Judge Rules Trump Violated Law by Sending Troops to Los Angeles

Updated 4:09 p.m. Monday

President Donald Trump violated federal law when he deployed military troops to Los Angeles, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled Tuesday in a case brought by Gov. Gavin Newsom. The lawsuit challenged the deployment of 4,000 National Guard members and 700 U.S. Marines to Southern California following protests over immigration raids.

U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer ordered the Trump administration to stop using the roughly 300 National Guard troops still stationed in Los Angeles for policing activities such as arrests, searches, security patrols, traffic enforcement and crowd control.

The ruling won’t take effect until Sept. 12, giving the Trump administration time to appeal.

Breyer’s decision does not require Trump to withdraw the troops still in Los Angeles, but prohibits their use for law enforcement activities.

“It’s status quo until we figure out if this is appealed. I don’t think a whole lot changes right now,” said Jessica Levinson, a law professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. “The significance today is that we have a federal judge concluding that the [Trump] administration violated the Posse Comitatus Act, a centuries-old law meant to protect the people against the military being able to enforce domestic law against us.”

In his 52-page opinion, Breyer said there was clear evidence that showed the armed soldiers were being used to conduct police functions in violation of the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act, which bars the military from being used against civilians.

“The evidence at trial established that Defendants systematically used armed soldiers (whose identity was often obscured by protective armor) and military vehicles to set up protective perimeters and traffic blockades, engage in crowd control, and otherwise demonstrate a military presence in and around Los Angeles,” Breyer wrote. “In short, Defendants violated the Posse Comitatus Act.”

The decision follows a three-day trial in August in a case Newsom filed in June after Trump federalized California’s National Guard over the governor’s objections. During closing arguments, California Deputy Attorney General Meghan Strong said, “There has been a standing army in our nation’s second-largest city for two months.”

In a June 7 memorandum federalizing the National Guard troops, Trump characterized the protests in Los Angeles “as a form of rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States.”

The use of the word “rebellion,” attorneys for the U.S. government alleged, gave them additional workarounds to some of the duties troops could perform while aiding federal law enforcement, including traffic patrol and crowd control — otherwise forbidden under the Posse Comitatus Act.

During the trial, California attorneys cited evidence that federalized troops accompanied ICE officers on raids at marijuana farms, manned traffic blockades and participated in “Operation Excalibur,” where armored vehicles lined MacArthur Park during immigration protests. Marines also detained at least one civilian at a federal building.

The judge undercut the legal rationale Trump used to justify his deployment, writing that the immigration protests did not amount to a rebellion.

“There was no rebellion, nor was civilian law enforcement unable to respond to the protests and enforce the law,” Breyer wrote.

Since Newsom filed suit, Trump has also sent troops to Washington, D.C., to combat crime and threatened to dispatch them to other cities, including Oakland and San Francisco.

“While Judge Breyer’s ruling is encouraging, we understand this doesn’t eliminate the threat of federal overreach,” Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee said. “Oakland remains prepared and vigilant in our commitment to protecting our residents.”

Breyer wrote that Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s statements about sending National Guard troops to other cities would create “a national police force with the President as its chief.”

However, Breyer’s ruling does not establish legal precedent for cities outside of his district. Still, legal experts say that Tuesday’s decision will likely be invoked to fight any future unwanted attempts by the president to federalize the National Guard.

“The state of Illinois, I’m sure, will be cutting and pasting out of this opinion as it writes its own complaint in anticipation of Mr. Trump ordering troops into Chicago,” said David Levine, professor of law at UC Law San Francisco.

Asked about the ruling during a press conference in the Oval Office on Tuesday, Trump called Breyer “a radical left judge” and noted the court allowed the 300 Guard members to remain in place. “They can stay, they can remain, they can do what they have to do,” Trump said.

Newsom and other California leaders praised the court’s decision.

“Today, the court sided with democracy and the Constitution,” Newsom said in a written statement. “No president is a king — not even Trump — and no president can trample a state’s power to protect its people. As the court today ruled, Trump is breaking the law by ‘creating a national police force with the president as its chief.’ That’s exactly what we’ve been warning about for months.

“There is no rampant lawlessness in California, and in fact, crime rates are higher in Republican-led states. Trump’s attempt to use federal troops as his personal police force is illegal, authoritarian, and must be stopped in every courtroom across this country.”

The White House pushed back on the ruling on Tuesday morning. In a statement, spokesperson Anna Kelly said, “Once again, a rogue judge is trying to usurp the authority of the Commander-in-Chief to protect American cities from violence and destruction.”

“President Trump saved Los Angeles, which was overrun by deranged leftist lunatics sowing mass chaos until he stepped in,” Kelly said. “While far-left courts try to stop President Trump from carrying out his mandate to Make America Safe Again, the President is committed to protecting law-abiding citizens, and this will not be the final say on the issue.”

California Attorney General Rob Bonta asserted that the National Guard members were taken away from other pressing duties to keep California residents safe, like fighting wildfires.

“Bottom line, military troops cannot police our community. This decision validates that the power of the president is not boundless,” Bonta said at a press conference on Tuesday. “Trump is not king. Trump’s decision to deploy military troops to the streets of Los Angeles was nothing more than an act of political theater and public intimidation.”

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass applauded the judge’s decision.

“Today, the federal court ruled in favor of the people of Los Angeles,” Bass said in a statement. “The White House tried to invade the second-largest city in the country. That was illegal. Los Angeles will not buckle and we will not break. We will not be divided and we will not be defeated.”

After Tuesday’s ruling, Bonta and Newsom filed a request for a preliminary injunction that would block the Trump administration from extending the remaining military deployment in Los Angeles through Election Day, when Californians will vote on whether to adopt new redistricting maps that could determine control of Congress in 2026.

KQED’s Brian Krans contributed to this report.