Legal showdown over California National Guard heads to 9th Circuit

High-stakes clash between Trump and Newsom heads to court

The 9th Circuit Court will hear arguments Tuesday in a high-profile legal battle between President Trump and Governor Newsom over who has authority to control California’s National Guard.

SAN FRANCISCO - A high-stakes legal battle between California Governor Gavin Newsom and President Donald Trump is set for a hearing Tuesday before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

At issue is who holds authority over the California National Guard: the state or the federal government. The case comes after a district judge ruled last Thursday that the Trump administration’s deployment of National Guard troops to Los Angeles amid largely peaceful protests was unlawful. 

The ruling ordered the Trump administration to return control of the troops to California.

"I hope it’s the beginning of a new day in this country where we push back against overreach, we push back against these authoritarian tendencies of a president that has pushed the boundaries, pushed the limit," Newsom said. 

But the victory was short-lived. Hours later, the 9th Circuit court temporarily blocked the judge’s order, keeping the National Guard under federal control pending the appeals process.

"So the protesters, if we didn’t have the National Guard on call and ready, they would rip Los Angeles apart. They come and they check, is the National Guard going to be there? And if the National Guard is there, they don’t even show up," Trump said Monday, defending the deployment. 

The hearing will consider whether the Trump administration’s actions constituted federal overreach and whether California’s sovereign rights were violated.

State vs. federal authority

Laurie Levenson, a professor at Loyola Law School, called the case "a crucial ruling." 

"This is the first appellate court to take a look at whether the states still have sovereign rights when President Trump tries to take over the situation. I do think that this is a case where it’s likely to have an issue that goes to the Supreme Court, but until it does, it’s going to set the tone for other states as well," she said. 

U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, who issued the original ruling in favor of Newsom, called the federal deployment illegal and emphasized that the right to protest the government is protected under the First Amendment. 

Breyer also said the protests in Los Angeles did not meet the definition of rebellion.

"The protests in Los Angeles fall far short of ‘rebellion.’ Defendants refer repeatedly to ‘violent rioters,’ and ‘mobs,’ and so the Court pauses to state that there can be no debate that most protesters demonstrated peacefully," Breyer wrote in his ruling.

San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu, who led a coalition of local officials from across the country in filing an amicus brief in support of Newsom, criticized the deployment. 

"He is doing everything he can to move forward with his illegal mass deportation project, and the fact that our laws get in his way, he will do anything, even including illegally commandeering the National Guard," Chiu said. 

The three-judge panel hearing the case includes two judges appointed by Trump and one appointed by former President Joe Biden. 

Levenson noted that one of the Trump-appointed judges has previously ruled against the Trump administration, leaving the outcome uncertain.

The hearing is scheduled for noon Tuesday at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, with a ruling expected within a day or longer.