PinnedUpdated June 8, 2025, 8:38 p.m. ETLaw enforcement officials fired tear gas and crowd-control ammunition at protesters in downtown Los Angeles on Sunday, as Gov. Gavin Newsom of California accused the Trump administration of a “serious breach of state sovereignty” for ordering members of the National Guard to help quell demonstrations against an immigration crackdown.Officers from the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the city police department fired crowd-control munitions at the protesters, who had gathered outside a detention center in downtown Los Angeles. National Guard troops deployed to the center by the federal government — an extraordinary maneuver that bypassed the governor’s authority — appeared to largely refrain from engaging with the demonstrators.It was not immediately clear what prompted the escalation. The demonstration, though tense, appeared to have been peaceful up to that point.The aggressive response followed President Trump’s announcement on Saturday that he would deploy at least 2,000 members of the National Guard, which followed two days of protests against the raids in the Los Angeles area. Mr. Trump said that any protest or act of violence that impeded officials would be considered a “form of rebellion.” Several hundred troops had been dispatched to the city on Sunday.While life throughout much of Los Angeles on Sunday seemed to go about its usual rhythms, Mr. Trump offered a grim portrayal of the protests, claiming that the city had been “invaded and occupied.” In a post on Truth Social, he asserted that “violent, insurrectionist mobs are swarming and attacking our Federal Agents to try and stop our deportation operations.”California officials condemned Mr. Trump for deploying members of the state’s National Guard without a request for assistance from the governor. Mr. Newsom, a Democrat, officially requested on Sunday that the order be rescinded. In a letter from his office, state officials argued the deployment was a breach that seemed “intentionally designed to inflame the situation.”The mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, characterized the deployment as “a chaotic escalation.” She said that the only other time she had seen the National Guard patrolling city streets outside of disaster recovery was during the 1992 riots. Then, they had been requested by state and local officials. “There’s no reason for them to be on our streets now,” Ms. Bass, a Democrat, said. But, speaking to reporters in the early evening, she also said that violence from protesters would not be tolerated, adding, “I don’t want people to fall into the chaos that I believe is being created by the administration.”Some protesters outside the detention center spilled onto nearby U.S. 101, blocking traffic on the freeway in at least one direction. Others implored the crowd to avoid any temptation to engage in violent or destructive behavior, on the belief that the president and other officials sought to provoke them.“They want to see us fail,” said Julie Solis, who described herself as a first-generation citizen born and raised in California. “We can’t give them that satisfaction.”Here’s what else to know:A rare decision: One expert said Mr. Trump’s order for the troops was the first time since 1965 that a president had activated a state’s National Guard force for a domestic operation without a state governor’s request for the purposes of quelling unrest or enforcing the law. That year, President Lyndon B. Johnson sent troops to Alabama to protect civil rights demonstrators. Read more ›Newsom and Trump: For most of this year, Governor Newsom has chosen conciliation over confrontation in dealings with the president. On Friday, he spent 40 minutes on the phone with Mr. Trump to discuss the immigration protests. But the president’s decision to send in National Guard troops seemed likely to shatter whatever delicate balance the governor was trying to maintain. Read more ›Mexican flags: Throughout this weekend’s protests, Mexican and other Latin American flags have emerged as protest emblems. Trump officials have cast flag wavers as insurrectionists and seemed to assume that they are not U.S. citizens. But for many protesters who are American citizens, the flag signifies pride in their roots, as well as solidarity with immigrants who are being targeted for deportation. Read more ›Latino communities: Some of the most active protests against immigration raids in California took place in Paramount, a small city some 25 miles southeast of the Hollywood sign that has for decades attracted Latino immigrants. Officials arrested eight people there on Saturday on federal obstruction charges, according to a Department of Homeland Security official. Read more ›June 8, 2025, 8:50 p.m. ETMimi Dwyer and Nicole StockReporting from Los AngelesSeveral Waymos have now caught fire on Los Angeles Street, with protesters painting graffiti and posing in front of the burning vehicles. Others are warning about the electric vehicles’ batteries exploding. “Watch out! That’s toxic!” One person said. The police are not on the scene. In front of the burning vehicles, people appear to be lighting off fireworks.Credit...Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesJune 8, 2025, 8:46 p.m. ETJesus Jiménez and Jill CowanJesus Jiménez reported from Pasadena and Jill Cowan reported from Los AngelesProtesters came together across the street from the AC Hotel Pasadena. Credit...Alex Welsh for The New York TimesOutside the upscale AC Hotel Pasadena on Sunday afternoon, dozens of demonstrators flooded the sidewalks, chanted “ICE is not welcome here” and blasted songs in Spanish. They entreated passing drivers to honk their horns in support, and many obliged, some raising fists out their windows. The scene contrasted sharply with the violence unfolding about 11 miles away in downtown Los Angeles.