Protests, Controversy in California over ICE
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This is CNN Breaking News. Good morning, everyone. I'm Audie Cornish, and thank you for waking up with me on this busy Monday morning. We're going to start with that breaking news out of California. Protests over immigration raids have led to arrests in both Los Angeles and San Francisco. Cars were set on fire. Flashbangs and tear gas were used to disperse crowds. Parts of a major freeway were shut down.

This morning marks the fourth day of protests. You're seeing some of those self-driving cars on fire. Right now, all of downtown LA has been declared an unlawful assembly area. President Trump called up the National Guard to protect federal personnel and property. It's the first time a president has done this without a state's request or consent in about 60 years. Are you prepared to invoke the Insurrection Act? It depends on whether or not there's an insurrection.

No, no, but you have violent people and we're not going to let them get away with it. I think that you're going to see some very strong law and order. 500 active duty Marines are also prepared to deploy. The entire National Guard situation is setting up a showdown with California's governor. He claims the president is putting fuel on the fire. The mayor of Los Angeles accused the president of being heavy handed.

When you raid Home Depot and workplaces, when you tear parents and children apart, and when you run armored caravans through our streets, you cause fear and you cause panic. For every single minute that we were here resisting against the Border Patrol, that was time that they were not out deporting people in our community.

But President Trump is urging L.A.'s police chief to bring in the troops right now. Police say at least 27 people were arrested Sunday, most of those on the 101 freeway that police shut down. They say protesters threw things onto the road and damaged police cars. Also overnight, a large crowd protested against ICE in San Francisco. About 60 people were arrested there. Joining me now, CNN's senior national security analyst, Juliette Kayyem. Juliette,

I want to start with some of the history here because you've pointed out that usually a president can federalize the National Guard, for instance, when a governor requests those resources. When a governor says, look, I'm overwhelmed, I think back to the L.A. riots, also Hurricane Katrina. Based on what you've observed, is that where we were?

Yes. I mean, that's this is this is a big distinction of what Donald Trump did. There's a series of cases coming out of desegregation when a governor defied a Supreme Court order and the president federalized the National Guard to get children into the school. So that's a pool of those cases. More recently, the time passed.

instances where a governor has requested additional federal support in the form of federalized National Guard assets or troops that has always been with the cooperation of the governor and the federal government. So, Hurricane Katrina, you exactly

noted. And the L.A. riots in the past, a Republican governor and a Democrat Democratic mayor of Los Angeles both requested this from the president. And they were deployed. I want to say something clear that simply because they're deployed doesn't mean it's been successful. I am in this field. The L.A. riots deployment of Federalized National Guard was considered chaotic and not very successful.

Can you get into that more? We have heard this argument that it can in some cases, actually we've heard from the governor, I think, can inflame or kind of further fuel backlash. What are you seeing? Yeah, so this is the white, it's hard to determine what the White House thinks.

is doing right now. The president and his team came on very strong on Saturday, using words like insurrection. I think getting people really hyped up about what was going to be happening. Then there was a delay. And now there's a couple hundred troops that are protecting federal buildings. That's an important mission. It could have been done with state National Guard. You didn't need to put them under the president or Secretary Hegseth.

And the reason why you don't do that is because state national guard work regularly with state police and local police for crowd control, games, the LA is gonna be hosting the Olympics. Think of a marathon or a big event. This is happening all the time. So there's training, there's understanding, there's what we call interoperability. The different teams can communicate with each other. When you bring a new entity in,

There's no training, there's no cooperation, there's often chaos, and there's a higher probability of friendly fire. This is what happened in the LA riots, is that there were two instances in which there was almost friendly fire. So we do this to protect, or we don't do this in order to protect the troops as well as the first responders.

Juliette Kayyem, CNN senior national security analyst, thank you. Thank you.

Coming up on CNN this morning, we're continuing to, of course, monitor this breaking news out of Los Angeles. California leaders say they're ready to sue over the president's deployment of the National Guard. Is the White House legally out of bounds? Plus, a new poll shows most Americans are on board with the president's deportation goals, but not how he's going about them. And we're watching protests unfolding in the early hours of the morning as police continue to make arrests overnight.

We're making more arrests as we speak. We're trying to get into that posture where we're able to make arrests. Right now, really, our officers are really under attack. I'm Eva Longoria, and I'm exploring Spain and its 17 regions to see how the land and its people have created one of the world's most exciting cuisines. Eva Longoria, Searching for Spain, Sunday at 9 on CNN.

