Oklahoma lawmakers overrides Stitt's veto of the Missing Murder Indigenous Persons funding
Earlier this month, Stitt vetoed the bipartisan bill saying, that while he supports efforts to solve missing persons and homicide cases, he could not endorse legislation that singles out victims based solely on their race.
The unit within the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation will focus exclusively on missing and murdered American Indians.
Rep. Ron Stewart, D-Tulsa, who authored the bill, celebrated the veto override.
'Today, the Oklahoma Legislature demonstrated its unwavering commitment to justice and accountability by overriding the Governor's veto of House Bill 1137. I am deeply grateful to my colleagues in both chambers–Democrats and Republicans–who stood together to prioritize the safety and dignity of Indigenous communities across our state.
Rep. Ron Stewart, D-Tulsa
This vote is more than a legislative victory–it is a moral affirmation that missing and murdered Indigenous persons will not be forgotten or ignored in Oklahoma, he said.
Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin, Jr., and the United Indian Nations of Oklahoma praised the lawmakers.
'This is a powerful and heartfelt step forward in the fight for justice,' said Margo Gray, Executive Director of United Indian Nations of Oklahoma. 'We are profoundly grateful to the legislators in both chambers who stood with Native families, survivors, and advocates across Oklahoma.'
According to the National Crime Information Center (NCIC), in 2016, there were 5,712 reports of missing American Indian and Alaska Native women and girls. However, the agency reported that NamUs only logged 116 cases, a significantly lower number than the number reported by the federal agency.
In Oklahoma, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation lists just 88 missing American Indians, including many Cherokee residents.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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The Hill
22 minutes ago
- The Hill
Here's where Democrats stand in polls at Trump's six-month mark
Recent polling is painting a mixed picture for Democrats as they look to chart a path forward in the wake of their loss to President Trump in November. Trump's approval rating remains comfortably underwater as he reaches the six-month mark back in office on Sunday. But while Democrats have scored some notable victories in high-profile elections since then, they've been unable to pull away from the GOP as the party hopes to regroup for the midterms next year. Data experts said Democrats' position has improved since Trump started his second term, but they still have a lot of work to do to win back trust from the American people and be poised to take back control of the House. 'You can't just be on the attack. You can't beat something with nothing,' said Democratic pollster Celinda Lake. 'We have to show and tell what we would do, but I think that we're on the precipice of a big opportunity, and I hope we take advantage of it.' Months after Democrats suffered a major blow with Trump sweeping all seven battleground states and the GOP winning control of both houses of Congress, the party is still seeking to put the pieces back together. Halfway through the first year of Trump's term, many data points on where the party stands don't appear bright. Views of the Democratic Party have been at historic lows for a couple months. The percentage of registered voters who view the party favorably reached some of its lowest levels since at least the start of Trump's first term in office in YouGov's average, more than 20 points underwater as of late May. A CNN poll released Thursday found only 28 percent of Americans view the party favorably, a record low in the history of the outlet's polling dating back to 1992. Views of the Republican Party also aren't strong but haven't been quite as poor. A poll conducted by the Democratic super PAC Unite the Country found recently that voters perceive the party as 'out of touch,' 'woke' and 'weak.' An AP-NORC poll found just over a third of Democrats are optimistic about the party's future, compared to 57 percent last July. Surveys have also shown widespread frustration with Democratic leaders and a feeling that Democrats aren't fighting hard enough against the Trump administration and for their voters. This has been particularly pointed against Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), whose favorability rating has been stuck in the mid-to-upper 20s throughout Trump's second term, according to the Decision Desk HQ polling average, though his net favorability has improved somewhat more recently. Scott Tranter, the director of data science for DDHQ, said Democrats are still trying to form a coherent message but don't have a clear 'rallying cry,' though some of them have received attention as they've been arrested during faceoffs with Trump administration officials or visited detention centers like 'Alligator Alcatraz' in Florida. 'It's pretty clear that Schumer is not the guy, just based on his approval rating,' Tranter said. 