{"id":43512,"date":"2025-08-28T13:06:35","date_gmt":"2025-08-28T20:06:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=43512"},"modified":"2025-08-28T23:49:16","modified_gmt":"2025-08-29T06:49:16","slug":"hey-gavin-call-out-the-national-guard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2025\/08\/28\/hey-gavin-call-out-the-national-guard\/","title":{"rendered":"Hey Gavin: Call out the National Guard\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

… unarmed, to protect immigrants in San Francisco and other California cities against Trump’s invasion<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By JOEL SCHECHTER<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

AUGUST 26, 2025 (48hills.org)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a resident of San Francisco who prefers to see urban streets free of armed soldiers, I\u2019d rather not have the National Guard occupy our city, as it already has occupied Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles. The recent military takeover of Washington by Donald Trump and his army has been abetted by the governors of West Virginia, Mississippi, Tennessee, Ohio, South Carolina, and Louisiana who voluntarily contributed some of their National Guard troops to the Washington bivouac, although 80 percent of the residents there, as well as the mayor, say they don\u2019t need or welcome the military invasion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The arrival of troops on the streets San Francisco may not be far away. Trump is eagerly seeking an excuse to send some of the National Guard \u2014if not our state\u2019s, then Ohio\u2019s, or Tennessee\u2019s, or Louisiana\u2019s\u2014 into our sanctuary city, as well as Chicago and Baltimore. (He only invades cities run by Democrats.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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National Guard troops in Washington D.C. Wikimedia Images photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I expect the soldiers will surround City Hall, intimidate the mayor and the Board of Supervisors and protesters, and guard the buildings where immigrants seeking asylum or visas will be subjected to arrest and deportation by masked men who purport to work for ICE.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To avoid this debacle, I modestly propose that Governor Gavin Newsom immediately invite some California National Guard troops into San Francisco, minus their weapons, and order them to protect immigrants and unhoused residents, as well as the rest of us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The governor is already mimicking Trump\u2019s rhetoric in text messages, but Newsom\u2019s messages call for democratic action instead of authoritarianism. By pre-empting a Trump placement of National Guard troops in San Francisco, and ordering them to protect residents and guests (including immigrants), Newsom would again prove himself a democrat, and undermine Trump\u2019s threats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If National Guard troops must be in our city, let them peacefully escort people seeking asylum or citizenship or work visas to and from their hearings. If ICE wants to arrest them, Newsom\u2019s National Guard officers should say no: These people are guests of the governor, leave them alone. And the Guard members are likely to outnumber ICE.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It might be slightly reminiscent of National Guard troops protecting and escorting nine school children past segregationists to their Little Rock, Arkansas classes in 1957, only this time it\u2019s mostly adults who would need the protective escort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

California\u2019s governor has started to resist Donald Trump\u2019s overreach\u2014the White House promotion of gerrymandering in Texas (which would rig 2026 midterm elections in the Republican Party\u2019s favor)\u2014by planning to reshape California\u2019s voting districts (if voters approve his plan this November).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Now, instead of using government lawyers to prosecute opponents, as Trump has, our governor could supply the city with additional public defenders to assist people in need of legal counsel, and add to the city\u2019s existing staff of social workers and job counselors who might help the unhoused and the unemployed. Some San Francisco city employees already offer these services, but an increase in staffing, along with the security provided to the indigent and undocumented by National Guardsmen, would increase the public services and reduce the chances of a Trump takeover.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t want the National Guard in our city?\u201d Newsom might ask in response to a White House order to withdraw the state\u2019s Guard from its Bay area posts. \u201cI don\u2019t want them here either. Stop kidnapping immigrants and persecuting the unhoused, fund affordable housing and give work visas to immigrant workers, and we won\u2019t need the National Guard\u2019s protection from you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The governor might also send San Francisco and others in the state additional medical assistance, set up new, free travelling health clinics, to help all those who are losing Medicaid. It\u2019s not quite the same as Cuba under Castro sending doctors abroad to nations that needed medical care, but our state could initiate a medical insurgency of its own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also would recommend that the governor sponsor some special Internet interventions. Get his favorite IT experts to conduct virtual inspections of DOGE\u2019s and Palentir\u2019s files\u2014initiate computerized checks on government overreach, to insure that the Social Security and tax files of Californians have not been stolen or misused. The governor\u2019s IT troops may be derided by Trump as \u201cGavin\u2019s geek squad,\u201d but if they\u2019re proficient in their field, they also could hack into the Epstein files and let us know how often Trump is mentioned as one of the sex trafficker\u2019s associates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before any California residents protest against these defensive maneuvers, or ask how the state can afford their cost, the governor should propose to pay for his special forces by raising the state\u2019s luxury fees and taxes it assesses wealthy citizens: Charge them at least as much as they\u2019ll save through Trump\u2019s current tax cuts for the rich. Trump\u2019s war against the poor, against refugees and Democrats, is costing taxpayers billions, and it\u2019s time to end it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, despite all his self-promotional claims that he\u2019s securing world peace and American prosperity, Donald Trump isn\u2019t going to win a Nobel Peace Prize, no matter how many times he meets with Putin, if he keeps commanding National Guard troops to occupy his own country. But if Gavin Newsom\u2019s special unarmed army\u2014his lawyers, doctors, and computer experts\u2014wins public support, as they should, the governor just might find himself preventing a Trump takeover of California and other states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joel Schechter is the author of several books on satire.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

… unarmed, to protect immigrants in San Francisco and other California cities against Trump’s invasion By JOEL SCHECHTER AUGUST 26, 2025 (48hills.org) As a resident of San Francisco who prefers to see urban streets free of armed soldiers, I\u2019d rather not have the National Guard occupy our city, as it… Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43512"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43512"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43512\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43522,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43512\/revisions\/43522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}