President Trump has deployed the National Guard to Los Angeles, and that's raised urgent questions about how far the White House will go to enforce its immigration crackdown and how far states can go in resisting. President Trump posted on Truth Social that, quote, order will be restored, the illegals will be expelled, and Los Angeles will be set free. The Trump administration is singling out California Governor Gavin Newsom's response to the protests as its main reason for getting involved.

If he was doing his job, then people wouldn't have gotten hurt the last couple of days. Governor Newsom has proven that he makes bad decisions. The president knows that he makes bad decisions, and that's why the president chose the safety of this community over waiting for Governor Newsom to get some sanity. And the White House's border czar, Tom Homan, is threatening to arrest anyone getting in the way of immigration enforcement, including Newsom, who says he's ready for a fight. The fear.

The horror. The hell is this guy? Come after me. Arrest me. Let's just get it over with. Tough guy.

- Joining me now in the group chat, CNN Politics senior reporter, Stephen Collinson, Republican strategist and CNN political commentator, Brad Todd, and CNN contributor, Lulu Garcia Navarro. I was talking during the break about whether or not this is still an immigration story, sort of how we're thinking about this moment. Can I kind of open it to you guys? - This is a very perilous moment because what we're seeing here

is a fight that President Trump wants to have. Meaning with blue states? With blue states, about immigration, about the rule of law and the way that he views it, and also using the threat of military force in a way that we haven't seen in this country, federal military force. I mean, there's discussion of deploying Marines for what is a civil disturbance. This should be of concern, I think, to many, many people in this country. And so I...

I think the context is that, yes, this is about immigration enforcement. Los Angeles is a city where 50% almost are Latinos. The people who have been protesting, peacefully protesting, I'm not talking about the violent protesters here. Violence...

should never be something that's condoned. But the people who have been peacefully protesting, sometimes they're first, second generation Latinos who are worried about this kind of immigration enforcement. And so, you know, this is a complicated issue. - And something we heard earlier, I think in a piece of tape, was a protester saying every moment that we're out here, they're not, he said, in our communities.

doing raids, etc. Brad, what are you thinking? Well, we got to this moment because California has a sanctuary policy. The state law forbids local law enforcement from cooperating with or local government from cooperating with immigration enforcement. We have immigration laws that govern the entire land and California is willfully ignoring them. California's left-wing politicians set this up. If California had long been

cooperating and helping enforce immigration laws all along the way. This would not be- - It's not the whole state though. It's not the whole state. You do know that some of this is jurisdictions. There are certain towns that do- - It's a state law. - Yeah, but there are certain- - They have a state law. - But there are certain towns that absolutely have cooperated with federal authorities. - Shouldn't they all? - You know, this is,

Part of the issue that is always interesting here is when Republicans want to talk about states' rights, it's about states' rights when it is something that they're interested in and not when it is something that perhaps Democrats and their states are interested in. And so I think- We've all agreed on what immigration laws are. There's not a state- We're going to talk about this more in the hour. I want to bring in Stephen because there is something you mentioned earlier about militarization. We're going to come back to your point. But having Marines

waiting in the wings is pretty wild because this is not the LA riots so far, not what I remember growing up with. And Steve-- - But you notice when, once the president-- - But hold on one second, Brad. So Stephen brought up this thing saying that the president's not just demonstrating his desire to militarize the crackdown on undocumented migrants, but also implying to use it against

protest, and dissent. Is that what you see when you look at these images? I think that's the imagery that the administration is creating. The president tweeted in the middle of the night or posted on Truth Social or whatever it is now, bring in the troops. He wants us...

to have that imagery of troops on the streets, I think, first of all, because-- - But that's because people are seeing this imagery, right? I mean, if you look at the cover of the Post today, dozens of thugs arrested as First National Guard troops. - And that is, you know-- - Gavin Newsom wants it too. - Yeah, I think you're right. - Gavin Newsom absolutely wants it. - That comment he said that we saw about him, you know, potentially being arrested, he clearly wants this political-- - He's peacocking to try to become a national figure. - I mean, there's a lot of peacocking going on, but from the administration's point of view,

Trump was elected on a mandate of strong border policy. He sees that. He wants to push that as far as he can. He's sending a message to other democratic states who he believes do not cooperate with the administration. To their leaders or to people who might try and protest in the streets? How do you mean exactly? The message he's sending. Yeah, but I think to that point I made in the story,

You know, and to your point about the Marines, this is a dangerous moment. The idea of American active troops even being talked about on the street. I remember I was in New Orleans after the hurricane. You had the 82nd Airborne there. And they were there on a much different mission. But seeing American active duty troops on a combat patrol walking through the streets of an American city is a chilling image.