'And one can make the argument that [former House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi's approval rating was underwater as well, but… Schumer doesn't seem to have that kind of gravitas that she did.' One other common trend in polling over these months is a lack of agreement over who the leader of the Democratic Party is after 2024. A CNN poll found in March that 30 percent of Democrats didn't give a name to respond to a question about which leader best reflects the party's core values. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) had the most support but with only 10 percent, while former Vice President Harris had 9 percent and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) had 8 percent. An Emerson College Poll found Democrats widely split among the field of potential 2028 presidential contenders, with the leading candidate only with 16 percent. Tranter said this dynamic is somewhat to be expected following a party's loss in the presidential election, pointing to the first months of 2005 for Democrats after John Kerry's loss and of 2013 for Republicans after Mitt Romney's loss. 'Coming out of Kerry, the Democrats were also in the wilderness,' he said. 'And so I think that the takeaway is that every time something like this happens, each party goes through its transformation. I think we're still pretty early on it.' But the data does show some reasons to be optimistic for Democrats. Trump's approval rating and favorability have consistently been underwater, not abnormal for him even as he won the November election, but still presenting Democrats with an opportunity. Democrats have mostly kept a lead in DDHQ's average of the generic congressional ballot since early March, albeit a small one of a couple points at most. They led on that question by 1 point as of Monday. The same CNN poll showing disapproval of the Democratic Party found Democrats are more motivated to vote in next year's midterms. A poll from Republican pollster Fabrizio Ward found Republicans trailing the generic ballot in 28 battleground House districts. Democrats also expressed hope that the passage of Trump's 'big beautiful bill,' extending Trump's tax cuts and increasing border security funding but also cutting Medicaid spending, could give them the opportunity they've been looking for. Multiple polls have shown at least a plurality of registered voters or adults oppose it, though many also say they don't know enough. 'Trump and the Republicans are certainly focused on incredibly unpopular policies that are likely to benefit the Democrats that they deserve leading into the midterms,' said Ryan O'Donnell, the interim executive director of the progressive polling firm Data for Progress. 'But Democrats also have to show that they're hearing people's concerns and actively offering solutions to those concerns to make their lives better and more affordable.' Lake said the lack of a clear leader has a positive side, as the 2028 Democratic field will likely feature many showing what the Democratic alternative is to Trump. But she said the process of a leader or a few leaders emerging has been slower than in the past, and she expects that is unlikely to be 'fixed' before the 2026 midterms. That will require having a unified message if no unified leader, she said. 'They need to have a unified voice and a unified plan, and that plan has to include a proactive, populist economic message about what we're going to do and who we're going to fight for,' Lake said. Lake's polling firm and the Democratic donor network Way to Win partnered to conduct a poll released Thursday evaluating those who voted for President Biden in 2020 but didn't vote in 2024. The poll, conducted from late April to early June, found many of those voters didn't like either candidate and didn't feel that Harris had a strong enough economic message to convince them she would lower costs. Pollsters also found most of those voters lean toward voting for a Democrat if the midterms were held today. Jenifer Fernandez Ancona, the co-founder and vice president of Way to Win, said the feelings of regret that respondents indicated they felt about not voting, particularly as relates to the Medicaid cuts and the cost of living not dropping, give the party an opening. She said the poll, showing the most anguish about cuts to programs that help children and Medicaid, was taken before the law's passage, but those concerns are coming to fruition now. 'I think you can use that, right? You could leverage that to say, 'The thing you care about the most is the thing that is actually happening. And so you need to come and be a part of [the] opposition to this,'' Fernandez Ancona said. And the firm's poll, along with other polling, has shown Democrats want their party to go on offense. 'The table has been set,' she said. 'So the question is, will we be able to take advantage of it? Will we really lean in? Will we not shy away from actually going on offense about this bill? It's all about, can we seize the opportunity?'
