Margaret Brennan Confronts Kristi Noem on Trump’s ‘Federalizing’ CA National Guard — Which She Opposed Just Last Year

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Sunday defended President Donald Trump’s decision to federalize the California National Guard in response to violent unrest in Los Angeles over the weekend.

Noem argued the president acted only after Democratic leaders failed to restore order. Notably, the former South Dakota governor opposed the idea of the White House federalizing her state’s National Guard just a year ago.

During an appearance on CBS’s Face the Nation, Noem said Trump had no choice but to intervene Saturday evening once it became clear that local officials, including Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom, were not taking adequate action to protect the public.

“If [Newsom] was doing his job, then people wouldn’t have gotten hurt the last couple of days,” Noem told anchor Margaret Brennan. “We wouldn’t have officers with shattered wrists from bricks being thrown… vehicles being burned, flags being burned in the street and Molotov cocktails being thrown.”

The decision to send in federalized Guard troops drew pointed criticism from Newsom, who said the situation in California was under control.

Newsom said he had already mobilized California Highway Patrol and other law enforcement resources, and called for calm in public statements.

Brennan pressed Noem on Newsom’s objections.

“California’s governor doesn’t want the federalized system here. He says he’s got it under control,” she said. “He says the Trump administration is seeking a spectacle.”

Noem responded by pointing to the severity of the violence and past examples of Democratic governors mishandling similar crises. “Governor Newsom has proven that he makes bad decisions,” she said. “That’s one of the reasons why these National Guard soldiers are being federalized — so they can use their special skill set to keep peace. We’re not going to let a repeat of 2020 happen.”

She also referenced the 2020 unrest in Minneapolis under then-Gov. Tim Walz, saying, “He let his city burn for days on end.”

Noem herself has criticized federal intervention in state unrest in the past, which Brennan did not mention.

In a February 2024 appearance on Fox News, she warned that if then-President Joe Biden tried to federalize South Dakota’s National Guard to remove them from the southern border, it would be “a direct attack on states’ rights.”

“Over the last several years, we’ve seen Democrats try to take away our freedoms of religion, assembly, and speech,” Noem said at the time. “We can’t let them take away our right to defend ourselves, too.”

The old comments by Noem were shared by Newsom on X Sunday morning.

Watch above via CBS News.