And I've worked in a lot of countries where that is the case. And it's not something you really want to bring home. The way to avoid that is for California law enforcement to work with immigration authorities. But is it okay that it's been raised? No one wants it. But I will note that once the president said he might mobilize the National Guard, the LAPD suddenly got interested in stopping the demonstration. Okay.

It took that kind of a threat to get LAPD to do their job. All right, group chat, stay with me. We've got a lot to talk about. We're actually going to talk about a different part of this later. But up next on CNN This Morning is we monitor the situation on the ground in Los Angeles. As we've talked about, the National Guard has been deployed. In the meantime, there are at least 500 Marines now on standby. We want to talk about the rules of engagement for all this.

Plus, all of downtown L.A. has been declared an unlawful assembly area overnight. So we're going to be live from Los Angeles in just a few minutes. I'm a veteran. So this angers me. This angers me. It's disgusting. They're using your own soldiers on your own people.

Right now, the White House has National Guard members in L.A. in response to the protests against immigration enforcement raids. And the Marines could be next, or at least at this point, on standby. That's according to U.S. Northern Command. And the president did not officially invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807 when he brought in the National Guard. L.A.'s police chief is disputing even the need for those troops on the ground.

What is your position on the National Guard being deployed? Do we need them here? We have great cops in Southern California here that work together all the time. So we have tremendous capability here. To say that we would go to that right away, I'd say we wouldn't have been there yet.

Joining me now to discuss is CNN Global Affairs Analyst Kimberly Dozier. Thank you so much for being here. So people might be wondering why we have the Global Affairs Analyst on this. First of all, how is this being seen overseas? It is being seen as an escalation of the dispute between Trump and the Democrats and the left.

because Trump has decided... But are they seeing the violence on the streets? They're seeing the violence on the streets and the choice to use troops as opposed to just cops as they're using words like authoritarian, the rise of the autocracy in the United States, all sorts of words like that. When I speak to European officials in general, they were worried about a turn in this direction and this...

images coming out of L.A. confirm some of their worst fears. I want to talk about what California's lieutenant governor said about this decision to send in the National Guard. This is Lieutenant Governor Eleni Kounalakis. Calling in the National Guard in the way that he did was not necessary, absolutely overkill, and seems to now be escalating the problem because of Donald Trump's actions.

The president, of course, bypassing the governor to send in that support. One, is it legal? And two, does it do what she says, escalate? You and I have both covered riots before, and the crowd can change depending on who's there and how they respond.

So under Title 10, he can do this. He can decide where he wants National Guard troops to go. As you said, he hasn't invoked the Insurrection Act. So these troops can protect federal property and federal forces. They cannot arrest American citizens unless the Insurrection Act is imposed. So right now, what we're seeing are these troops used

in situations where they're supposed to be hanging back, but we're already seeing some face-to-face confrontations where protesters are calling out to them, reacting to what we call full battle rattle, when troops are deployed with helmet, mask, the flak jackets, weapons in hand.

When I would speak to troops in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, if they were going into community trying to win trust, they would do things like take some of that stuff off. The moment you see that kind of a force deployed, it especially, I've covered riots from Northern Ireland to Palestinians in the West Bank to the Black Lives Matter protests that I think both of us saw here in D.C.,

Whenever you see a line of troops arrayed like that, it creates fear, anger, and an aggressive reaction in the protesters. And it's the kind of thing that can turn a protest into a riot. - But isn't the point to have a show of force?

If you are on the conservative side of the house, you think that California is lawless and that the governor and the mayor of LA didn't step in to impose discipline

And what has dominated your television screen are pictures of burning cars, et cetera. If you're in another political side of the house, what you see are largely peaceful protesters with a few troublemakers being met with massive force. So President Trump isn't losing anything with his base by deploying these forces, but it is starting this cleaving between the two sides that

What I fear, because I've watched it happen in other countries, is that the protests snowball. It becomes sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy for the conservative side. More and more force is used. And what happens are the protesters end up, instead of working on political action, signing people up for elections, et cetera, they get caught in this cycle of

destroying property and getting seen on television screens and they think that's actually doing something because this is this amorphous thing they're trying to fight and here's a concrete thing that they can go and hit out against. But I appreciate your point about how these things are depicted and in the media, social media age, what people are going to be seeing. Kim Dozier, thank you so much. Kim is a CNN global affairs analyst.