Los Angeles Times
22 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
‘Stay mad.' Amid immigration raids, Epstein rumors, Trump team ramps up its trolling
Morgan Weistling, an accomplished painter of cowboys and Old West frontier life, was vacationing with his family this month when he got a surprising message from a friend about one of his works of art. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, he said the friend told him, had posted a work he had painted five years ago to its official social media channels without his knowledge. The painting, which looks like a scene from the Oregon Trail, depicts a young white couple — she in a long dress, he in a cowboy hat — cradling a baby in a covered wagon, with mountains and another wagon in the background. 'Remember your Homeland's Heritage,' the Department of Homeland Security captioned the July 14 post on X, Instagram and Facebook. Exactly whose homeland and whose heritage? And what was the intended message of the federal department, whose masked and heavily armed agents have arrested thousands of brown-skinned, Spanish-speaking immigrants — most with no criminal convictions — in California this summer? That has been the source of heated online debate at a time when the Trump administration has ramped up its online trolling with memes and jokes about the raids that critics have called racist, childish and unbefitting official government social media accounts. The 'Remember your Homeland's Heritage' post racked up 19 million views on X and thousands of responses. Critics compared the post to Nazi propaganda. Supporters said it was 'OK to be white' and to celebrate 'traditional values.' Among the responses: 'You mean the heritage built on stolen land, Indigenous genocide, and whitewashed history? You don't get to romanticize settlers while caging today's migrants.' And: 'A few minutes later, an ICE wagon pulls up next to them, agents cuff and stuff them into the back and then summarily send them back to Ireland.' Another person, referencing the 'Oregon Trail' video game, joked: 'All three died from dysentery.' Asked about criticism of the post, a Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said in an email to The Times: 'If the media needs a history lesson on the brave men and women who blazed the trails, forded the rivers, and forged this Republic from the sweat of their brow, we are happy to send them a history textbook. This administration is unapologetically proud of American history and American heritage. Get used to it.' On July 11, a federal judge temporarily halted indiscriminate immigration sweeps in Southern California at places such as Home Depot, car washes and rows of street vendors. U.S. District Judge Maame Ewusi-Mensah Frimpong said she found sufficient evidence that agents were unlawfully using race, ethnicity, language, accent, location or employment as a pretext for immigration enforcement. The next week, the Department of Homeland Security — which includes Immigration and Customs Enforcement along with Customs and Border Protection — posted the white-people-in-the-covered-wagon painting. It also posted a meme with a fake poster from the 1982 movie 'E.T. The Extra Terrestrial' with the caption: 'Illegal aliens, take a page from E.T. and PHONE HOME.' Ramesh Srinivasan, founder of the University of California Digital Cultures Lab, which studies the connections between technology, politics and culture, said the mean-spirited posts and gleeful deportation jokes are part of a deliberate trolling campaign by the Trump administration. 'The saddest part of all of this is it mirrors how DHS is acting in real life,' he said. 'Someone can be a troll online but may not be as much [of one] in real life,' he said. 'The digital world and physical world may not be completely in lockstep with each other. But in this particular case, there's a level of honesty that's actually disturbing.' Srinivasan, who is Indian American, said that although the covered wagon painting is not offensive in and of itself, the timing of the Homeland Security post raises questions about the government's intended meaning. The painting, he said, 'is being used to show inclusion and exclusion, who's worthy of being an American and who isn't.' Srinivasan said mean memes are effective because they spread quickly in a media environment in which people are flooded with information and quickly scroll through visual content and short video reels with little context. 'There are hidden algorithms that determine visibility and virality,' Srinivasan said. 