SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom said Thursday that President Trump’s decision to deploy National Guard troops to Los Angeles amounted to costly political theater, saddling taxpayers with a nearly $120-million bill.
Newsom’s office said the newly revealed price tag was tallied from estimates provided by the California National Guard about costs incurred since June, when Trump sent more than 4,200 National Guard soldiers and 700 Marines to Los Angeles. That included $71 million for food and other basic necessities, $37 million in payroll, $4 million in logistic supplies, $3.5 million in travel and $1.5 million in demobilization costs, Newsom’s office said.
Most of the soldiers were sent home in August, although 300 remain in Los Angeles.
On Tuesday, a federal judge in San Francisco barred soldiers from aiding immigration arrests in a scathing opinion that amounted to a major win for California and other states critical of the Trump administration’s deployments. Newsom filed a preliminary injunction after the ruling asking that the court block a new order from the U.S. Secretary of Defense that extended the deployment of 300 National Guard members in Los Angeles until after the election in November.
“Let us not forget what this political theater is costing us all — millions of taxpayer dollars down the drain and an atrophy to the readiness of guardsmembers across the nation and unnecessary hardships to the families supporting those troops,” Newsom said in a statement. “Talk about waste, fraud, and abuse. We ask other states to do the math themselves.”
In Washington, D.C., where Trump has deployed the National Guard to the nation’s capital, city leaders filed a lawsuit earlier this week. That lawsuit said more than 2,200 National Guard troops are in Washington D.C., where they are seen dressed in military fatigues and carrying rifles around national monuments. Soldiers are seen picking up trash, laying down mulch and chatting aimlessly as they patrol.
Trump has warned that he intends to expand his use of military forces in other cities.