Trump DOJ sues Los Angeles over sanctuary city policy, citing ‘rioting, looting, and vandalism’ stemming from city’s refusal to cooperate with ICE

In the latest escalation of a heated immigration battle between the Trump administration and California, the Justice Department is suing Los Angeles over its sanctuary city policies.

“Sanctuary policies were the driving cause of the violence, chaos, and attacks on law enforcement that Americans recently witnessed in Los Angeles,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement announcing the lawsuit. “Jurisdictions like Los Angeles that flout federal law by prioritizing illegal aliens over American citizens are undermining law enforcement at every level – it ends under President Trump.”

The city’s council members, in a unanimous vote, formally established Los Angeles a sanctuary city in 2024 – meaning it is prohibited from using any city resources to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement. The city’s sanctuary policies also prohibit the city from cooperating with federal immigration agents or sharing information with them. Although the city had already declared itself as a “sanctuary” in 2017, the 2024 vote codified the protections into municipal law, one council member’s memo noted.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass described the Trump administration’s actions against it as an “all-out assault.” 

“The lawsuit is an attempt to overturn the will of the city, calling for a halt to longstanding policy to protect immigrant Angelenos. We are a city of immigrants who have had policies in place for decades,” she said during a press conference. “We will defend our ordinance and continue to defend policies that reflect the longstanding values of our city.” 

The Justice Department, for its part, insists that Los Angeles’s refusal to cooperate with federal immigration authorities has “contributed to the recent lawlessness, rioting, looting, and vandalism that was so severe that it required the federal government to deploy the California National Guard and the United States Marines to quell the chaos.” 

The lawsuit will hold the city “accountable” for “deliberately obstructing” federal law, U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said. The lawsuit calls the city’s sanctuary policies “illegal” and argues they directly violate the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause.  

That clause “prohibits the City from picking and choosing which federal laws will be enforced and which will not,” Essayli said. “By assisting removable aliens in evading federal law enforcement, the City’s unlawful and discriminatory ordinance has contributed to a lawless and unsafe environment that this lawsuit will help end.”