'Outrage goes more viral because it generates what tech companies call engagement.' Here in California, Gov. Gavin Newsom has taken a page from Trump's troll playbook, with recent social media posts that include name-calling, swear words, and, of course, memes. Earlier this month, Newsom responded to a post on X by the far-right Libs of TikTok account that showed video of someone apparently firing a gun at immigration officers in Camarillo. The account asked if the governor would condemn the shooting. Newsom wrote: 'Of course I condemn any assault on law enforcement, you shit poster. Now do Jan 6.' In a post on X, Newsom's press office called White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, the architect of many of Trump's hard-line immigration policies, a 'fascist cuck.' Newsom defended the name-calling in a news conference, saying of the Trump administration: 'I don't think they understand any other kind of language.' The term is used in far right circles to insult liberals as weak. It is also short for 'cuckold,' the husband of an unfaithful wife. Even for Team Trump, which is adept at distraction, the heightened online efforts to own the libs, as supporters say, come at a precarious time for the president. He has been embroiled in controversies over rumors about his friendship with deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and the effects of the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill, which will cut Medicaid and food assistance programs while funding the planned hiring of thousands of new immigration agents. Still, his meme teams are working hard to stoke outrage and brag about immigration raids. Earlier this month, Homeland Security posted a slickly edited video on its social media accounts showing border agents at work, with a narrator quoting the Bible verse Isaiah 6:8: 'Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, 'Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?' And I said, 'Here am I. Send me.'' The video uses a cover of the song, 'God's Gonna Cut You Down' by the San Francisco rock band Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. On Instagram, the band wrote: 'It has come to our attention that the Department of Homeland Security is improperly using our recording of 'God's Gonna Cut You Down' in your latest propaganda video. It's obvious that you don't respect Copyright Law and Artist Rights any more than you respect Habeas Corpus and Due Process rights, not to mention the separation of Church and State per the US Constitution.' On July 10, the band asked the government to cease and desist the use of its recording and pull down the video. It added, 'Oh, and go f— yourselves.' As of Friday evening, the video remained posted on X along with the song. In recent days, White House and Homeland Security social media accounts have shared memes that include: A coffee mug with the words 'Fire up the deportation planes;' a weightlifting skeleton declaring, 'My body is a machine that turns ICE funding into mass deportations;' and alligators wearing ICE caps in reference to the officially named Alligator Alcatraz immigrant detention facility in Florida. A meme shared last week depicted a poster outside the White House that read: 'oMg, diD tHe wHiTE hOuSE reALLy PosT tHiS?' The caption: 'Nowhere in the Constitution does it say we can't post banger memes.' The White House also shared the Homeland Security covered wagon post. In response to questions about online criticism that calls the posts racist, White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson asked a Times reporter in an email to 'explain how deporting illegal aliens is racist.' She also said in a statement: 'We won't stop celebrating the Trump Administration's many wins via banger memes on social media. Stay mad.' Weistling, the artist unwittingly caught up in the controversy, apparently was surprised not only by the posting of his painting and his name, but also by the Department of Homeland Security using an incorrect title for the artwork. The government labeled the painting: 'New Life in a New Land — Morgan Weistling.' The actual title of the painting is 'A Prayer for a New Life.' Prints are listed for sale on the website for the evangelical nonprofit Focus on the Family. Weistling, a registered Republican who lives in Los Angeles County, could not be reached for comment. Shortly after the government used his painting, he wrote on his website: 'Attention! I did not give the DHS permission to use my painting in their recent postings on their official web platforms. They used a painting I did 5 years ago and re-titled it and posted it without my permission. It is a violation of my copyright on the painting. It was a surprise to me and I am trying to gather how this happen [sic] and what to do next.' He later shortened the statement on his website and deleted posts on his Instagram and Facebook accounts saying he learned about the post while on vacation and was stunned the government 'thought they could randomly post an artist's painting without permission' and re-title it. The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to questions from The Times about copyright issues. But a spokesman said the posting of an incorrect title was 'an honest mistake.'
Los Angeles Times
22 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
After six months under Trump, California and L.A. are battlegrounds. Who benefits?
