The Justice Department might be stretched a little thin these days in President Donald Trump’s second term. In its court filing opposing California’s request for a temporary restraining order against the military deployment in Los Angeles, the government left the second page’s table of contents blank, and the third page’s table of authorities only says “[INSERT],” seemingly an unresolved note to fill out the page with legal authorities that would normally signal what’s ahead.
To be sure, the DOJ did cite various legal authorities within the filing Wednesday, but it’s not a great way to start an important argument to the judge handling this crucial litigation. U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer (brother of the retired Supreme Court justice) is set to hold a hearing Thursday afternoon on the state’s restraining order request.
Getting to what the DOJ did include in the filing, its lawyers wrote that the president “has every right under the Constitution and by statute to call forth the National Guard and Marines to quell lawless violence directed against enforcement of federal law.” They complained that “instead of working to bring order to Los Angeles, California and its Governor filed a lawsuit in San Francisco seeking a court order limiting the federal government’s ability to protect its property and officials.”
Notably, the state’s motion said that’s what it’s not trying to do.
“This motion does not seek to prevent any of those forces from protecting the safety of federal buildings or other real property owned or leased by the federal government, or federal personnel on such property,” it said. California’s lawyers said they’re seeking “narrow relief tailored to avoid irreparable harm to our communities and the rule of law that is likely to result if [federal government] Defendants are allowed to proceed with their plans to use Marines and federalized National Guard to enforce immigration laws and other civil laws on the streets of our cities.”
They said the state wants to “prevent the use of federalized National Guard and active duty Marines for law enforcement purposes on the streets of a civilian city.”
Whether California can prevail should become clearer at Thursday’s hearing.
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