“I would say to you that the protest that I’m at is more of a celebration of our pride and culture as immigrants,” said Mayor Victor Gordo, who immigrated from Mexico with his family as a young child.The demonstration was one of several taking place across the Los Angeles region on Sunday afternoon that were prompted by reported sightings of federal immigration officials.In the case of the AC Hotel Pasadena, sightings of a few federal vehicles in the parking lot quickly transformed into rumors of raids. Those rumors then spread on social media, prompting protesters to show up outside the hotel.But Lisa Derderian, the spokeswoman for the city of Pasadena, said that there had not been any immigration enforcement operations in the city on Sunday. She said that federal personnel had stayed in at least two of the city’s hotels. Ms. Derderian said that the Pasadena Police Department was monitoring the demonstration, but that so far, there had not been any problems.Mr. Gordo, the mayor, said he was proud to see members of his community, his constituents, turning out to support immigrants like him — and like his parents, who were undocumented immigrants from Mexico.“It is personal and painful to see what I and many others experienced in our youth reoccur,” he said.Mr. Gordo, who grew up in Pasadena and whose father worked for 50 years at the now-closed Ranchero’s Mexican Restaurant, recalled knowing that there was a Folgers coffee can in the family’s garage that contained cash and copies of birth certificates and other documents. If his parents ever failed to come home, he said, he was supposed to take the can to a neighbor’s to ask for help. He was about five years old at the time.He said he hoped that National Guard troops would not show up in Pasadena.June 8, 2025, 8:32 p.m. ETHamed AleazizDepartment of Homeland Security reporterIf you want to know how the White House is feeling about the protests in Los Angeles, look no further than the X account of Stephen Miller, Mr. Trump’s deputy chief of staff. Mr. Miller has been closely following the protests in Los Angeles this weekend and posting messages on social media describing what he’s seen as an “insurrection” at times. But on Sunday evening, Mr. Miller appeared to go a step further, insinuating that Los Angeles had been taken over: “Look at all the foreign flags. Los Angeles is occupied territory,” he wrote in a message on X above a post showing a live feed from the protests. Mr. Miller grew up in Santa Monica, not far from downtown Los Angeles.June 8, 2025, 8:21 p.m. ETEven as she assailed the Trump administration for stoking turmoil, Bass said that not all of the protesters had been demonstrating peacefully. She said throwing things at officers or blocking traffic on a freeway crossed a line. For those who contributed to unrest, she added, “You’re going to suffer the consequences of doing that.”Credit...Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesJune 8, 2025, 8:24 p.m. ET“I don’t want people to fall into the chaos that I believe is being created by the administration,” she said.June 8, 2025, 8:16 p.m. ETMayor Bass encouraged residents to continue expressing their anger and their outrage, but urged them to do so peacefully. “We don’t want to play into the administration’s hands,” she said.June 8, 2025, 8:12 p.m. ETThere were several protests in spots across Los Angeles County. One of the largest has been in downtown Los Angeles, where protesters had blocked traffic on the 101. Northeast of downtown, several dozen protesters are marching through the streets of Pasadena after federal agents were seen in the area earlier. Additional protests have been planned for tonight and tomorrow in the city.June 8, 2025, 8:08 p.m. ETThe authorities have now cleared the 101. Protesters are now on an overpass where they continue to cheer, chant and wave Mexican and American flags.June 8, 2025, 8:05 p.m. ETMayor Karen Bass said on Sunday that she was joining Gov. Gavin Newson in asking the Trump administration to rescind the order to federalize the National Guard.June 8, 2025, 8:05 p.m. ETIn remarks from downtown, Mayor Bass said that “what we are seeing in Los Angeles is chaos provoked by the administration.”Credit...Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesJune 8, 2025, 8:02 p.m. ETNews AnalysisNational Guard troops in Los Angeles on Sunday. Gov. Gavin Newsom of California has formally asked the Trump administration to remove them.Credit...Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesIt is the fight President Trump had been waiting for, a showdown with a top political rival in a deep blue state over an issue core to his political agenda.In bypassing the authority of Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, a Democrat, to call in the National Guard to quell protests in the Los Angeles area over his administration’s efforts to deport more migrants, Mr. Trump is now pushing the boundaries of presidential authority and stoking criticism that he is inflaming the situation for political gain.Local and state authorities had not sought help in dealing with the scattered protests that erupted after an immigration raid on Friday in the garment district. But Mr. Trump and his top aides leaned into the confrontation with California leaders on Sunday, portraying the demonstrations as an existential threat to the country — setting in motion an aggressive federal response that in turn sparked new protests across the city.As more demonstrators took to the streets, the president wrote on social media that Los Angeles was being “invaded and occupied” by “violent, insurrectionist mobs,” and directed three of his top cabinet officials to take any actions necessary to “liberate Los Angeles from the Migrant Invasion.”