Six months into President Trump's second term, his predilection for picking on California has never been on fuller display, turning the state broadly and Los Angeles specifically into key battlegrounds for his right-wing agenda. There are chaotic immigration raids occurring across the state and military troops on L.A. streets. The administration has sued the state or city over sanctuary policies, transgender athletes and the price of eggs. The state has sued the administration more than 30 times, including over funding cuts, voting restrictions and the undoing of birthright citizenship. Federal officials are investigating L.A. County's gun permitting policies, and have sought to overturn a host of education, health and environmental regulations. They have talked not only of enforcing federal laws for the benefit of California residents, but of showing up in full force — soldiers and all — to wrench control from the state's elected leaders. 'We are not going away,' Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said at a news conference in Los Angeles last month. 'We are staying here to liberate this city from the socialists and the burdensome leadership that this governor and that this mayor have placed on this country, and what they have tried to insert into this city.' The antagonism toward California is not entirely surprising, having been a feature of Trump's first term and his recent presidential campaign. And yet, the breadth and pace of the administration's attacks, aided by a Republican-controlled Congress and a U.S. Supreme Court convinced of executive power, have stunned many — pleasing some and infuriating others. 'Trump's been able to go much further, much faster than anyone would have calculated, with the assistance of the Supreme Court,' said Bob Shrum, director of the USC Dornsife Center for the Political Future. 'In a second Trump term, he's clearly either feeling or acting more emboldened and testing the limits of his power, and Republicans in Congress certainly aren't doing anything to try to rein that in,' said California Sen. Alex Padilla, who was forced to the ground and handcuffed by federal agents after confronting Noem at her news conference. 'It's enraging. It's offensive.' 'What is clear after six months is we now have some measure of checks and balances in California, a counterweight to one-party supermajority control at the state level,' said Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Rocklin). 'From securing the border to reversing the ban on gas cars to protecting girls' sports, balance and common sense are returning to our state.' Rob Stutzman, a longtime GOP strategist in California who is no fan of Trump, said the president's motivations for targeting California are obvious, as it 'is the contrast that he basically has built MAGA on.' Visuals of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents rounding up immigrants in liberal California are red meat to the MAGA base, Stutzman said. 'What they've been able to do in California is basically create the live TV show that they want.' But Trump is hardly the only politician who benefits from his administration being on a war footing with the nation's most populous blue state, Stutzman said. There is a 'symbiotic relationship that Democrats in California have with Trump,' he said, and leaders such as Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass also benefit politically when they're seen as standing up to the president. 'If not for Trump's assault on California, was Gavin Newsom in South Carolina?' Stutzman asked, of what many viewed as an early presidential campaign stop earlier this month. 'Would Karen Bass otherwise have been given a lifeline after her disastrous performance with the fires?' Bass, in a statement to The Times, defended her record, saying both homelessness and homicides are down and fire recovery is moving quickly. She said the Trump administration was helpful with early fire response, but 'now they've assaulted our city' with immigration raids — which is why L.A. has joined in litigation to stop them, as her 'number one job is to protect Angelenos.' Bob Salladay, a senior advisor to Newsom, dismissed the idea that battling Trump is in any way good for California or welcomed by its leaders. 'That's not why we're fighting him,' he said. 'We're fighting him because what he's doing is immoral and illegal.' Salladay agreed, however, that the last six months have produced a stunning showdown over American values that few predicted — even with the conservative Project 2025 playbook laying out much of it in advance. 'We knew it would be bad. We didn't know it would be this bad,' Salladay said. 