Gov. Gavin Newsom touted California’s drug interdiction efforts during a San Diego news conference Monday that contrasted the state’s public safety efforts with combative tactics by President Donald Trump’s administration.
Since 2021, Newsom said, National Guard troops have seized 34,357 pounds of fentanyl worth an estimated $506 million at California ports of entry.
“This is what the National Guard should be doing,” Newsom said at the event at “This is the kind of partnership that makes sense.”
Last month a federal judge ended federal control of the National Guard troops in Los Angeles and returned them to Newsom’s command, six months after President Donald Trump ordered 4,000 troops to the city to quell protests against federal immigration raids in California. Newsom argued that Trump’s deployment of the Guard diverted them from duties including drug enforcement and wildfire prevention.
Newsom terms out after eight years as governor this year, and is expected to launch a campaign for president in the 2028 election. He has positioned himself as a resistance figure against Trump’s intensified immigration crackdown and heightened federal control over states.
On Monday, Newsom argued that California is combatting crime and patrolling its border, while responding to disruption in the wake of the administration’s mass deportation campaign.
“It's the kind of thing that we should be doing more,” he said. “It's not about politics. It's not about creating anxiety and fear.”
CalMatters could not reach the White House for comment Monday.
Newsom denounced sweeping immigration raids in Los Angeles and other California cities, noting that one of the early ICE actions involved arrests of kitchen staff at the San Diego restaurant Buona Forchetta last May.
The ICE surge escalated in Los Angeles, prompting public demonstrations, then a crackdown by the Trump administration.
“We saw the federalization of the National Guard, hundreds of millions of dollars wasted of taxpayer money,” Newsom said.
As the Department of Homeland Security draws down its controversial "Operation Metro Surge" in Minneapolis, where ICE officers fatally shot two U.S. citizens, Newsom lamented that the operation’s leader, Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino, was sent back to California.
“We're hardly celebrating that,” he said.
Newsom said that earlier Monday he spoke with residents of El Centro, where Bovino originally held command. Community leaders described how local organizations are helping children left in charge of households after parents are detained in immigration raids, and aiding people in ICE custody.
Newsom pointed to CalMatters reporting that immigration arrests in San Diego have quietly surged by 1,500% over last year, “but without the fanfare of what you're seeing in your living room and on your screen happening in places like Minneapolis.”
He said the state is responding with lawsuits challenging the administration’s mass deportation efforts, and distributing money to community organizations for legal aid, counseling and mental health support for people affected by immigration raids.
In the wide-ranging press conference, Newsom weighed in on topics from his efforts to seek $33.9 billion in wildfire disaster assistance for Los Angeles, to his rejection of Trump’s bid to restart offshore oil drilling. He cited Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ shared misgivings about the proposal.
“We have a well-established opposition in the state of California,” Newsom said. “I find it ironic and interesting that so does the governor of Florida. When Donald Trump advocates for offshore drilling off the coast of Mar-A-Lago, I'll know the sincerity of these efforts.”
Newsom distanced himself from former President Joe Biden’s immigration policies, saying “My opinion was a little different than the prior administration’s on border security.” He called for reforming the immigration and asylum systems to account for long-time residents without legal status, mixed status families and workforce needs.
“Those things need to be front and center in our conversation and debate around immigration, but unfortunately, it's not, because it's been bastardized,” Newsom said.
He pointed to the state’s seizure of half billion dollars worth of fentanyl, along with methamphetamine, guns and cash, as evidence that California’s approach is working.
Since October the National Guard has seized 3,005 firearms and $34 million in cash, Maj. Gen. Matthew Beevers of the California National Guard said, freeing other law enforcement to perform their duties.
“What it means is that my team enables sworn law enforcement officers to get on the street and do the hard work that they have to do,” Beevers said. “It also enables Customs and Border Protection agents to be able to be on the border where they belong.”
Newsom described California Highway Patrol officers and National Guard troops as “Swiss Army knives” that fill multiple roles in disaster response and public safety. In August, the governor deployed California Highway Patrol officers on crime suppression teams in San Diego, the Inland Empire, Los Angeles, the Central Valley, Sacramento and the San Francisco Bay Area, to seize illegal weapons and drugs.
“Everybody knows that we are proud to be partners and part of the solution,” California Highway Patrol Commissioner Sean Duryee said. “I look at it as the National Guard is the first line of defense.”
The highway patrol, Duryee said, is “the last line of defense before those narcotics are in our communities.”
Newsom said he’s committed to working with the Trump administration on “legitimate public safety concerns,” but cast doubt on the potential for such a partnership.
“That's not again what this is about,” he said of Trump’s immigration enforcement campaign. “It's about terrorizing the community. It's about chaos. It's about fear.”
This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.
