Vice President JD Vance To Visit LA Friday Amid Tension Over Immigration Enforcement

LOS ANGELES, CA — Vice President JD Vance will travel to Los Angeles on Friday amid ongoing tension over federal immigration enforcement in the city.

The White House announced that Vance on Friday "will tour a multi-agency Federal Joint Operations Center, a Federal Mobile Command Center, meet with leadership and Marines, and deliver brief remarks." The White House did not provide a more specific timeline for Vance's visit.

Vance departed Joint Base Andrews in Maryland shortly after 8:30 a.m. Pacific Time, with his flight expected to be about five hours, likely bound for Los Angeles International Airport.

Southland motorists should expect delays as the vice president's motorcade traverses the area.

The visit reflects the large, contentious presence of federal law enforcement and the military in Los Angeles as part of the Trump administration's immigration enforcement and response to ensuing protests.

President Donald Trump ordered the California National Guard deployed to Los Angeles shortly after protests broke out earlier this month in response to raids by federal immigration authorities of workplaces in the city. He deployed as many as 4,000 Guard troops and later deployed up to 700 U.S. Marines to the area. On Friday, he suggested plans to expand the military presence on American streets, noting it could happen “all over the United States" if necessary.

On Thursday, a federal appeals court allowed Trump to maintain control of the Guard, halting a lower court's ruling that found the president acted illegally when he federalized troops over the fierce objection of Gov. Gavin Newsom.

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Vance's visit comes after Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem traveled to the city last week in a visit that was highlighted by the brief detention of U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla, D-California, who was forcibly removed from a Noem news conference, forced to the ground in a hallway and handcuffed.

It's unclear where Vance's visit will take place. Noem held her news conference at the federal building in West Los Angeles, where U.S. Marines have been stationed in a protective posture. Federalized California National Guard troops, meanwhile, have been stationed at the downtown complex of federal buildings to protect the structures from protests.

Though protests and violence have waned, federal authorities have continued operating in the Southland.

A U.S. citizen on Tuesday was arrested during a raid in Pico Rivera after he spoke out against an agent's questioning of another man.

On Thursday, authorities carried out raids at Home Depot stores in Hollywood and San Fernando and at a Glendale car wash. There was a brief and confusing federal presence outside Dodger Stadium that drew a crowd of protesters and later a denial by ICE that its agents were, in fact, those at the ballpark. They turned out to be Border Patrol agents, who also fall under the Department of Homeland Security umbrella and have been used lately for the same mission as ICE — to round up undocumented immigrants in Southern California amid the president's push to increase deportations in Democratic cities.

City News Service contributed to this report.