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The Trump administration appeared poised on Wednesday to deploy scores of law enforcement personnel to the San Francisco Bay Area for a major border security initiative, prompting outrage from local politicians.

Information of the Operation

Information of the deployment were continuing to unfold, but it will allegedly feature approximately 100+ law enforcement personnel, according to reports. The personnel are scheduled to begin using the Coast Guard facility in Alameda, opposite San Francisco. It was not confirmed whether national guard troops would participate.

Government Backlash

The operation comes after months of threats by Donald Trump to focus on the liberal city. Governor Gavin Newsom criticized the move, calling it “taken directly from the dictator’s handbook”.

“He dispatches covered agents, he deploys border agents, he dispatches immigration officials, he generates anxiety and fear in the neighborhood so that he can lay claim for solving that by sending in the military forces,” Newsom said. “This is exactly like the firestarter putting out the inferno.”

Municipal Preparation

San Francisco is the newest large urban area singled out by the federal effort of widespread apprehensions. The mission is anticipated to provoke a showdown between the federal government and city officials who have vowed to prevent militarized immigration enforcement in the city.

San Franciscans have been preparing for months for Trump to make good on frequent statements to dispatch personnel to the city. At a Wednesday afternoon press conference, San Francisco’s municipal chief stated again that the city was ready.

“During this period, we have been preparing for the chance of some kind of federal deployment in our city,” declared the leader, noting that he had enacted new policies on Wednesday to “strengthen the city’s support for our newcomer populations, and ensure our departments are coordinated before any federal deployment.”

Legal Context

In spite of judicial disputes to deployments in a number of cities, including Chicago, Oregon and Southern California, Trump has declared “absolute authority” to dispatch the national guard in cities, citing the Insurrection Act which allows presidents limited power to deploy troops on US soil.

Community Response

The governor, who once held office as San Francisco’s city leader – had pledged to step in “right away” to a deployment in the city. “The notion that the national administration can send forces into our cities with no justification based on facts, no monitoring, no accountability, no respect for regional control – it constitutes an attack on the legal system,” he said on Wednesday.

Community groups, including social justice nonprofits created during the initial federal leadership, have prepped to swiftly gather a public demonstration in the city, as well as peaceful assemblies at local libraries.

Community Effect

In San Francisco’s Mission area, a predominantly Latino population, local representative stated to media last week she and her voters had been bracing for this situation. “The point that workers cease employment, when minority individuals are afraid to go outdoors without the concern of government officers targeting based on race and detaining them, the point when families keep children home, grow too frightened to go to the grocery store or physician,” she said. “What we have been preparing for in the Mission is basically a halt the scale of which we haven’t seen since the pandemic.”

Military Status

Approximately several hundred out of several thousand California state soldiers stay under federal control under an directive from Trump. Approximately 200 of them had been dispatched to Oregon, where they were waiting in limbo during a legal battle over their mission.

This week, Newsom said he had called the California national guard troops under his authority to staff food banks throughout the administrative stoppage.