Now, after the break on CNN this morning, we're on the ground in Los Angeles as protests spill into a fourth day. What the situation is like in L.A. right now. Plus, with the immigration crackdown center stage, Democrats are pulled back into a fight many have been avoiding. This is CNN Breaking News.

They could not kidnap people in our community today because the people came out to resist. The breaking news: Immigration protests continue. A fourth day in Los Angeles continued overnight. Good morning, everybody. I'm Adi Cornish, and I want to thank you for being with us here on CNN this morning. It's half past the hour on the East Coast, and here's what's happening right now.

President Trump has deployed the National Guard to LA as thousands of protesters flood the streets. The unrest began Friday after immigration raids in the area. Police declared all of downtown LA as an unlawful assembly area and at least 27 people have been arrested. That happened on Sunday.

Overnight, President Trump's new travel ban went into effect. It bars people from 12 countries, mainly in Africa and the Middle East, from entering the U.S. and it puts more restrictions on those from seven other nations. Today, officials from the U.S. and China will resume trade talks in London. President Trump's economic adviser said he is "very comfortable" with a deal closing between the two.

All right, we're going to return now to those protests. There's some polling that shows Americans were not opposed to the president's immigration policies. Interestingly enough, according to a CBS News and YouGov poll, a majority of Americans approve of the Trump administration's deportation program. Another 42% say they believe it's making people in the U.S. safer, and it's also exposing a weak spot for Democrats as they try to figure out how to get their message across on immigration.

Scott Peters, a Democratic congressman from San Diego, told Politico over the weekend we were wrong on the border. And here's what Senator Amy Klobuchar said this weekend on the matter. So Democrats believe in public safety. As a former prosecutor, it's been a lot of my life work working with law enforcement. And that means you don't inflame things and make it worse. And that is that you make sure that violent criminals aren't in our midst.

The group chat is back. I want to finish that quote from Congressman Peters, because he went on to say, even though he said Democrats had been wrong on the border, he said, "It's not hard to explain to average Americans why what's happening here is unproductive." He called it "un-American" and also "cruel."

We talked about the split-screen effect, but Stephen, can I start with you about how you think Americans are going to see this now? Because that poll was done before this round of riots and government response. Right. I think the problem the Democrats have is that there is a long political hangover from the previous administration's management of the border and immigration issues.

their continual insistence that there wasn't a border crisis. That does give the president, I think, some significant political leeway. It's always been a safe haven for him, this issue. But in that CBS poll, people did start to register concern about the way that the crackdown is being implemented. I think there's going to be a battle of imagery between

scenes that can be presented on conservative media and by the White House as scenes of masses of unrest and disorder, which is traditionally a way that conservative politicians can create some political traction.

Troops on the streets is a fearful image, and I think that has the potential to change things. I mean, we've seen Senator Ted Cruz using an image on social media that was from 2020 of a police car on fire. There have not been, to the best of my knowledge, police cars on fire. Plenty of cars on fire. Yeah, Waymo, but there's a difference between imagery of police cars on fire and other... Police were attacked. But it was not the right image. Also a driverless car.

Yeah, I'm not saying that any of this is right, but what I am saying, I'm trying to, what I am calling out here is that there is, I think, to your point, a desire to portray this in a certain way that feeds the narrative that calls for troops. Listen, the big problem here is do you want to see U.S. Marines

shooting US citizens on the streets of an American city? No, I don't. And the way to avoid all of this confrontation would have been to enforce the law. The Biden administration did over a half dozen executive orders that encouraged people to come. We were seeing 165,000 people a month crossing the southwest border illegally when Joe Biden was president. That's now about 8,000 a month. It's because of the failures of the Biden administration that we have this many illegal

immigrants in America. 100% true. Well, then we have to fix that problem. But there's a huge issue that is about what is happening at this moment. Because, yes, the failures of the Biden administration, 100%, the border was a mess. So should California help enforce immigration law right now to clean up that mess?

I'm not here to say whether they should or they shouldn't. I'm not a Californian. That's the question. I'm a reporter. It's an American call. Hold on, you guys. I want to just say this issue, which is this. This all started, this particular issue started because there were enforcement operations outside of Home Depot from day laborers. And so the idea was that, you know, initially what Donald Trump was saying was we're going to get criminals, we're going to get people who are terrible in this country, who have committed atrocities.

