US President Donald Trump deployed 700 Marines to Los Angeles in response to ongoing protests, despite the objections of California’s governor.
It is the first time in more than 30 years that Marines have been sent to a US city because of civil unrest. Governor Gavin Newsom sued the federal government over what he called an intrusion into his state’s sovereignty, saying the deployment was “to fulfill the deranged fantasy of a dictatorial President.”
Trump is deliberately goading California, the US journalist Harold Meyerson wrote in the Financial Times, to “use the predictable backlash to seize more power.” It may work: Protesters have begun burning Waymo robotaxis, stark images that fuel narratives of a “lawless” city, The Verge reported.
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