SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — National Guard troops repeatedly rehearsed their role in an operation at a Los Angeles park intended as a show of force against undocumented people and those protesting the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, a deputy commanding general testified Tuesday.
Maj. Gen. Scott Sherman, who commanded Guard troops in Los Angeles, was testifying at a trial to determine whether the Trump administration violated federal law when it deployed the soldiers and U.S. Marines to Southern California this summer.
Sherman said the deployment of federal agents on horseback and on foot to MacArthur Park in the heart of a neighborhood with a large immigrant population was initially planned for Father’s Day, June 15. But the operation was moved to July 7 after he raised concerns the park could be crowded, he said.
“We assessed that there could be a large amount of people in the park (on Father’s Day), which could quickly overwhelm Border Patrol,” Sherman testified.
Sherman said the decision to shift the timing of the operation came after discussion among the National Guard, the U.S. Northern Command, the Border Patrol, Department of Defense Secretary Peter Hegseth and Department of Homeland Security Kristi Noem.
The Guard troops were deployed to protect the perimeter and were instructed only to exit their vehicles if there was a direct threat to federal agents, he said.
All troops remained in their vehicles during the brief but mighty show of force. Sherman said the operation took just 20 minutes because it had been rehearsed multiple times. The Department of Homeland Security hasn’t said if anyone was arrested.
Sherman testified during the second day of a three-day trial on whether President Donald Trump’s deployment of armed forces to Los Angeles following protests over immigration raids this summer violated the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act. The law generally prohibits a president from using the military to police domestic affairs. All but about 300 Guard troops have since left Los Angeles.
Sherman testified that he also raised concerns that military vehicles would park along Wilshire Boulevard, which traverses the park, instead of staying in the park’s perimeter.
After he raised his concerns, Gregory Bovino, the Border Patrol’s El Centro sector chief in charge of the immigration crackdown in Los Angeles, questioned his loyalty, Sherman told the court Monday.
On July 7, federal agents, many of them in tactical gear, walked and rode their horses around the park, which was nearly empty since word had spread of a potential raid.
LA Mayor Karen Bass and Gov. Gavin Newsom called it a political stunt and spectacle meant to intimidate the city’s immigrant communities.