And instead, what the people of L.A. have seen is you're going after people who are just looking for a job and who are here in this country who haven't done anything. Yeah, and we've had some clips today of some protesters kind of referring to this. 56% of Americans, in our poll, in CNN's own poll, 56% of Americans say that everyone who's here illegally should be deported. Yeah.

Do you see raids happening in agribusinesses in South Dakota? What's your sense of this? I think that the approach Lulu's suggesting is actually correct. I agree. You start with criminals and move on to that. Do you think they're doing that? Yes, I think that's their priority. That is their priority. So how do you think we ended up here? Well, first off, if you're a deportable person under the law,

You don't have any recourse. If the Immigration and Customs Agency wants to deport you, they can. They can. We have immigration laws for a reason. You're either here illegally or you're not. The point that Democrats are making...

is that this kind of action, you know, at a Home Depot in L.A., 50% Latino, where everyone is related to someone who might be here illegally and none of them have done anything wrong, is going to propel this kind of reaction. Hang on, too. We also had an administration that said, if you're here illegally, you should go home. You should self-deport. Talking about this administration, though.

This administration has said that. Okay, so let me let you guys pause for a second, mainly because we actually have someone from L.A. here. I want to get this reporting in so people have an update on what's going on. At this point, police say they're investigating reports of looting overnight in L.A.'s financial district. They're also urging businesses to report any vandalism during the protests going on there.

Now, yesterday, as those protests were escalating in the streets of L.A., officers used flashbangs and tear gas to disperse crowds. One reporter who is from Nine News Australia unfortunately got hit by a rubber bullet while she was doing her job. The LAPD moving force back, firing rubber bullets at protesters, moving them on through the heart of L.A. You just shot the... You okay?

She said she was good. I'm going to bring in now CNN's Maribel Gonzalez. She's also on the ground in Los Angeles. Maribel, I hope you're staying safe. What are you seeing now so early in the morning?

Yeah, good morning, Adi. So here in downtown Los Angeles area, we are right by the Metropolitan Detention Center. This was the building that was at the heart of all the chaos that erupted just a few hours ago. Of course, we know that downtown Los Angeles has been declared an unlawful assembly area. And right now, those crowds that were here just hours ago have dispersed, at least here,

But as we've seen, law enforcement presence is not letting up. Just moments ago, we saw more reinforcements coming in, including an armored vehicle from the Sheriff's Department and from several agencies in the Los Angeles area. Los Angeles Police Department also here blocking the street and right

behind them, we're seeing a several, a line of National Guardsmen patrolling the area up above. We've heard and seen the Los Angeles Police chopper staying vigilant of this zone. Now, we know, Adi, that at least 27 people were arrested on Sunday here in this area. And some of those alleged crimes include, uh,

throwing a Molotov cocktail at a police officer and also ramming a motorcycle into a police line. Now, all of this happening as these protests are taking place on the streets, we know that the state and federal government are at odds with a governor, California Governor Gavin Newsom, threatening to sue the Trump administration for their deployment of national troops. We know that it's been decades.

since the White House has deployed the National Guard without the consent or request of the state. So things definitely heating up not only on the streets of Los Angeles, but also between the governments as well. Maribel, I have one more question because we're hearing the word looting, which I think has pretty serious connotations when people hear the term L.A. and riot. What is the extent of what you've heard so far?

Yes, and you know that I'm very glad that you pointed that out. You know, right now we're not hearing much about the specifics of the looting. We have only heard that Los Angeles Police Department is asking businesses to document any sort of damage that they incurred during these protests. They want to keep a track of them. But as

I can tell you that here in the downtown area, while we haven't necessarily seen, quote unquote, looting, we have seen a lot of destruction of property, of some vehicles and lots of graffiti that unfortunately we cannot show you because a lot of it is profanity just scribbled on the walls of the freeway and along the streets here in downtown. OK, CNN's Maribel Gonzalez reporting in Los Angeles. Thank you.

Next on CNN This Morning, we continue to monitor this breaking news. And a Homeland Security expert is here to talk about things from a tactical standpoint. Was the deployment of National Guard troops necessary? Plus, President Trump versus California Governor Newsom, a longstanding rivalry. Is this a fight that both men have been waiting for? And more from the group chat after this.

He did not have the authority to call in the National Guard for 400 people protesting in a way that local law enforcement could clearly handle it. And I believe that we are likely going to see a lawsuit. That's the lieutenant governor of California on the state's plans to sue over President Trump's deployment of the National Guard there. Governor Gavin Newsom claims the deployment was completely unnecessary.

Donald Trump has created the conditions you see on your TV tonight. He's exacerbated the conditions. He's lit the proverbial match. He's putting fuel on this fire ever since he announced he was taking over the National Guard in a legal act, in a moral act, an unconstitutional act. I want to bring in Dr. Donnell Harvin. He's a Homeland Security and public health emergency expert. First, I just want to tackle what the governor said, the idea that this escalated things, that it was fuel on the fire. What's your response to that?

Well, I could see how that's possible. You know, they're playing a game of what if. But I will tell you, having trained with CDU units, civil disturbance units and knowing those tactics that they use, you know, the more armor, the more people you put out there, the more that riles up the crowd. I was on the phone yesterday with the mayor's office officials in the mayor's office and they could have handled this.

important for context. These state and local authorities have a robust what we call memorandum of agreement or memorandum of understanding with local and statewide law enforcement. California has the largest access to police, almost 80,000 police officers. They certainly could have handled this from a tactical standpoint on their own. And so in all assessments, the deployment of the National Guard was unnecessary for this type of civil unrest.

I want to play for you a response here from Senator Mark Wayne Mullen. He's a Republican from Oklahoma and is supportive of the efforts the White House has been making. We also know the defense secretary is wanting Marines on standby. But here's what he had to say about what you were seeing in the riot images.

You saw rioters throwing rocks, throwing fireworks, being extremely aggressive towards not just federal agents, but even the county and the local PD that was there. So does it look like it's under control? Absolutely not. The difference between what you're seeing during the riots back in, what was it, 96? I forget what year that was, to what we are today.

92 to where we are today is that the governor was actually working with the president of the United States. Now you have a governor that isn't. Now, should we we should be clear from what I remember of that, I think upwards of 60 people were killed in those riots. But can you talk about that, that aspect of it that, you know, he's saying like this is meriting this kind of response?

Well, it's difficult to make an equivalency between civil unrest, but I will say that where has he been for the last decade? I mean, I've been involved in these type of operations for over 30 years. They're never pretty, right? One of the issues that, and this is not to be critical of the media, but the images that you've seen, regardless of whether it's on this channel or others, are really the same burning car, and we need to put context to that.

LA has almost 470 square miles, right? And so we really don't understand watching television, the extent of the rioting and the civil unrest that's going on. Who knows the people on the ground? And that's the mayor's team and the governor's team. You really have to lean on that because that's how our system is built.

Military parade is coming up this Saturday. I was reading the paper and saw an advertisement for protests, counter protests, no King's Day. Can you talk about how Homeland Security departments around the country might be thinking about demonstrations going forward?

Well, I've been on the phone all weekend with some counterparts and colleagues, and they're concerned about contagion from this. There was already an effort, as you've mentioned, to have counter protests to not necessarily the 250th anniversary of the army. I think most people can celebrate the army, but the fact that it's happening on President Trump's birthday. And so what you're going to find in many of these other cities that don't have

ICE deportation operations going on is, you know, people have been out there peacefully protesting against a whole host of things, right? This is a confluence of protests. So Doge, you know, Gaza, we saw people with Gaza flags and, you know, free Gaza yesterday in L.A., as well as against President Trump. So a true concern about contagion and violence spreading and potential for overreaction from the federal government.

Dr. Donnell Harvin, Homeland Security and Public Health Emergency Expert, thanks for being with us. Thank you.

It's now 52 minutes past the hour. Here is your morning roundup. Israel stopped an aid ship heading for Gaza carrying climate activist Greta Thunberg and others. Video from Israel's foreign ministry shows those on board being given food and water. The group Freedom Flotilla Coalition says Israel unlawfully boarded the ship. The foreign ministry says the passengers were taken to Israel and will be returned to their home countries.

And this morning, court will resume in the Sean Combs federal trial. An alleged victim who is only identified by the name Jane will be back on the stand. Over the weekend, Combs' defense team has asked for a mistrial. And Wicked star Cynthia Erivo hosted last night's Tony Awards, where the show may be happy ending, dominated with multiple trophies, including Best Musical. A big highlight also, of course, the Hamilton reunion.

