The first thing you need to know about President Donald Trump’s decision to deploy National Guard troops in California is that this moment was always coming.
Always.
Back in 2023, long before Trump was elected to a second term as president, media outlets such as The Washington Post reported that his team was planning to “potentially invoke the Insurrection Act on his first day in office to allow him to deploy the military against civil demonstrations.”
Trump didn’t end up invoking the Insurrection Act — he used a different legal authority — and he waited a few months instead of rolling out the troops on his first day.
But that documented history suggests the president came to office looking for a pretext, an excuse, to do what he already wanted to do.
He found one.
Trump announced over the weekend that he would deploy the National Guard against anti-deportation protests in Los Angeles, over the objections of California Gov. Gavin Newsom. No surprise there.
The surprise: Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly quickly joined the pushback.
Kelly, a Democrat governing a red state, has always handled Trump delicately. She even earned his praise at one point in 2020 for her governance during the pandemic.
On Sunday, though, hers was the first name on a list of Democratic governors criticizing Trump’s move as an “abuse of power” and that deploying troops “without consulting or working with a state’s governor is ineffective and dangerous.”
Would the GOP object to National Guard here?
Kansas Republicans immediately criticized Kelly.
“This is wrong,” Secretary of State Scott Schwab, a Republican running to replace her next year, wrote on X.
“Kansans deserve better,” said Kansas Senate President Ty Masterson.
Kelly “is picking the side of violence and lawlessness!” Kansas Young Republicans added.
You wonder: Would they be saying the same thing if troops were being deployed in Kansas? It could happen.
