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A new national poll indicates that Americans are divided over President Donald Trump’s deployment of the National Guard and U.S. Marines to the nation’s second most populous city.
Aiming to extinguish escalating protests in Los Angeles sparked by immigration raids carried out by ICE at his administration’s direction, Trump sent in National Guard troops and even mobilized Marines. The unrest and the moves by the president have dominated national headlines for a week.
Forty-one percent of adults nationwide questioned in a Washington Post/George Mason University Schar School poll said they support the president’s move, with 44% opposed and 15% unsure.
The survey was conducted on Tuesday and questioned over 1,000 adults nationwide, including roughly 200 in blue-state California.
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Support for the president’s actions among the California respondents stood at 32%, with 58% opposed.
The poll also highlighted an expected massive partisan divide.
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Eight-six percent of Republicans surveyed supported the president’s deployment of the National Guard and Marines to the streets of LA, with more than three-quarters of Democrats giving a thumbs down on Trump’s move.
A third of independents approved of the sending of the troops, with nearly half opposed and nearly one in five unsure.
Trump took control of California’s National Guard without the permission of Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, the first time in 60 years that a president has federalized National Guard troops without a governor’s request.
Newsom, leading the resistance to Trump’s moves, took legal action to try and reverse the order.
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A federal district court judge this week ruled that Trump’s moves were illegal and ordered him to return control of the National Guard troops to Newsom. But a federal appeals court quickly temporarily blocked the lower court judge’s ruling.
The survey also indicates Americans are divided over whether they support (39%) or oppose (40%) the protests. Just over one in five (21%) were unsure of their support or opposition.
Seventy percent of Democrats — but just 39% of independents and only 6% of Republicans — support the aims of the protesters.
According to the poll, Americans are also divided over whether the protests have been mostly peaceful (35%) or mostly violent (37%).
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