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The White House appeared poised on Wednesday to deploy numerous of law enforcement personnel to the northern California for a large-scale crackdown on immigration, sparking condemnation from California leaders.

Specifics of the Deployment

Specifics of the deployment were still emerging, but it will reportedly involve approximately 100+ federal agents, based on information. The officers are reportedly set to begin utilizing the military installation in the East Bay, facing San Francisco. It was still uncertain whether military personnel would participate.

Official Response

The deployment is the result of months of threats by the president to take action against the progressive municipality. The state's leader Gavin Newsom condemned the action, describing it as “right out of the autocrat's manual”.

“He deploys masked men, he deploys border agents, he dispatches immigration officials, he creates concern and apprehension in the neighborhood so that he can claim credit for addressing that by dispatching the military forces,” Newsom said. “This is exactly like the arsonist extinguishing the blaze.”

Local Preparation

San Francisco is the latest large urban area focused on by the administration's initiative of mass immigration arrests. The operation is expected to trigger a confrontation between the administration and municipal authorities who have pledged to prevent militarized immigration enforcement in the city.

San Franciscans have been readying for weeks for Trump to carry out repeated threats to send troops to the city. At a Wednesday public announcement, San Francisco’s municipal chief reiterated that the city was equipped.

“Over recent weeks, we have been anticipating the possibility of a potential federal deployment in our city,” said the mayor, adding that he had taken further executive actions on Wednesday to “strengthen the city’s protection of our newcomer populations, and guarantee our agencies are coordinated ahead of any federal deployment.”

Judicial Context

In spite of judicial disputes to missions in a several municipalities, including the Windy City, the Pacific Northwest and Los Angeles, Trump has asserted “unquestioned power” to send the national guard in cities, citing the federal statute which permits presidents limited power to deploy troops on US soil.

Public Response

Newsom – who once held office as San Francisco’s city leader – had vowed to step in “immediately” to a mission in the city. “The concept that the national administration can deploy troops into our cities with no legitimate cause grounded in reality, no monitoring, no accountability, no consideration of local authority – it represents an infringement on the legal system,” he said on Wednesday.

Public associations, including civil rights groups established during the previous presidential term, have organized to rapidly assemble a large protest in the city, as well as vigils at community centers.

Community Impact

In San Francisco’s Mission neighborhood, a predominantly Latino population, city supervisor informed journalists last week she and her voters had been preparing for this time. “The time that people stop going to work, when anyone Black or brown cannot move about freely without the fear of Trump’s federal agents targeting based on race and detaining them, the time when families keep children home, become too afraid to go to the supermarket or medical provider,” she said. “Our ongoing preparations in the Mission is fundamentally a halt the likes of which we have not witnessed since Covid.”

State Troops Situation

Approximately 300 out of several thousand regional state soldiers remain federalized under an command from Trump. Roughly two hundred of them had been dispatched to Oregon, where they were waiting in limbo in the midst of a judicial dispute over their deployment.

This time, Newsom said he had requested the California national guard troops under his control to staff charity kitchens during the government shutdown.