I am not throwing away my shot. I am Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton, just you wait. Throwing away my shot. Members of the original Broadway cast performed a mashup of the show's biggest songs to mark its 10th anniversary. The last time the cast performed together was in 2016.

OK, we want to talk about the context for this showdown in L.A., also the political showdown between President Donald Trump and California Governor Gavin Newsom. It's over an issue that's right in the president's wheelhouse, immigration, and his decision to send in a National Guard without coordinating with the governor is the latest in a back and forth between them.

There's no working with the president. There's only working for him. And I will never work for Donald Trump.

The group chat is back. Stephen, can we talk about that response? There's no working with, there's only working for? Yeah, and these two politicians with their own big egos, Newsom looks like he wants a political future on a national stage.

have a long history of antagonism. We saw it suspended a little bit during the wildfires earlier this year. But I think the political back and forth here is a reminder of why immigration is such a treacherous issue, because bad things can happen when politicians weaponize this issue.

I was overseas last week, and it's not just in the United States. Every country in Europe is facing this decision of how to deal with migration, how much power to use against them, whether to use, in some cases, the military to intervene to stop migration, which has become a massive issue in the decades going forward. You know, liberal democracy can be very badly damaged when immigration as an issue is mishandled

And it looks like in this situation you have politicians on all sides who are doing that. One of the things that's interesting is I think the history politically. So you have a Trump administration that the first time around did overstep and face backlash from the public with its child separation policy. We know during the protests, Black Lives Matter, people at first did object to the militarization of police. And for Democrats, the Abolish ICE movement hurt them for a very long time.

And I argue they weren't able to actually get traction with even the Latino community on talking about immigration in some ways. - The Trumps don't like open borders, let me just be clear. - But I mean the politics, it's not easy to figure out here how to respond. - Donald Trump improved his standing in 2024 with Latinos over his previous two races and immigration largely drove that.

Also, I think you have to look at California. Gavin Newsom, he wants to be a national figure, but it's an ungovernable mess. They can't recover from the fires because government entities won't let people rebuild their homes. People, taxes are- Well, Newsom has talked a lot about deregulation. Right, but he slept while all these regulations stayed in place before they let them become a problem. People are leaving California. They're losing congressional districts. This next decade when the census comes, California might lose two to three congressmen. But can I, something you said earlier about

about winning Latinos made me think of this. I have to hold this up again because on one side it talks about thugs being arrested, but the other thing was about waving Mexican flags. And the idea of backlash is very real in a lot of Latino communities. Some of the protest clips we've heard today were people saying, "We are here." - Let me just say something. I'm from Miami.

And you couldn't have a more conservative, Trump-loving part of the country as the demographics have shifted. And there is an enormous sense of betrayal. In fact, the head of Latinas for Trump has just come out condemning some of the immigration actions. You're seeing that because of what they're doing with Venezuelans, what they're doing with Cubans, you know,

trying to expel them and taking away their temporary visa status. And so what I would say is this is a very, very present issue for the Latino community. The border issue was terrible for Biden. The way the border was dealt with was an absolute catastrophe. On purpose. On purpose. You know, I'm not going to get into that. But it was catastrophic. But this...

equally has the potential to be very damaging for President Trump. Well, I would just say that if you're taken to the streets to argue that we should not be enforcing immigration laws because you would like to become an American and you'd like to stay here, you should probably be waving an American flag and not waving a flag of a country where you're asking to not be sent back to. That's the politics of this. Stephen, can I give the last word to you on this? How are you going to be thinking about this going forward this week?

The two concerns I have to your guest point is whether this does create a contagion and we see rolling protests in other cities that could turn violent and we kind of have a summer of discord, which I think is a possibility. I hope it doesn't happen. And then there's the question of, you know, to your point, this is a good spot for the administration. I think it feels it's in a good spot because when everyone says, OK, we're

this is wrong, you're militarizing the situation, they can turn it back and say, you're soft on immigration. And they think that they have a sweet spot there. So there's no incentive, I think, for them to back down. But, you know, you could get to a point where you're putting a young American soldier in a position where they're on the streets and they're facing American citizens. And that is a very...

dark prospect. Yeah, we should say in the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter protests, also the protests on campuses in Gaza, state and local authorities have a very different approach to protests, peaceful or not. So we're all going to be watching that going ahead. I want to thank you guys for the discussion this morning. I want to thank you for being with us. I'm Audie Cornish and CNN News Central starts right now.