'We didn't know it would be the president of the United States sending U.S. troops into an American city and taking away resources from the National Guard for public theater.' When protests over early immigration raids erupted in scattered pockets of L.A. and downtown, Trump dramatized them as a grave threat to citywide safety, in part to justify bringing in the military. Local officials say masked and militarized agents swarming Latino and other immigrant neighborhoods and racially profiling targets for detention have undermined safety far more than the protests ever did. Trump has since pulled back about half the troops, but thousands remain. A federal judge recently ordered federal agents to stop using racial profiling to carry out indiscriminate arrests, but raids continue. The Trump administration, meanwhile, is demanding California counties provide lists of noncitizens in their jails. Beyond L.A., officials and industry leaders say immigration raids have badly spooked workers in farming, construction, street vending and other service sectors, with some leaving the job for fear of being detained. Meanwhile, Trump's tariff war with trading partners has made it more difficult for some farmers to purchase equipment and chemical supplies. The Justice Department is suing the state for allowing transgender girls to compete in girls' sports, alleging such policies violate federal civil rights law. It is suing the state over an animal welfare law protecting hens from being kept in small cages, blaming the policy for driving up the cost of eggs in violation of federal farming regulations. It is investigating L.A. County's gun permitting process, suggesting excessive fees and wait times are violating people's gun rights. Trump signed legislation to undo California's aggressive limits on auto emissions and a landmark rule that would ban new gas-only car sales in the state by 2035. His administration just rescinded billions of dollars for a long-planned high-speed rail line between Los Angeles and San Francisco, calling it a 'boondoggle.' The legal antagonism has cut in the opposite direction, as well, with California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta's office having sued the Trump administration more than 30 times in the last six months over a range of issues. Bonta has sued over billions of dollars in cuts to education funding and billions of dollars in cuts to medical research and development. He has sued over Trump executive orders declaring that California must radically restrict voting access, over Trump's unilateral tariff scheme and over clawbacks of funding and approvals for wind energy and electric vehicle charging stations. Bonta called the Trump administration's targeting of the state 'a lot of show' — and 'disrespectful, inappropriate and unlawful.' He noted a lot of wins in court for the state, but also acknowledged the administration has scored victories, too, particularly at the Supreme Court, which has temporarily cleared the way for mass layoffs of federal employees, the dismantling of the Department of Education and the undoing of birthright citizenship. But those rulings are 'just procedural' for now as litigation continues, Bonta stressed, and the fight continues. 'We are absolutely unapologetic, resolute, committed to meeting the Trump administration in court and beating them back each time they violate the law,' Bonta said. After six months of entrenched political infighting between the U.S. and its largest state, who benefits? Trump, officials in his administration and some state Republicans are adamant that it is good, hardworking, law-abiding people of California, who they allege have long suffered under liberal state policies that reward criminals and unauthorized immigrants. 'What would Los Angeles look like without illegal aliens?' Stephen Miller, one of Trump's top policy advisors, recently asked on Fox News — before suggesting, without proof, that it would have better healthcare and schooling for U.S. children and 'no drug deaths' on the streets. Abigail Jackson, a White House spokesperson, said in a statement to The Times that 'Gavin Newscum' — Trump's favorite insult — is 'destroying' the state, and that Trump 'has had to step in and save Californians from Gavin's incompetence.' 'First, when Newscum was chronically unprepared to address the January wildfires, and more recently when he refused to stop violent, left-wing rioters from attacking federal law enforcement,' Jackson said. 'This doesn't even account for Newscum's radical, left-wing policies, which the Administration is working to protect Californians — and all Americans — from, like letting men destroy women's sports, or turning a blind eye to child labor exploitation.' Trump, she said, 'will continue to stand up for Californians like a real leader, while Newsom sips wine in Napa.' Some Republicans in the state strongly agree, including Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, who is running for governor. With Trump in office, Bianco said, 'there's finally someone working and looking out for Californians' best interests.' He said Trump called in troops only because of the 'embarrassing' failure of L.A. officials to maintain order. He said the only reason ICE is going after unauthorized immigrants in the streets — with some bystanders admittedly caught in the fray — is that California sanctuary laws prevent agents from just picking them up in jails. 