“Nobody’s going to spit on our police officers. Nobody’s going to spit on our military,” Mr. Trump told reporters as he headed to Camp David on Sunday, although it was unclear whether any such incidents had occurred. “That happens, they get hit very hard.”The president declined to say whether he planned to invoke the 1807 Insurrection Act, which allows for the use of federal troops on domestic soil to quell a rebellion. But either way, he added, “we’re going to have troops everywhere.”Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, posted on social media that “this is a fight to save civilization.”Mr. Trump’s decision to deploy at least 2,000 members of the California National Guard is the latest example of his willingness and, at times, an eagerness to shatter norms to pursue his political goals and bypass limits on presidential power. The last president to send in the National Guard for a domestic operation without a request from the state’s governor, Lyndon B. Johnson, did so in 1965, to protect civil rights demonstrators in Alabama.President Donald Trump in New Jersey on Sunday. On social media, he, his aides and allies have sought to frame the demonstrations against immigration officials on their own terms.Credit...Haiyun Jiang for The New York TimesBut aides and allies of the president say the events unfolding in Los Angeles provide an almost perfect distillation of why Mr. Trump was elected in November.“It could not be clearer,” said Newt Gingrich, the former Republican House speaker and ally of the president who noted that Mr. Trump had been focused on immigration enforcement since 2015. “One side is for enforcing the law and protecting Americans, and the other side is for defending illegals and being on the side of the people who break the law.”Sporadic protests have occurred across the country in recent days as federal agents have descended on Los Angeles and other cities searching workplaces for undocumented immigrants, part of an expanded effort by the administration to ramp up the number of daily deportations.On social media, Mr. Trump, his aides and allies have sought to frame the demonstrations against immigration officials on their own terms. They have shared images and videos of the most violent episodes — focusing particularly on examples of protesters lashing out at federal agents — even as many remained peaceful. Officials also zeroed in on demonstrators waving flags of other countries, including Mexico and El Salvador, as evidence of a foreign invasion.“Illegal criminal aliens and violent mobs have been committing arson, throwing rocks at vehicles, and attacking federal law enforcement for days,” wrote Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary.Mr. Newsom, whom the president refers to as “Newscum,” has long been a foil for Mr. Trump, who has repeatedly targeted California and its leader as emblematic of failures of the Democratic Party.“We expected this, we prepared for this,” Mr. Newsom said in a statement to The New York Times. “This is not surprising — for them to succeed, California must fail, and so they’re going to try everything in their tired playbook despite the evidence against them.”Law enforcement officers and members of the California National Guard engaged protesters in downtown Los Angeles on Sunday.Credit...Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesOn Sunday, the governor sent a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth formally requesting that Mr. Trump rescind the call-up of the National Guard, saying federal actions were inflaming the situation.He was echoed by other Democratic officials, who said the mounting demonstrations were the result of Mr. Trump’s own actions.The president and his aides “are masters of misinformation and disinformation,” Senator Alex Padilla of California, a Democrat, said in an interview. “They create a crisis of their own making and come in with all the theatrics and cruelty of immigration enforcement. They should not be surprised in a community like Los Angeles they will be met by demonstrators who are very passionate about standing up for fundamental rights and due process.”Republicans defended Mr. Trump’s moves, saying he was rightfully exercising his power to protect public safety.“The president is extremely concerned about the safety of federal officials in L.A. right now who have been subject to acts of violence and harassment and obstruction,” Representative Kevin Kiley, Republican of California, said in an interview.He added: “We are in this moment because of a series of reckless decisions by California’s political leaders, the aiding and abetting the open-border policies of President Biden.”Trump officials said on Sunday that they were ready to escalate their response even more, if necessary. Tom Homan, the president’s border czar, suggested in an interview with NBC News that the administration would arrest anyone, including public officials, who interfered with immigration enforcement activities, which he said would continue in California and across the country.Protesters in Pasadena, Calif., on Sunday.Credit...Alex Welsh for The New York TimesMr. Trump appears to be deploying against California a similar playbook that he has used to punish universities, law firms and other institutions and individuals that he views as political adversaries.Last month, he threatened to strip “large scale” federal funding from California “maybe permanently” over the inclusion of transgender athletes in women’s sports. And in recent days, his administration said it would pull roughly $4 billion in federal funding for California’s high-speed train, which would further delay a project that has long been plagued by delays and funding shortages.