Lefty LA Mayor Karen Bass on Monday blamed the riots ripping apart her city on ICE agents trying to uphold the law.
Bass added that while Los Angeles is “peaceful now,” the city could quickly devolve into further chaos if the federal immigration raids — which have netted convicted violent criminals — continue.
“I just have to say that, if you dial back time and go to Friday, if immigration raids had not happened here, we would not have the disorder that went on last night,” Bass told CNN’s “The Situation Room.”
“It is peaceful now, but we do not know where and when the next raids will be. That is the concern, because people in the city have a rapid-response network. If they see ICE, they go out, and they protest,” she said of the demonstrators, including vandals who lit cars on fire and looted stores as they paralyzed parts of the city with their crimes.
“What was the reason that the president had to take the power from the governor and federalize the National Guard?” the miffed mayor said.
“The night before this action was taken, there was a protest that got a little unruly late at night. It was 100 people, 27 people were arrested. There wasn’t a reason for this.”
Starting Friday, demonstrations popped up in the Los Angeles area against the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement after by a raid on a Home Depot in Paramount.
By Saturday, some of the protests had devolved into violent clashes with federal authorities in Compton and Paramount.
Trump promptly did what local and state officials failed to do, calling in 2,000 members of the California National Guard to contain the violence. Rioters had been hurling rocks and getting violent with federal authorities at the time.
Federal immigration officials are expected to continue to carry out intense enforcement operations over the next 30 days or so, said Rep. Nanette Barragán (D-Calif.) on Sunday, citing what she had been told.
“It’s just a recipe for pandemonium that is completely unnecessary,” Bass insisted. “Nothing was happening here. Los Angeles was peaceful before Friday.”
California Democrats such as Bass and Gov. Gavin Newsom have raged against Trump for bringing in the National Guard, a move that hasn’t been done in Los Angeles since the 1992 Rodney King riots.
Federalization of the National Guard also hasn’t been done in a state without its governor’s blessing since 1965, when President Lyndon B. Johnson did so to safeguard civil-rights protesters in Alabama.
“We made a great decision in sending the National Guard to deal with the violent, instigated riots in California,” Trump said on Truth Social on Monday. If we had not done so, Los Angeles would have been completely obliterated.
“The very incompetent ‘Governor,’ Gavin Newscum, and ‘Mayor,’ Karen Bass, should be saying, ‘THANK YOU, PRESIDENT TRUMP, YOU ARE SO WONDERFUL. WE WOULD BE NOTHING WITHOUT YOU, SIR,” Trump said.
He warned protesters not to think about even spitting at law enforcement.
“If they spit, we will hit,” he said.
Trump even claimed he would arrest Newsom if necessary as tensions with the Golden State governor fray dramatically. Newsom has vowed to sue Trump over the federalization of the National Guard.
“I think the issue here is state power and state sovereignty,” Bass said.
The mayor claimed that she is “not concerned about being arrested,” noting that she can’t imagine a situation where she’d be undermining federal law enforcement.
The Los Angeles mayor also underscored that “this is not citywide civil unrest taking place” and that it’s merely been “a few streets downtown.”
Still, she acknowledged, “I will tell you that I’m saddened by the extent of the vandalism in the form of graffiti all through the downtown area.”
Bass’ move to fault the Trump administration for the riots by blaming its ICE raids quickly drew backlash from conservatives.
“People who were already violating the law are only violating the law because President Trump started enforcing the law. This is the logic of Newsom and his stooges,” Vice President JD Vance swiped on X.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, “Newsflash, Karen: There are immigration raids happening because Joe Biden allowed illegal alien criminals into Los Angeles, and you have dangerous sanctuary city policies that protect them.
“Since you and Governor Newsom refuse to maintain law and order — President Trump will.”
Conservative pundit Guy Benson also jabbed on X, “It’s peaceful right now, but who knows what these rioters will do if federal authorities continue to do their duty’ is pro-mob violence extortion.”
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