00:00In other news, the U.S. president is deploying 2,000 more National Guard troops to Los Angeles.
00:05700 Marines are also being dispatched to quell protests which have erupted over the immigration policies of Donald Trump.
00:12The move escalates a standoff with the state's Democratic officials who accuse the president of putting public safety at risk.
00:18This as the local LAPD says it's confident it has the resources to handle large-scale demonstrations.
00:24We can now bring in Christopher Featherstone, associate lecturer at the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of York.
00:32Thank you so much for joining us on the program today.
00:35Where are we now in this standoff in Los Angeles? Have things started to simmer down in the city?
00:44Well, I think you're right in that we have to take our position here.
00:49We have to understand what's going on. And the chaos on the streets has somewhat ameliorated, has somewhat calmed down.
00:58But at the same time, it is still quite a chaotic scene.
01:02We have reports of journalists being shot with rubber bullets.
01:06We have reports of extreme use of tear gas and these kind of things.
01:09And then there's the relationship between the LAPD saying that they actually can control this perfectly fine.
01:15They don't need any help. And Donald Trump coming out with these, frankly, quite typical Trumpian claims about the need for his deployment of troops to the streets of a heavily, heavily Democrat city.
01:30We've seen ICE raids right since Donald Trump assumed the presidency the second time around.
01:36Why now are we seeing these protests erupt in Los Angeles?
01:40Well, I think you're you're right in highlighting that the idea that ICE have been taking people, have been detaining them is nothing new for the Trump administration, especially this time around.
01:56But it has escalated significantly.
01:59There are reports coming out of the White House that Stephen Miller has pushed ICE to hit new targets, to hit targets around 3000 arrests a day, is what is alleged to have been said.
02:11And this means that the scale, the sheer scale, is quite significant.
02:16I would also say it's important to think about the rhetoric that Donald Trump uses.
02:20Donald Trump likes to talk about arresting the gang members, arresting the dangerous criminals, the dangerous people.
02:27And essentially, these people who are being arrested by ICE at the moment, a large number of whom are in places of employment.
02:33These are people who are actively working and therefore, you know, their supporters would argue contributing to American society.
02:41These aren't the gang members. These are people who are trying to exist and trying to support the American economy.
02:48And therefore, it's it's a significant change in tone.
02:52And it's it's also far more visible than it has been in previous years.
02:56So, you know, the the idea that people are being arrested is not necessarily all that new.
03:01What's new is how it's being done.
03:03And the sheer scale, the arrests in farming communities or in factories have been going on apace and they have been arguably equally violent.
03:13But they haven't been so targeted in such a heavily Democrat leaning city and a sanctuary city as well, which is a significant aspect of it.
03:21Now, Donald Trump, if we were to listen to him, would make us think that the whole of Los Angeles is burning to the ground.
03:27This isn't the case. We know that it is concentrated amongst amongst certain streets in the city, especially in the downtown area.
03:35But I want to ask, is there a difference between who attends these protests during the day and at night?
03:40Because at night is when we typically start seeing cars being torched, etc.
03:46Well, I think you're absolutely right in that there is a a discrepancy there or there is a wide range of people who are here and who are protesting on the streets of L.A.
03:57And that means that you have a whole range of people participating where you have people who are from unions who are coming out and saying that their fellow union member has been arrested and therefore they are protesting with placards in an extremely peaceful way.
04:12They are shouting fine. They're walking around. It isn't particularly violent.
04:15And that's during the day. At night, we've seen cars set on fire.
04:19We've seen some quite extreme violence in some cases, although I would also say the LAPD have repeatedly reported that actually they've experienced the protests as peaceful.
04:32And that the people who are escalating this or who have at some points escalated this are the ICE agents themselves.
04:38So it's important to weigh both sides when it comes to the violence and when it comes to the experience on the streets.
04:46I think it is purposeful for Donald Trump to portray this as chaos on the streets of a Democrat city.
