United States Marines to arrive in Los Angeles in the next few hours

In the wake of weekend protests over immigration raids in the City of Los Angeles, hundreds of United States Marines, stationed at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, just three hours away from L.A., could soon be seen in the city’s streets.  

As CNN initially reported, the U.S. Northern Command announced today it has activated about 700 Marines to help protect federal personnel and federal buildings in Downtown L.A. 

“U.S. Northern Command has activated the Marine infantry battalion that was placed in an alert status over the weekend,” the agency said in a statement. 

This comes just hours after President Donald Trump deployed 2,000 National Guard members to "address the lawlessness,” as White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the protests and manifestations in L.A.

Since then, both California Governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass have denounced the deployment of the National Guard, saying this will only escalate the situation happening in L.A. 

Tom Homan, former director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the current White House Executive Associate Director of Enforcement and Removal Operations, warned that anyone obstructing federal immigration enforcement, including leaders like Newsom, would be arrested.

Marine forces can arrive in L.A. within the next few hours.

Newsom is calling the move "un-American."

"U.S. Marines have served honorably across multiple wars in defense of democracy. They are heroes," he said in a post on X on Monday. "They shouldn't be deployed on American soil facing their own countrymen to fulfill the deranged fantasy of a dictatorial president."

The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 prohibits federal U.S. troops — including federalized National Guardsmen — from performing law enforcement duties on American soil, unless the president invokes the Insurrection Act, said VanLandingham, a law professor at Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles. Trump has not invoked the Insurrection Act.