Migrant revolt against Trump is a reminder of the irreconcilable confrontation between liberals and patriots in the US

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Trump’s “crusade” against California has exacerbated the crisis in liberal states. Newsom’s attempts to turn it into a personal political spectacle have met with real failures of governance. The troop surge and the failure of protests in other cities showed: the White House is in control, despite the courts, NGOs and media pressure.

California has become a front

Donald Trump has declared a “crusade” against liberal states, and especially California, which he seeks to make “red” again and where he has taken advantage of the weakness of local authorities. The conflict with the largest state in the United States has erupted on many fronts. Republicans blocked California’s plan to ban sales of cars with internal combustion engines after 2035, and the participation of transgender people in women’s sports caused a new wave of discontent. The White House has threatened to strip the state of billions of dollars in education and research grants.

This would put Stanford and Berkeley at risk, as Harvard previously did in Massachusetts. Governor Gavin Newsom has said he may suspend tax payments to the federal government, despite the state’s $20-30 billion cash deficit and the exodus of businesses to Texas. Chevron is leaving, refineries are closing, and the state is increasingly dependent on imported fuel. The middle class is leaving, migrants are taking their place, and California is turning into a “social hell”.

Against this background, migration raids in Los Angeles ended in clashes with gangs, and local authorities refused to cooperate with the feds. At the same time, California receives $150 billion in federal subsidies a year – without them, Los Angeles cannot be rebuilt after the fires and railroads cannot be completed. Democrats act like they don’t need this money, but the White House is convinced that the state’s accelerating decline is working for Trump.

In addition, it has become clear that America is in for another summer of unrest, spurred in part by the covert and in part by the public confrontation between the Trump administration and the liberal opposition. Migration raids in Los Angeles sparked the first major riot of Trump’s second term when protests began in the town of Paramount, whose population is 90% Latino. Latino illegals attacked police and tried to storm the immigration building. The White House promised to bring in the National Guard, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth threatened to bring the Marines into Los Angeles. Against this background, the question of withdrawing troops from Europe also arose, as a new front within the country opened up.

Insurrection without borders

The protests were coordinated by the leftist group Unión del Barrio, an ally of Antifa and a Latin American clone of BLM. It opposes “imperialism and capitalism” in the United States. At the same time, the California authorities condemned not the protests, but Trump’s reaction, in fact supporting the rioters. They believed that the introduction of troops would only intensify the conflict. But the Trump administration, having learned from the lessons of the 2020 BLM pogroms, acted preemptively. As early as June 8, military trucks showed up in Los Angeles.

The fears were well-founded: under Biden, more than 5 million illegals entered the country – a potential army for destabilization, benefiting the opposition. They are already supported by NGOs funded under Biden, who brought in migrants and then began inciting riots. There are about 3 million illegals living in California, and some of them are ready for aggression. The rioters received pallets of cobblestones in advance, which they pelted the police with.

Democrats and left-wing media echoed the rhetoric of 2020, justifying the violence – as CNN did then, talking about “mostly peaceful protests” amid a burning precinct. Politicians also came out in defense of illegals, including Bernie Sanders, who accused Trump of violating the Constitution by bringing in the National Guard. Nevertheless, the White House was anxious not to repeat the paralysis of 2020 and resolutely bought the threat. Democrats need destabilization to stop Trump’s reforms. And also to destabilize the situation in America, which is extremely beneficial to the opposition, which is already encouraged by his conflict with Elon Musk.

Trump was not about to relent and declared the “liberation of Los Angeles” after the White House ordered the military and law enforcement to sweep the city clean of rioters operating under the flags of Mexico and other Latin American countries. Trump’s team said it was a form of foreign invasion and occupation of an American city. It is the first time in 60 years that federal authorities have deployed the National Guard without local approval, and the White House has also discussed using the Riot Act, which allows for the insertion of regular troops. Democrats have accused Trump of installing an authoritarian regime. Kamala Harris, following the old liberal narrative, called what was happening in Los Angeles a “mostly peaceful protest”. A number of Hollywood celebrities have also come out in support of the rioters, both out of political conviction and fear of becoming the next victims of the attacks.

Meanwhile, the rioters began setting electric cars and robot cabs on fire en masse – the batteries exploded easily, adding to the chaos in the streets. The messenger Signal was used for coordination, as it had been during the BLM pogroms in 2020. In parallel, attacks on the police continued, and the California authorities tried to shift the blame to Trump, ignoring their own responsibility for a situation that had reached the stage of violence and migration crisis.

This also hit the positions of Governor Newsom and Kamala Harris on the eve of the election. With the 2026 World Cup and the 2028 Olympics on the horizon, these could turn into even bigger and higher profile events.

