Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat from California, has announced the deployment of California Highway Patrol ‘crime-suppression teams’ to combat rising crime rates across the state. The initiative, announced during an interview with Politico’s California Summit, is part of an effort to enhance public safety and reduce violent crime, particularly in high-risk urban centers. Newsom’s office highlighted that these teams will partner with local law enforcement to saturate high-crime areas, target repeat offenders, and recover illicit weapons and narcotics, building on existing successful deployments in cities like Bakersfield, San Bernardino, and Oakland, where over 9,000 arrests, 5,800 stolen vehicles, and 400 firearms were recovered in the past year.
Newsom’s move follows criticism of President Donald Trump’s approach to crime, which he has described as an overreach that ‘militarizes American cities.’ Trump has been deploying the National Guard in cities like Washington, D.C., and has threatened similar actions in Baltimore and Chicago. Newsom has also criticized Trump for federalizing the National Guard in California without his request, accusing the administration of ‘authoritarian tendencies.’
In response, the White House has accused Newsom of copying Trump’s agenda, claiming that ‘after Newscum spent weeks criticizing the president’s highly successful efforts to crack down on crime, he’s reverted to his tried-and-true strategy: embracing and copying the Trump agenda.’ However, a White House spokeswoman, Abigail Jackson, acknowledged that ‘the more Democrats follow the president’s lead to crack down on crime, the better it is for the American people!’ She emphasized the need for bipartisan cooperation in addressing crime, noting that ‘stopping crime should not be a partisan exercise.’
Newsom’s office also highlighted California’s $1.7 billion investment in crime-fighting efforts since 2019, citing data from the Major Cities Chiefs Association that shows homicide, robbery, and property crime rates have dropped to levels below or in line with pre-pandemic levels. The governor’s announcement comes as some blue states and cities braced for potential National Guard deployments to address rising crime concerns in their areas, signaling a broader national debate on the role of federal versus local law enforcement in crime reduction.