04:55Right. It's a purposeful thing to say that actually he needs to step in.
04:58He needs to put his weight in there and deploy federal troops to the streets of a Democrat city to ensure security.
05:07His base, his supporters are the kinds of people who would actually be quite anti the policies enacted in California.
05:14So it's not necessarily that surprising that he's chosen this as a place to make this fight first.
05:21I mean, Donald Trump has always sort of shown that he is the law and order president.
05:27We know what his strategy is by saying that he's bringing law and order to a Democratic city.
05:33But what is Gavin Newsom's strategy here? Because he's obviously trying to score political points by standing up to the U.S. president.
05:43But is he speaking for the entire Democratic Party?
05:46Because a lot of people within the Democratic Party establishment would say he's not speaking for everyone.
05:53Well, absolutely. I think it's an important thing to think about the splits within the Democratic Party.
05:58The Democratic Party is lacking a certain element of leadership here. And actually, that's a significant issue for them.
06:05So I would say it's good to notice the move that Newsom's making.
06:11He is launching a legal case against the federal government and he is reveling in this attention.
06:18He has always been someone who has been suspected of maybe looking for that higher office,
06:23looking to go that next step from governor up to the presidential kind of race.
06:28And this is giving him that national attention that he's wanted for years.
06:32And it's arguably been able to give him an opportunity to show his leadership and show how he can interact with Donald Trump.
06:40He is very happy in this kind of limelight. He's very happy to put himself out there.
06:45But I would say he's also agenda setting for the Democrat Party.
06:50The Democrat Party doesn't necessarily know how to stand up or how to effectively and volubly stand up to this kind of Trump policy.
06:58Rather than just saying that this is wrong morally or ethically or whatever,
07:03there needs to be something coming later as a reasonable, as a real opposition party.
07:09And Gavin Newsom is really setting the tone there.
07:12So it is going to push the Democratic Party to think, what else are we going to do?
07:17What is someone else who wants to stand up and be counted as a potential candidate next time around?
07:24How are they going to put themselves onto this national stage?
07:26So Gavin Newsom is coming out swing.
07:30Donald Trump is a complex figure, isn't he?
07:33Because every day he goes from one thing to the next.
07:36And just a couple of days ago, we were talking about the bromance that ended between Elon Musk and Donald Trump.
07:42This over the big, beautiful bill, which Elon Musk was not in favor of.
07:46Then a couple of days later, we see that Donald Trump has deployed National Guard troops to Los Angeles.
07:51Is this part of the president's strategy to shift focus and the media jumps around to whatever he says?
07:56I completely agree. Absolutely.
08:00I think this is a purposeful strategy of chaos.
08:03It makes the life of any journalist so much more complex.
08:07How do you characterize?
08:09How do you keep everybody on track when we're looking at Donald Trump and all of his policies?
08:14He's a chaotic president, I would argue, because he wants to be seen as proactive,
08:19but also to keep the media off their feet, to really not know how do you portray what he's doing?
08:26So he is intentionally chaotic in how he's communicating, in his claims on Truth Social,
08:32his bizarre fight with Elon Musk, his statements about arresting Gavin Newsom.
08:38These are all chaotic and intentional.
08:40But also his policy goes that one step further.
08:44And we have a huge bill on economic reform, a tax bill,
08:49all these huge policies that are highly controversial and really quite difficult to discuss in any real sense,
08:56given the schist scale of that big, beautiful bill.
08:59But also he has this extreme immigration policy,
09:03which is leading to violence on the streets of one of the richest cities in the US.
09:08So it's a purposeful use of chaos to reduce opposition.
09:13The media, as you said, will jump around and follow every little move.
09:17But in doing so, it means that we cannot really get to grips with who Donald Trump is
09:22and what he's trying to do with the power that he's got,
09:26and also to people who he sees as a threat to America.
09:31Christopher Featherston, thank you so much for joining us on the programme today.
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