Vice President JD Vance visited Los Angeles on Friday, a day after a federal appeals court temporarily ruled in favor of the administration’s federal presence in the state. Vance said the ruling demonstrated that President Donald Trump’s authority to mobilize troops in such a way is “legitimate.”
“I think what the 9th Circuit said very clearly is that when the president makes a determination that you’ve got to send in certain federal officials to protect people, that determination was legitimate,” Vance told reporters, reacting to the Thursday ruling. “And the president’s going to do it again if he has to. But hopefully it won’t be necessary.”
Vance acknowledged at the start of his remarks to reporters that “the rioting has gotten a lot better,” in reference to the protests that led to Trump mobilizing thousands of National Guard troops and hundreds of Marines to the area. The demonstrations were against federal immigration raids in the area and have calmed significantly in recent days.