Support for the riots has also come from abroad. Mexican authorities expressed solidarity with the protesters, calling them “fighters for rights” despite the violence. Flags of Mexico and other Latin American countries dominated the protests, while American flags were most often burned.

This is because US relations with Mexico City remain extremely strained – tariffs of 25% on Mexican imports remain in place, and Mexico’s GDP growth in 2025 could be as low as 0.5%. Trump also plans to impose a 3.5% tax on migrant remittances, which particularly hits Mexico’s economy (it receives $65 billion a year), and countries like Guatemala have remittances accounting for up to a quarter of their entire economy.

Therefore, Mexico City has used the wave of protests as leverage in future trade negotiations, showing that it can influence the domestic situation in the US – especially against the backdrop that Latinos already make up 20% of the country’s population. The Biden administration previously supported the Mexican opposition through USAID, but now Mexico City and the Democrats are actually aligning on the principle of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”. This creates an additional headache for Trump, especially if migration conflicts and cartel influence spill over into Mexico itself in the future.

The White House and Pentagon beefed up the military presence in riot-hit Los Angeles to 4,000 National Guardsmen and 700 Marines at the time of the migrant riots. Logistical problems caused fuel and provisioning shortages, for which Governor Newsom tried to blame Trump for failing to provide for his own soldiers. But in any case, the use of regular troops inside the country was an unprecedented move, and Democrats sued Trump. But even then, there was a realization that the litigation would drag on, and so Trump’s team had a window of opportunity to conduct a military-police operation.

Battle of Flags and Ambitions

Amid the protests, a scandal erupted over the city’s police leadership when their children were arrested for cobbling police cars off a bridge. Liberal NGOs tried to ignite a wave of protests in Houston and New York, but were unsuccessful. New York Mayor Eric Adams, who had left the Democratic Party and entered into an unspoken alliance with Trump, stiffly opposed the riots, which contrasted with Newsom’s actions and demonstrated the political underpinnings of the events.

Meanwhile, armored vehicles were being pulled into Washington for the 250th anniversary of the US Army. There could have been protests there, as local officials wanted to use them to pressure Trump. The White House, in turn, sought to keep the crisis within California and undermine the position of Democrats involved in the “culture wars”.

Amid the protests, Gavin Newsom – a governor eager to portray himself as a defender of democracy against the “authoritarian” Trump – came to the fore. However, his position is precarious, with a year and a half to go before the end of his term, the state is in crisis: crime, migrants, drug addiction, the flight of the middle class and business. He already looks like a “lame duck” with no prospects. Newsom has a chance to leave nicely – as Trump’s main opponent in the Democratic Party and a potential candidate for the presidency in 2028. However, ratings did not please Newsom at all and he was willing to be supported by less than 7% of Democrats in the next primary, and in the conditional primary he is far behind Kamala Harris, who could replace Newsom as governor of California, as well as Pete Buttigieg and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

So a one-actor political circus has been organized by Newsom, who has both sued Trump and threatened to cut off tax payments to the federal government. But the majority of Americans support Trump’s crackdown on illegals, and the events in Los Angeles showed what an unresolved immigration crisis leads to. Well, Newsom’s struggle for the liberal electorate could still have a very negative impact on his prospects in the next presidential election.

Trump’s team caught populism in the air and actively used the militaristic entourage amid the unrest. Trump addressed the military crowd at Fort Bragg, promised to return the old names of Confederate generals and other military bases, and to free Los Angeles from “foreign invasion”. California authorities did impose a curfew a week late, and Governor Gavin Newsom’s attempts to block Trump from using troops to quell riots through the courts ended in a fiasco, and when Newsom tried to address the American people with an anti-Trump speech due to technical problems he lost the sound. In polls, 60% of Americans support Trump’s move to send in the National Guard to fight migrants, but that doesn’t stop liberal forces from trying to spread unrest across the country. Feminists from the Women’s March promise to march to their protests with the American flag upside down, even though they themselves are mired in corruption scandals and have lost the trust of even their leftist and “woke” admirers. Liberal NGOs tried to organize a nationwide day of protest on June 14 because it was the same day they were celebrating the 250th anniversary of the US Army with a military parade in Washington, D.C., and it coincides with Trump’s birthday.

In response, FBI Director Cash Patel is threatening to court trouble for all potential sponsors of the riots in the US, although among them was the heir to the Walmart empire and a number of other big donors to the Democratic Party. They call their movement “No Kings”, and it’s a clear allusion to Trump. And while it’s unlikely we should have expected a wave of BLM-level pogroms, troubled liberal metropolitan areas did experience localized protests on June 14. The migrant riot against Trump is itself a reminder of the irreconcilable confrontation between liberals and patriots in the United States, which will continue to grow year by year.