The Trump administration has begun deploying more than 100 federal immigration agents to the San Francisco Bay Area, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
The agents — primarily from U.S. Customs and Border Protection — will operate from the U.S. Coast Guard Base Alameda in one of the largest federal immigration enforcement actions in a sanctuary jurisdiction in years, according to the report.
They begin arriving Thursday.
“San Francisco is a great city. It won’t be great if it keeps going like this,” President Donald Trump said in an interview last weekend.
The operation is intended to bolster enforcement in the northern part of California, though specifics on timing and scope remain unclear, according to the Chronicle.
Officials told the outlet that agents will focus on locating and detaining individuals with outstanding deportation orders or criminal records.
The deployment also is being viewed as a possible precursor to a National Guard presence in the region.
Trump last week floated sending the National Guard to San Francisco, which he called “a mess.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom and San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie condemned the move as political theater that could inflame tensions and violate state sanctuary laws.
“California has seen enough. President Trump and Stephen Miller’s authoritarian playbook is coming for another of our cities, and violence and vandalism are exactly what they’re looking for to invoke chaos,” Newsom said in a post on X.
Alameda County Sheriff Yesenia Sanchez said her department would not cooperate with federal enforcement actions, citing California’s Values Act, which limits local involvement in immigration operations.
Legal experts note that California remains under a patchwork of federal court rulings that limit immigration arrests without “reasonable suspicion” — restrictions critics say have handcuffed law enforcement and emboldened illegal immigration.
Left-wing advocacy groups are already mobilizing legal hotlines and activist networks to shield migrants from potential deportation efforts.
City officials in San Francisco, a self-declared sanctuary city, are warning that the federal deployment could “erode trust” within immigrant communities — a familiar refrain that critics say prioritizes politics over public safety.
“We need cooperation on public safety — not federal intimidation,” one city official told the Chronicle.
Newsmax wires contributed to this report.
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