“Everything he’s done to attack California or anybody he fears isn’t supportive of him is going to continue to be an obsession of his,” Mr. Padilla said. “He may think it plays smart for his base, but it’s actually been bad for the country.”White House officials said there was a different common denominator that explains Mr. Trump’s actions both against institutions like Harvard and immigration protests in Los Angeles.“For years Democrat-run cities and institutions have failed the American people, by both choice and incompetence,” Abigail Jackson, a White House spokeswoman, said in a statement.“In each instance,” she added, “the president took necessary action to protect Americans when Democrats refused.”June 8, 2025, 7:55 p.m. ETOfficials deployed flash-bang grenades and gas canisters at protesters outside the Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles on Sunday.Credit...Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesStepping up his confrontation with the White House, Gov. Gavin Newsom demanded on Sunday that President Trump pull California National Guard troops off the streets and away from the demonstrations unfolding in Los Angeles.Mr. Newsom asserted on X that the deployment order was “unlawful” and called on the Trump administration to return the command of the guard to his office.It is extremely rare for a president to call up a state’s National Guard troops without the permission of that state’s governor for the purpose of quelling unrest or enforcing the law. In California, the adjutant general of the state National Guard is appointed by the governor.“Rescind the order,” Mr. Newsom wrote Sunday on X. “Return control to California.”The Democratic governor made his demand as protests against the immigration crackdown took place in parts of Los Angeles, marked by clouds of tear gas and confrontations between demonstrators and law enforcement. There was no immediate response from the White House.“We didn’t have a problem until Trump got involved,” Mr. Newsom said. “This is a serious breach of state sovereignty — inflaming tensions while pulling resources from where they’re actually needed.”Mr. Trump’s attempt to bypass Mr. Newsom’s authority and activate the Guard relied on a seldom-used reading of federal law. In signing the order on Saturday, the president cited a provision within Title 10 of the U.S. Code on Armed Services that allows the federal deployment of National Guard forces if “there is a rebellion or danger of a rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States.”The last time a president overrode a state governor to activate the National Guard to stop unrest or enforce the law was in 1965, when President Lyndon B. Johnson sent troops to Alabama in 1965 to protect civil rights demonstrators, according to Elizabeth Goitein, senior director of the Liberty and National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice.In a letter to Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, David Sapp, the governor’s legal affairs secretary, argued there was no need for such an intervention and that the situation was being adequately controlled by local police officers.“Local law enforcement resources are sufficient to maintain order,” Mr. Sapp told Mr. Hegseth in urging him to rescind the order.“In dynamic and fluid situations such as the one in Los Angeles, state and local authorities are the most appropriate ones to evaluate the need for resources to safeguard life and property,” Mr. Sapp wrote.He also told Mr. Hegseth that the president’s order did not follow the law, which he said requires that deployment orders be issued through a state’s governor.June 8, 2025, 7:55 p.m. ETFormer Vice President Kamala Harris, who lives in Los Angeles, posted a statement on social media saying she is “appalled by what we are witnessing on the streets of our city.” She criticized the Trump administration for ordering in the National Guard. “In addition to the recent ICE raids in Southern California and across our nation, it is part of the Trump Administration’s cruel, calculated agenda to spread panic and division,” Ms. Harris wrote.My statement on what's unfolding in Los Angeles. pic.twitter.com/rujs8mrVPK— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) June 8, 2025June 8, 2025, 7:49 p.m. ETTrump officials have homed in on Mexican and other Latin American flags that are flying at the protests in Los Angeles.Credit...Mark Abramson for The New York TimesElizabeth Torres, 36, held a Mexican flag outside the detention center in downtown Los Angeles on Sunday morning.“I am a very proud American,” said Ms. Torres, whose grandparents immigrated to the United States. “But I have to show support also for our Mexican brothers and sisters.”Throughout this weekend’s protests, Mexican and other Latin American flags have emerged as protest emblems, which has angered the Trump administration’s officials and supporters. Trump officials have cast flag wavers as insurrectionists and seemed to assume that they are not U.S. citizens.Stephen Miller, a top White House adviser, called out “foreign nationals, waving foreign flags, rioting and obstructing federal law enforcement attempting to expel illegal foreign invaders” in a social media post on Sunday afternoon.But for many protesters who are American citizens, the flag signifies pride in their roots, as well as solidarity with immigrants who are being targeted for deportation.“They’re the children and grandchildren of immigrants,” said Chris Zepeda-Millán, a professor of Chicano studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, who has studied the immigrants rights movement in California. “They have no doubt in their own citizenship or their own belonging here, but they understand the racial undertones of the attacks on immigrants,” he said.“So you’re getting this reaction of ‘We’re not going to let you make us be ashamed of where our parents and grandparents came from,’” Mr. Zepeda-Millán added.“I am a very proud American, but I have to show support also for our Mexican brothers and sisters,” Elizabeth Torres said as she held a Mexican flag.Credit...Philip Cheung for The New York TimesOn Saturday afternoon in Paramount, Eric Torres, 30 and no relation to Elizabeth Torres, waved a Mexican flag in front of sheriff’s deputies in riot gear. Mr. Torres wore an oversized white T-shirt and baggy jeans, typical attire for many Chicanos in Los Angeles.“I came out here to support my people and show them where we came from,” Mr. Torres said. “My parents are immigrants. Most of the people right here have immigrant parents, so I’m here to support, show them our love.”The appearance of foreign flags at immigration protests is not new, nor is the outrage by those who deem it un-American. But American flags have been flown by protesters in Los Angeles, too, as they have in past protests against immigration crackdowns. And in Los Angeles this week, fusions of the American flag with that of another country, such as Mexico or Guatemala, have regularly been seen waving among the demonstrators.Some immigrant coalitions in the past have discouraged the waving of foreign flags, lest it feed anti-immigrant backlash. But Alfonso Gonzales Toribio, an ethnic studies professor at the University of California, Riverside, who has written about Latino immigrant rights movements, said that right now, immigrants “feel attacked.”He added, “I don’t think we are going to be able to dissuade people” from flying the flag of their homeland. “It gives people a sense of pride.”June 8, 2025, 7:37 p.m. ETGov. Gavin Newsom has landed in Los Angeles, according to his aides.June 8, 2025, 7:26 p.m. ETThe California National Guard at the protests in Los Angeles. The union leader David Huerta was arrested on Friday, accused of interfering with federal officers.Credit...Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesThe arrest and apparent injury of a prominent California union leader at an immigration protest has drawn condemnation from across the labor movement.David Huerta, the president of the Service Employees International Union of California, was detained by federal agents on Friday while protesting an immigration raid at a work site in downtown Los Angeles. Video of the incident shows Mr. Huerta being knocked down and lying with his head on the curb. He was hospitalized and released on Friday, the union said in a statement, but remained in custody.Federal officials said Mr. Huerta had been deliberately blocking a law enforcement vehicle and had been arrested for interfering with federal officers. He is expected to be arraigned in federal court on Monday.“I don’t care who you are — if you impede federal agents, you will be arrested and prosecuted,” Bill Essayli, the U.S. attorney for the Los Angeles region, wrote in a social media post on Friday. “No one has the right to assault, obstruct, or interfere with federal authorities carrying out their duties.”The union, however, said Mr. Huerta was arrested while acting as a peaceful “community observer” at the raids. Union leaders across the country released statements demanding his release, as did prominent Democratic elected officials including Gov. Gavin Newsom of California and Hakeem Jeffries, the House minority leader.“He was doing what he has always done, and what we do in unions: putting solidarity into practice and defending our fellow workers,” the leaders of the AFL-CIO, the largest federation of U.S. labor unions, said in a statement.Mr. Huerta is a well-known figure in the California labor movement. He began his union career with Justice for Janitors, an effort to organize the largely immigrant — and often undocumented — workers who clean offices and other commercial buildings.“He’s always been at the forefront of really advocating for all types of immigrant workers,” said Lorena Gonzalez, president of the California Labor Federation.Immigration has long been a divisive issue in the labor movement, including in California. Cesar Chavez, the Mexican American labor leader who helped organize farm workers in the 1950s and 1960s, campaigned against illegal immigration, believing that it was a source of low-wage labor that undermined workers’ bargaining power.In recent decades, however, many union leaders, particularly in California, have come to see labor and immigrant rights as intertwined. If the authorities do not enforce minimum wage laws, safety regulations and other protections for undocumented immigrants, they argue, that will undermine labor standards for union members as well.Organized labor’s embrace of immigrants’ rights is also a numbers game: In California and many other parts of the country, immigrants — documented and undocumented — dominate the work force, especially in the service sector.“There’s been a real reckoning over the past 25 years with the history of xenophobia in California labor unions,” said Veena Dubal, a law professor at the University of California, Irvine, who studies the labor movement. “If labor wants to grow its strength, if it wants to be powerful, it cannot see itself as just representing the white working class.”Republicans under President Trump have made inroads with rank-and-file union members in recent elections, even as labor leaders have mostly continued to back Democrats.But Ms. Dubal said Mr. Huerta’s arrest — and the recent immigration raids more generally — seemed to be drawing protest in a way that some of the other policies that Mr. Trump has enacted early in his term have not. The SEIU planned to hold rallies in Los Angeles and more than a dozen other cities on Monday to demand Mr. Huerta’s release.