Topline
The Trump administration sued the city of Los Angeles on Monday, claiming its policy limiting cooperation with federal immigration enforcement efforts promotes attacks on law enforcement, the latest legal battle centered around the L.A. protests against federal deportation raids.
U.S. Customs and Border Police (CBP) officers regroup next to their vehicles as they are surrounded … More
Key Facts
The lawsuit, filed in a Los Angeles-area federal court against Mayor Karen Bass, along with the Los Angeles City Council and its president Marqueece Harris-Dawson, alleges the Council’s vote last year to codify L.A.’s sanctuary city policies “thwart Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection from carrying out their statutory obligations as directed by Congress.”
The lawsuit alleges the policy, which prohibits federal resources from being used for federal immigration enforcement led to “lawlessness, rioting, looting and vandalism” in conjunction with anti-immigration protests that began earlier this month, and accuses Bass of blaming any chaos associated with the protests on the federal immigration raids.
It also cites a request from the City Council to the L.A. police department to notify it of upcoming federal anti-immigration raids and the sanctuary city ordinance prohibiting LAPD and other law enforcement from communicating with federal immigration enforcement officials regarding a detainee’s citizenship or immigration status.
Alleging the ordinance violates “the supremacy clause” of the Constitution, which says that state law can’t circumvent federal law, the lawsuit asks the court to declare the sanctuary city ordinance is unconstitutional and void and block it from being enforced.
Key Background
Mass protests in and around Los Angeles—and replicated in cities across the country—have sparked numerous lawsuits centered around the dispute between the Trump administration’s immigration policies and local policies. California Gov. Gavin Newsom also sued the Trump administration for what Newsom’s office referred to as an “illegal and unnecessary takeover of the CalGuard unit, which has needlessly escalated chaos and violence in the Los Angeles region,” referring to the Trump administration’s deployment of the National Guard to assist in the protests without a request from state government.
Tangent
The Trump administration also sued New York earlier this month and Chicago in February over its sanctuary city laws.
Further Reading
Gavin Newsom Sues Fox News For $787 Million (Forbes)
Trump Takes Credit For Quelling LA Protests After Newsom Accuses Him Of Inflaming Demonstrations (Forbes)
Stephen Miller Pushes For Even More Surprise ICE Raids—His Deportation Quotas, Explained (Forbes)
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/saradorn/2025/06/30/trump-sues-los-angeles-over-sanctuary-city-immigration-policies/