Washington Examiner chief political correspondent Byron York said that, despite what Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass think, state and local governments do not have the authority to enforce immigration laws — only the federal government does.
Bass defended her resistance to the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement on CNN’s The Situation Room, where she responded to the network’s new poll finding that 54% of people approve of the administration’s program to deport illegal immigrants. However, Bass said she does not believe this poll is accurate and that federal agents were “overstepping,” taking away power from the state.
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In response, York clarified that the federal government has the sole authority to enforce immigration law.
York recalled the Obama administration, when Arizona officials told former President Barack Obama, “You are not enforcing immigration laws, so we’ll do it.” Obama said no, the issue went to court, and the president won.
“The ruling is the federal government has the sole authority to do this,” York said Tuesday on Fox News’s America’s Newsroom. “So when Karen Bass says, ‘It is like the federal government is coming in and taking our state and local authority,’ no, they don’t have any state and local authority.”
Turning to the deployment of the National Guard, Gillian Turner, a Fox News anchor, asked York about President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s move to send in Marines to back up the National Guard.
York said he is unsure whether the president has fully made the case for Marines and if they are needed.
“It appears, as we were reporting this morning, that it is quieter at the moment,” York said. “It could get bad again tonight. Not sure that active-duty troops are actually needed in this situation, but the National Guard, which hasn’t been done since 1965 in these circumstances, was definitely needed.”
York also shared his opinion on the claim made Monday by Whoopi Goldberg and Sunny Hostin, hosts of ABC’s The View, that the National Guard deployment will lead to another Civil War.
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York said he cannot foresee this happening, recalling a similar situation in 1965.
“No, I certainly hope not,” York said. “The last time it was done, when the governor did not ask for the National Guard, was in 1965 in Alabama, the Selma to Montgomery march. George Wallace, the governor of Alabama, did not want the Guard. Lyndon Johnson, the president, did. The president won because he has the authority.”