On Saturday, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti stressed during a press conference pertaining to the ongoing riots that the city would not “call in the National Guard.” A short while later, Garcetti tweeted that “the California National Guard” was coming to LA.
“Would you support calling in the National Guard?” asked a reporter.
Garcetti replied: No. I spoke with the governor earlier today. This is not a city – this is not 1992. We’re not going to evoke what happened then and call in the National Guard, but that’s also on all of us. Let’s just all deescalate. We’ve trained police officers to learn more and more about deescalation, and we still have more to do, but all of us as human beings can deescalate. You can escalate without a weapon. You can provoke without a baton. So, let us all deescalate, and no, I do not anticipate in any way needing to call in [the] National Guard. We got this, Los Angeles. Let’s show our better angels.
Garcetti was, of course, referring the 1992 LA Riots, which followed the acquittal of four Los Angeles police officers who brutally beat African American man Rodney King.
Later, Garcetti changed course, issuing the following tweet: “The California National Guard is being deployed to Los Angeles overnight to support our local response to maintain peace and safety on the streets of our city.” – READ MORE
Listen to the insightful Thomas Paine Podcast Below --