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The White House appeared poised on Wednesday to send numerous of federal agents to the San Francisco Bay Area for a significant crackdown on immigration, triggering criticism from state officials.

Specifics of the Deployment

Information of the mission were continuing to unfold, but it will reportedly involve more than 100 government officers, according to reports. The officers are expected to begin occupying the Coast Guard facility in Alameda, opposite San Francisco. It remained unclear whether national guard troops would join the operation.

Official Reaction

The deployment is the result of weeks of warnings by the president to target the Democratic-run city. California’s governor Gavin Newsom condemned the decision, labeling it “straight from the authoritarian playbook”.

“He sends out masked men, he deploys customs officers, he deploys immigration officials, he instills anxiety and fear in the neighborhood so that he can take credit for solving that by dispatching the national guard,” Newsom said. “This is exactly like the incendiary putting out the fire.”

City Planning

San Francisco is the newest large urban area singled out by Donald Trump’s campaign of mass immigration arrests. The deployment is expected to trigger a showdown between the administration and local leaders who have pledged to prevent paramilitary operations in the city.

San Franciscans have been preparing for months for Trump to carry out repeated threats to dispatch personnel to the city. At a Wednesday afternoon press conference, San Francisco’s city leader emphasized that the city was equipped.

“Over recent weeks, we have been anticipating the possibility of some kind of national intervention in our city,” said the mayor, noting that he had taken further executive actions on Wednesday to “bolster the city’s support for our immigrant communities, and make certain our offices are organized ahead of any federal deployment.”

Constitutional Background

Despite legal challenges to missions in a several municipalities, including the Windy City, Portland and Southern California, Trump has declared “absolute authority” to send the national guard in cities, citing the presidential authority which enables presidents specific authority to deploy troops on domestic land.

Community Reaction

Newsom, who once held office as San Francisco’s chief executive – had pledged to intervene “immediately” to a deployment in the city. “The idea that the national administration can dispatch personnel into our cities with no justification based on facts, no monitoring, no answerability, no consideration of regional control – it represents an infringement on the judicial framework,” he said on Wednesday.

Public associations, including advocacy organizations created during the initial federal leadership, have organized to quickly mobilize a large protest in the city, as well as candlelight gatherings at community centers.

Community Consequences

In San Francisco’s Mission area, a predominantly Latino population, local representative stated to media last week she and her residents had been preparing for this time. “The point that employees avoid workplaces, when anyone Black or brown can’t freely walk outside without the apprehension of Trump’s federal agents discriminating against and apprehending them, the moment when students avoid classrooms, grow too frightened to go to the food market or medical provider,” she said. “What we have been preparing for in the Mission is fundamentally a closure the extent of which we have not witnessed since the health crisis.”

State Troops Status

Approximately three hundred out of four thousand regional military personnel continue under national command under an command from Trump. Roughly two hundred of them had been sent to the neighboring state, where they were waiting in limbo in the midst of a court case over their deployment.

This period, Newsom said he had called the local soldiers under his command to operate distribution centers during the administrative stoppage.