Will Democrats ever learn a political lesson on immigration and crime? It doesn\u2019t appear so judging from their response to the migrant protests in Los Angeles that turned violent on Sunday night. Chaos on the streets will increase public support for a hard-line restrictionist agenda.<\/a><\/p>\nProtests against Mr. Trump\u2019s immigration raids escalated Sunday evening as activists torched cars, looted businesses and occupied a major freeway. Law enforcement and immigration officers were pelted with rocks and fireworks. Activists also smashed concrete bollards outside federal buildings where they were protesting, using chunks as weapons.<\/p>\n
California Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s response on Monday? Sue Mr. Trump over his Saturday order deploying the California National Guard to Los Angeles to protect federal property and officers. The Governor claimed that calling in troops was \u201cinflammatory.\u201d But recent history suggests that protesters don\u2019t need a provocation to turn violent.<\/p>\n
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The current chaos isn\u2019t a surprise in a city and state that too often tolerate lawlessness. Still, it wasn\u2019t clear early Sunday whether deploying troops was necessary or would be constructive. But asked late Sunday if the National Guard were needed, L.A. police chief Jim McDonnell responded: \u201cWell, looking at tonight, this thing has gotten out of control.\u201d<\/p>\n
All of this will please Stephen Miller, the White House deportation czar, who is eager for such a confrontation with a \u201csanctuary city.\u201d Now Democrats are playing into his hands by soft-pedaling the violence. Mr. Newsom and the city\u2019s Democratic leaders could have tried to douse the flames by denouncing the violence and stressing that lawbreakers will be arrested.<\/p>\n
Instead, they\u2019re blaming Mr. Trump for their own failure to maintain order. …<\/p>\n
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That explanation may resound in Mr. Newsom\u2019s liberal echo chamber, but it won\u2019t sit well with most Americans who have little patience for disorder. Mr. Trump is already escalating by sending in 700 Marines, ostensibly to protect federal buildings.<\/p>\n
Mr. Newsom said the President\u2019s calling in the National Guard is an \u201cunmistakable step toward authoritarianism,\u201d which is transparent hyperbole. The rarely used law Mr. Trump invoked allows such a deployment when \u201cthere is a rebellion or danger of a rebellion against the authority of the Government of the United States.\u201d Rioters are certainly rebelling against the authority of immigration enforcement.<\/p>\n
The airwaves and social media are saturated with footage of protesters waving Mexican flags atop burning cars, carrying signs claiming California is \u201cStolen land\u201d and chanting \u201cWe don\u2019t want ICE or police!\u201d Mr. Newsom really is living in La La Land if he thinks Americans will side with such radicals over Mr. Trump.<\/p>\n
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Maybe one of these days Democrats will learn that their automatic, unqualified anti-Trump \u201cresistance\u201d helps him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Wall Street Journal lead editorial yesterday. They are oh so right. Will Democrats ever learn a political lesson on immigration and crime? It doesn\u2019t appear so judging from their response to the migrant protests in Los Angeles that turned violent on Sunday night. Chaos on the streets will increase public support for a hard-line […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-119","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=119"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6982,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119\/revisions\/6982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=119"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=119"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tomfarandasfolly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=119"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}