“His arrest has ignited even the more conservative elements of the labor movement,” Ms. Dubal said. “If they can go after him, the head of the largest labor union in the largest economy in a labor friendly state, who is the government not going to go after?”June 8, 2025, 7:26 p.m. ETThe Democratic Governors Association condemned President Trump’s decision to send National Guard troops into Los Angeles over the objections of Gov. Gavin Newsom as “an alarming abuse of power.” The association, which includes every Democratic governor in the country, said in a statement that they stand with Mr. Newsom.June 8, 2025, 7:15 p.m. ETThe Federal Bureau of Investigations is offering a reward of up to $50,000 for information identifying a protester who they say threw rocks at government vehicles on Saturday in Paramount. In a wanted poster, the agency said a federal officer was injured and vehicles were damaged.Credit...FBIJune 8, 2025, 7:07 p.m. ETDemonstrators have breached a police line guarding the entrance to Highway 101 and are now getting in the way of traffic. This freeway has been blocked during immigration and racial justice protests in years past.Credit...Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesJune 8, 2025, 7:02 p.m. ETGov. Gavin Newsom greeted President Trump during his trip to Los Angeles in January.Credit...Kenny Holston/The New York TimesFor most of this year, Gov. Gavin Newsom of California has chosen his own way to engage the man in the White House: conciliation over confrontation.Mr. Newsom went to the Los Angeles airport in January to greet President Trump, who had flown to California after the devastating wildfires. The Democratic governor started a podcast in which he interviewed leaders of the MAGA movement, including Steve Bannon, to the distress of many on the left. Mr. Newsom broke with Democrats when he said it was unfair for trans athletes to compete in girls sports.And on Friday, he spent 40 minutes talking to Mr. Trump on the phone, during which the president told him to get the local police in line because things were getting out of control with protesters confronting immigration agents, White House officials said.To many Democrats, Mr. Newsom’s pursuits have seemed like an exquisitely calculated effort by one of the nation’s highest-profile Democrats to thread the needle. But the president’s decision to bypass Mr. Newsom and send National Guard troops to demonstrations in his state seems likely to shatter whatever balance the governor was trying to maintain.It was a moment that has long-term implications for Mr. Newsom’s legacy as governor, his ability to lead the state through yet another crisis and any hope he has to run for president in 2028.“He has no choice but to fight back directly — the base is demanding it,” said Mike Madrid, a Republican political consultant and critic of the president. “I think his tone, direction, strategy will adjust.”The stakes could be seen in the sharp, confrontational tone Mr. Newsom adopted this weekend after the Trump administration unilaterally decided to send troops to Los Angeles. He accused Mr. Trump and his defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, of trying to provoke unrest, and mocked the president for claiming the National Guard had already quelled the demonstrations, even before the guard had been deployed.“The President is attempting to inflame passions and provoke a response,” Mr. Newsom said in a fund-raising email for his political action committee Sunday morning. “He would like nothing more than for this provocative show of force — and Pete Hegseth’s absurd threat to deploy United States Marines on American soil — to escalate tensions and incite violence.”Mr. Newsom is in a complicated position as he tries to manage a crush of political and governance forces. He is well aware that this weekend’s events are the kind that, if mishandled, can define the legacy of a chief executive, as Mayor Karen Bass of Los Angeles learned when she was overseas during the immediate aftermath of the fires in January.The governor needs Mr. Trump’s support as California solicits critical federal aid to help rebuild Los Angeles from the fires.And Mr. Newsom, who cannot seek another term as governor next year, is positioning himself for 2028. With the national electorate in mind, Mr. Newsom until recently did not portray himself as a part of the resistance to Mr. Trump. He talked about the need to understand the concerns of many voters who supported Mr. Trump in November, even if that meant violating Democratic orthodoxy.That strategy was always risky for a governor from a blue state like California, which — along with New York — has been a target for Mr. Trump since the day he took office.For all of Mr. Newsom’s efforts to placate the president, Mr. Trump in the last week alone threatened to cut funding to California schools because a trans girl won two events at the state track and field meet, eliminated $4 billion in federal funds for high-speed rail in California and, now, sent troops to Los Angeles against Mr. Newsom’s wishes.“I would hope this would demonstrate to Newsom that there is no accommodation with Trump, that Trump is determined to pick fights in California and to make faux shows of force to build his false case that California is out of control,” said Jim Newton, a former head of the editorial page of the Los Angeles Times, and a biographer of Jerry Brown, Mr. Newsom’s predecessor as governor.Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan contributed reporting.June 8, 2025, 6:43 p.m. ETThe National Guard was deployed to clamp down on the protests, but videos show they are largely refraining from clashing with demonstrators. While Los Angeles police officers and federal agents have fired crowd-control munitions at protesters, the National Guard appears to be standing along the perimeter holding riot shields and wooden batons.Credit...Philip Cheung for The New York TimesJune 8, 2025, 6:39 p.m. ETGov. Gavin Newsom just formally asked Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, to rescind President Trump’s order to deploy the National Guard in Los Angeles. “We didn’t have a problem until Trump got involved,” Mr. Newsom said in a social media post. “This is a serious breach of state sovereignty — inflaming tensions while pulling resources from where they’re actually needed.”I have formally requested the Trump Administration rescind their unlawful deployment of troops in Los Angeles county and return them to my command.We didn’t have a problem until Trump got involved. This is a serious breach of state sovereignty — inflaming tensions while… pic.twitter.com/tOtA5dcfxc— Gavin Newsom (@GavinNewsom) June 8, 2025June 8, 2025, 6:23 p.m. ETA helicopter circling the crowd in downtown Los Angeles is announcing via loudspeaker that the protest is an “unlawful assembly.”June 8, 2025, 6:22 p.m. ETMimi DwyerReporting from Los Angeles CountyA large group of Los Angeles police officers just ran in formation through a crowd of protesters. Some fired projectiles into the crowd. Many protesters are filming the faces and badges of police who are lined up with weapons and batons drawn.June 8, 2025, 6:12 p.m. ETFoam projectiles fired into the crowd of protesters littered the ground outside a downtown detention center where a crowd has been growing since the morning.Credit...Livia Albeck-Ripka/The New York TimesJune 8, 2025, 6:12 p.m. ETMimi DwyerReporting from Los Angeles CountyTensions are escalating in one area of the protest, where a line of Los Angeles police officers are separating the crowd. “Love thy neighbor,” one protester yelled.VideoCreditCredit...Mimi Dwyer for The New York TimesJune 8, 2025, 6:00 p.m. ETLos Angeles police officers fired crowd-control munitions at one group of protesters near downtown after the gathering was declared an unlawful assembly.June 8, 2025, 5:58 p.m. ETProtesters are facing off with law enforcement officers outside the detention center in downtown Los Angeles, where it appears two separate protests are about converge.June 8, 2025, 5:47 p.m. ETThe president said he had directed three of his top cabinet officials — Kristi Noem, the secretary of homeland security, Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, and Pam Bondi, the attorney general — “to take all such action necessary to liberate Los Angeles from the Migrant Invasion, and put an end to these Migrant riots.”June 8, 2025, 5:48 p.m. ETHamed AleazizDepartment of Homeland Security reporterTrump often talks about an “invasion” of migrants, particularly when discussing migrants who illegally cross at the border. He also justified the use of the Alien Enemies Act to rapidly deport Venezuelan migrants by saying there was an “invasion” by the gang Tren de Aragua. Still, Los Angeles is place that has embraced rich and various immigrant cultures.June 8, 2025, 5:38 p.m. ETNational Guard troops were deployed to Los Angeles in 1992 to restore order following the acquittal of police officers involved in the beating of Rodney King.Credit...Paul Sakuma/Associated PressSome Republicans have drawn parallels between President Trump’s dispatching of National Guard troops to Los Angeles on Saturday and what happened in 1992, when soldiers and Marines were sent to the Los Angeles area to restore order after the Rodney King riots.But that was a far different situation.In contrast with the isolated skirmishes seen in Los Angeles County over the past few days, there were neighborhoods in 1992 that had devolved into something resembling a lawless dystopia. Drivers were pulled from cars and beaten. Buildings were burned. Businesses were looted. In all, 63 people died during the riots, including nine who were shot by the police.The mayhem, which went on for six days, was rooted in Black residents’ anger over years of police brutality. It ignited after four officers were found not guilty of using excessive force against Mr. King, a Black motorist who had been pulled over after a high-speed chase, even though videotape evidence clearly showed the officers brutally beating him. That anger had erupted before, notably in the Watts riots of 1965.The violence in 1992 was also fueled by tensions between the Black and Korean American communities in the area, and by the shooting death of a Black girl by a Korean American shopkeeper. It got so far out of control that major-league sports events were postponed or moved to safer locations, dusk-to-dawn curfews were imposed, schools were closed and mail delivery was withheld in some neighborhoods.On the third day of the violence, President George H.W. Bush activated the National Guard at the request of Gov. Pete Wilson and Mayor Tom Bradley of Los Angeles. Thousands of Army and Marine troops were sent into Los Angeles as well. Caravans including Humvees and other armored vehicles rolled into the city along the freeways.The protests of 2025 bear little if any comparison to the widespread upheaval and violence of 1992. The protesters have directed their anger mainly at ICE agents, not at fellow residents, and the demonstrations have so far done relatively little damage to buildings or businesses.“It doesn’t appear to me that they’re anywhere near close to needing the National Guard now,” said Joe Domanick, an author who has written extensively about the Los Angeles police. “It looks like an opportunity for Trump to clamp down and use the military in ways that aren’t necessary yet.”Much of the anger today is emanating from Latinos, the main group being targeted by federal immigration agents.Latinos make up a plurality of Los Angeles residents, hold many powerful political positions in the region and account for nearly half of the officers in the Los Angeles Police Department and Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.