California Governor Gavin Newsom might finally be getting what he has long deserved, as President Donald Trump revealed on Monday, June 9, that he is calling on his Border Czar, former ICE acting director Tom Homan, to arrest the California governor for his lax stance on illegal immigration.
As background, the precipitating incident for this latest remark of the president’s about Gov. Newsom is the ongoing chaos taking place in Los Angeles, where anti-ICE rioters have been fighting with the police and destroying public and private property for days in an attempt to block ICE from arresting illegal aliens.
Homan, in the context of the riots and Governor Newsom’s mismanagement of California in a way that aids illegal aliens, said, threatening to arrest him, “I’ll say it about anybody. You cross that line, it’s a felony to knowingly harbor and conceal an illegal alien. It’s a felony to impede law enforcement doing their job.”
Newsom, angry, snapped, when speaking to NBC, “He’s a tough guy. Why doesn’t he do that? He knows where to find me.” He continued, “But you know what? Let your hands off 4-year-old girls that are trying to get educated. Let your hands off these poor people. They’re just trying to live their lives, man. Trying to live their lives, paying their taxes. Been here for 10 years. The fear, the horror.” He added, “The hell are they doing? These guys need to grow up. They need to stop, and we need to push back. And I’m sorry to be so clear, but that kind of bloviating is exhausting. So, Tom, arrest me. Let’s go.”
In any case, President Trump’s Monday comments about arresting the California governor came when he was approached by members of the media while walking to Marine One on the White House lawn, the presidential helicopter, and was asked, by Fox News’ Peter Doocy, “Gavin Newsom, he’s daring Tom Holman to come and arrest him. Could he do it?”
President Trump, in response, said that he would arrest the California governor were he in Homan’s shoes and that Newsom has done a terrible job running California. He said, “I would do it if I were Tom. I think it’s great. Gavin likes the publicity. But I do think it would be a great thing. He’s done a terrible job.”
Continuing, Trump slammed the governor as being totally incompetent, saying, “I like Gavin Newsom. He’s a nice guy, but he’s grossly incompetent. Everybody knows. All you have to do is look at the little railroad he’s building. It’s about a hundred times over budget. We’re putting a flagpole over there. Under budget. I always do under budget.”
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Newsom, for his part, claimed in a post on X that Trump’s comments showed “authoritarianism,” writing, “The President of the United States just called for the arrest of a sitting Governor. This is a day I hoped I would never see in America. I don’t care if you’re a Democrat or a Republican this is a line we cannot cross as a nation — this is an unmistakable step toward authoritarianism.”
Watch Trump call for Newsom’s arrest here: