The Center for Progressive Reform released the following statement:
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Center for Progressive Reform is alarmed by the illegal deployment of active military, including 700 U.S Marines and 4,000 National Guard troops, against a civilian population in Los Angeles last week. Under the false pretense of providing “safety” and “protection,” these actions follow overwhelmingly peaceful protests of inhumane enforcement of immigration laws and the detention of nonviolent undocumented and legal immigrants.
The deployment of the U.S. military against civilians and the forceful detention and removal of Sen. Alex Padilla from a press conference held by U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem — preventing him from performing his constitutional duty to conduct reasonable congressional oversight over the federal government’s immigration enforcement operations in Los Angeles and across California — mark a clear escalation of authoritarian actions by the Trump administration.
These actions also demonstrate the administration’s increasingly aggressive weaponization of the tools of the administrative state against its perceived political enemies — even to the point of denying states and communities their constitutionally protected rights of self-determination. By Noem’s own admission, these actions are more than an immigration enforcement operation and the real objective is to “…liberate [the city Los Angeles] from the socialist and burdensome leadership of Governor [Newsom] and Mayor [Bass]” and create a “model blueprint“ to expand these actions to other cities and states. In other words: to undermine any democratically elected state and local government that does not align with the policy goals of the Trump administration.
The Center first began calling attention to Project 2025 nearly two years ago because it foretold the vision of an authoritarian administrative state these recent actions are now making all too real. The administration’s misuse of military action against civilians (which federal law only permits in the extremely limited circumstance of “suppressing insurrections”), its attacks against constitutional checks and balances, and its disregard for the rule of law and democratic government are fundamentally incompatible with our nation’s centuries-long project of building a fair, inclusive government and a more just society.
