By Alexis Koseff, CalMatters
As he publicly mocks concerns that crime in California is out of control, Gov. Gavin Newsom is also surging law enforcement resources across the state.
Newsom announced Thursday that he would deploy new “crime suppression” teams of California Highway Patrol officers to partner with local officials in six regions: San Diego, the Inland Empire, Los Angeles, the Central Valley, Sacramento and the San Francisco Bay Area.
It’s an escalation of a strategy that Newsom has already tried in cities such as Oakland and Bakersfield, sending in state officers to assist with cracking down on retail theft, stolen vehicles and drug dealing.
And it appears closely related to political considerations, as President Donald Trump ramps up threats of military action to “clean up” Democratic-led cities across the country.
During a press conference in his executive office overlooking the state Capitol, where he was flanked by high-ranking CHP officials, Newsom held up flyers showcasing Republican politicians whose states have higher murder rates than California.
“Perhaps the president could deploy the National Guard in every corner of Mississippi. The murder rate’s out of control there. Carnage,” Newsom said. “This is if they care about the issues of crime and violence.
Crime has again become a hot-button national topic. Earlier this month, Trump deployed thousands of National Guard troops in Washington, D.C. and took control of its local police force, arguing that federal intervention was needed because of unsafe conditions in the city — though reports of violent offenses are at their lowest in three decades.
Since then, Trump has publicly mulled expanding the operation into numerous other cities that he claims Democrats have destroyed, including San Francisco and Oakland. Newsom has denounced the idea on social media and in interviews, referring to it on Thursday as “authoritarian.”
Newsom and Trump are also in the midst of an ongoing struggle over the president’s deployment of National Guard troops and Marines into Los Angelesearlier this summer to quell fierce protests against immigration enforcement. The governor sued to stop what he alleges was an illegal military action, and though most of the troops have since been demobilized, a potentially precedent-setting case is still ongoing.
This latest “crime suppression” program provides Newsom an opportunity to get ahead of Trump and show that California is already taking action with an approach that the governor claims is highly effective. Last year, CHP officers made more than 9,000 arrests, recovered nearly 5,800 stolen vehicles and confiscated more than 400 firearms in Bakersfield, Oakland and San Bernardino, according to the governor’s office. The announcement touted a 34% decrease in homicides and a 25% reduction in robberies in Oakland in 2024, while shootings in Bakersfield dropped to their lowest since before the coronavirus pandemic.
“Whatever the crime is, when we come in and do just enforcement that leads to good police work, that crime goes down,” CHP Commissioner Sean Duryee said during the press conference.
Magnus Lofstrom, who researches crime for the Public Policy Institute of California, said it’s plausible that strategy contributed to lower crime, though it’s hard to attribute it as the main reason. Among the eight largest cities in California, which include Oakland, three saw slight increases in violent and property crime rates last year, while San Francisco experienced a drop on par with Oakland.
“It’s difficult to pinpoint any specific factor that’s behind them,” he said in an interview.
Duryee said the new “crime suppression” teams would be at least 12 to 15 officers and focus on problems flagged by local officials, which could include illegal street racing and open-air drug markets.
Newsom denied that the expansion was a reaction to Trump. He said his administration was “trying to be responsive to the people we serve,” who want to see more done.
“You still have people whose cars are broken into. You still have crimes being committed. You still have murders,” he said. “I’m not arguing to defend the status quo. Quite the contrary. We think we can do better still.”
Alexei Koseff covers Gov. Gavin Newsom, the Legislature and California government from Sacramento.He joined CalMatters in January 2022 after previously reporting on the Capitol for The Sacramento Bee and the San Francisco Chronicle. Folsom Times and All Town Media LLC are authorized CalMatters media partners in an effort to keep our local community up to date on happenings in the State Capitol.