'This is an absolute failure of a Democrat-led agenda and Democrat policy that is forcing the federal government to go into our neighborhoods looking for these criminals,' Bianco said. 'Californians are being punished for it because of failed California leadership, not because of the federal government.' Newsom, Bass and other liberal officials, of course, have framed Trump's actions in the state in very different terms. In a recent filing in the federal case challenging the constitutionality of ICE's immigration tactics in L.A., California and 17 other liberal-led states argued those tactics had left citizens and noncitizens afraid to go outside, turned 'once bustling neighborhoods into ghost towns' and devastated local businesses. State and local officials have said they are fighting the administration so aggressively because Trump's policies threaten billions in federal funding for the state in education, healthcare, transportation and other sectors. California Sen. Adam Schiff, a staunch adversary of Trump, said he has had particularly troubling conversations with farmers up and down the state, who are feeling the pain from Trump's immigration polices and tariffs acutely. 'Their workers are increasingly not showing up. Their raw materials are increasingly more expensive because of the tariffs. Their markets are shrinking because of the recoil by other countries from this kind of indiscriminate turf war,' Schiff said. 'Farmers are really in the epicenter of this.' So, too, Schiff said, are the millions of Californians who could be affected by the administration's decision to cut environmental funding and curtail disaster preparation and relief in the state, including by hampering water management and flood mitigation work and 'slow-walking' wildfire relief in L.A. 'Donald Trump is the first U.S. president who doesn't believe that it's his job to represent the whole country — only the states that voted for him,' Schiff said. 'The president seems to have a particular, personal vendetta against California, which is obviously [a] deep disservice to the millions of residents in our state, no matter whom they voted for.' During her Los Angeles news conference, Noem said that federal officials in L.A. were 'putting together a model and a blueprint' that could be replicated elsewhere — an apparent warning against other blue cities and states bucking the administration. California officials saw it exactly that way. Bass has accused the administration of 'treating Los Angeles as a test case for how far it can go in driving its political agenda forward while pushing the Constitution aside.' What happens next, several political observers said, depends on whether the antagonism continues to work politically, and whether the administration starts acting on its threats to crack down even more. When Bass showed up in person to object to heavily armed immigration agents storming through MacArthur Park recently, U.S. Border Patrol Chief Gregory Bovino allegedly told her that she and other L.A. officials and residents 'better get used to' agents being in the city, who 'will go anywhere, anytime we want in Los Angeles.' Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin, when asked if Bass would be arrested, said they were 'keeping everything on the table.' Trump has suggested Newsom should be arrested, too, saying, 'I'd do it.' Padilla was taken forcefully to the ground and handcuffed at a Noem press event. Trump has accused Schiff of criminal fraud for claiming primary residency in mortgage paperwork for a home in his district and one near his work in Washington, D.C., which Schiff called a baseless political attack. Padilla said it's all to be expected from a Republican administration that hates and fears everything that his state stands for, but that Democrats aren't backing down and will continue to 'organize, organize, organize' to defend Californians and win back power in the midterms. 'We're not the fourth largest economy in the world despite our diversity and immigrant population, but because of it,' Padilla said. 'Diversity and migrants doing well and making our country stronger is Donald Trump's worst nightmare — and that has made California his No. 1 target.' Schiff said the administration's actions in California in the last six months are indeed producing 'the TV show that Trump wanted to show his MAGA base,' but 'it's a TV show that is not going over well with the American people.' Trump's approval numbers on immigration are down, Schiff said, because Americans don't want to live in a country where landscapers, car wash employees and farmworkers with zero criminal convictions are terrorized by masked agents in the streets and U.S. citizen children are ripped from their parents. 'The more Trump tries to inflict harm and pain on California, and the more he disrupts life in California cities and communities, the more he makes the Republican brand absolutely toxic,' Schiff said, 'and the more harm that he does to Republican elected leaders up and down the state.'
