diego, California, at a courthouse where numerous people awaited an immigration hearing. ICE showed up to arrest people who were following the legal process.

In the video, an ICE officer told an attorney, who was explaining that some of her clients included a family with health issues, to choose which of her clients would be arrested and which would be spared to get their hearing.

“I’m not picky so I’m giving you the options cause I have to take one. If not I’ll take all,” the officer says.

“This is dystopian,” said immigration attorney and American Immigration Council senior fellow Aaron Reichlin-Melnick. “An ICE officer explains he was ordered to arrest migrants at their court hearings — even those with pending cases. Then he asks an attorney to make a Sophie’s Choice.”

ICE is evil!

https://www.rawstory.com/ice-2672366385