“These organizations are going to be caught in the middle,” Mr. Domanick said. “They’ve invested in community policing, to the extent that they could, and many of these officers have parents and grandparents who were probably undocumented. It’s a very complex situation.”June 8, 2025, 5:32 p.m. ETTrump, in a post on Truth Social, said Los Angeles had been “invaded and occupied.” He wrote that “violent, insurrectionist mobs are swarming and attacking our Federal Agents to try and stop our deportation operations.” So far on Sunday, hundreds of protesters had converged on a detention center in downtown Los Angeles, but the demonstrations appeared to be peaceful.June 8, 2025, 5:30 p.m. ETPresident Trump fielded questions from reporters about the protests in California before leaving for Camp David on Sunday. “We’re going to have troops everywhere,” Mr. Trump said. “We’re not going to let this happen to our country.”June 8, 2025, 5:12 p.m. ETNational Guard troops outside of Selma, Ala., in 1965.Credit...Getty ImagesIt was March 1965, on the eve of the momentous civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery, Ala. Tensions between protesters and law enforcement officers had been rising across the South. The president was at odds over voting rights with a governor he considered to be a recalcitrant political adversary.So to protect demonstrators against violence, President Lyndon B. Johnson did something presidents rarely do: He invoked his legal authority to activate and deploy the National Guard without the cooperation of the state’s governor — in this case, Gov. George Wallace of Alabama, one of the nation’s most prominent segregationists.Before Saturday, that was the last time a president used his limited executive authority to bypass a state governor and dispatch that state’s National Guard himself to deal with civil unrest. In nearly all cases when the National Guard is activated, it happens at the request of the state governor, who commands the troops, and presidents do not interfere.On Sunday morning, though, hundreds of California National Guard troops arrived in Los Angeles, and hundreds more were on the way, at President Trump’s direction.He said their mission was to help defuse clashes between federal immigration agents and demonstrators in and around Los Angeles. In some cases, demonstrators who oppose Mr. Trump’s mass deportation campaign have surrounded agents, pelted them with objects and tried to block them from moving down streets.A White House spokeswoman, Karoline Leavitt, said officials in California had “completely abdicated their responsibility to protect their citizens.” Gov. Gavin Newsom of California called the president’s move an unnecessary provocation.“Presidents rarely federalize a state or territory’s guard without the consent of the governor,” the Council on Foreign Relations noted in an online fact sheet summarizing the history of the National Guard.As an example, President George W. Bush decided against taking control of the National Guard in Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina in 2006, after the state’s Democratic governor, Kathleen Blanco, objected.Often, a governor works with the president when a situation arises that local authorities are not equipped to handle on their own. This was the case in 1992 during another tense situation in Los Angeles: the riots that followed the acquittal of police officers who had beaten Rodney King, a Black man.President Johnson explained his decision in 1965 to call out the Guard as a way to ensure the rights of American citizens “to walk peaceably and safely without injury or loss of life from Selma to Montgomery, Ala.”He acted because Governor Wallace — who did not want to take action that could be seen as defending the marchers or their cause for civil rights — refused to issue orders to the National Guard himself.June 8, 2025, 3:50 p.m. ETThe deployed National Guard troops are with the Army’s 79th Brigade Combat Team. Credit...Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York TimesMilitary officials were still trying to figure out on Sunday the extent to which National Guard troops deployed to the Los Angeles area under President Trump’s order would engage with protesters, two Defense Department officials said on Sunday.The troops are part of the Army’s 79th Infantry Brigade Combat Team from the California National Guard and report to United States Northern Command, the officials said. Northern Command is based in Colorado Springs and commanded by Gen. Gregory M. Guillot.The ultimate authorities for the troops are Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and President Trump.The officials said that the soldiers have been tasked with defending federal property and federal personnel in the operational area in and around Los Angeles. They were read their rules of engagement — specifically the rules for using force with protesters — just before they deployed, the officials added.But Pentagon officials have not said publicly what those rules of engagement are. It was unclear exactly what the soldiers were told about their role. Pentagon officials were still working on Sunday to respond to Mr. Trump’s sudden announcement on Saturday.One U.S. military official said the initial troops deployed from the 79th Infantry Brigade Combat Team were sent not because of any specialized training or expertise but because their planned drills were this weekend, so it was easy to mobilize them.Eric Schmitt contributed reporting.