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The federal government appeared poised on Wednesday to deploy numerous of law enforcement personnel to the Bay Area region for a significant immigration enforcement operation, prompting outrage from local politicians.

Specifics of the Deployment

Specifics of the operation were gradually becoming clear, but it will reportedly involve over a hundred government officers, as reported. The officers are scheduled to begin using the Coast Guard facility in across the bay, facing San Francisco. It was still uncertain whether national guard troops would participate.

Political Backlash

The deployment comes after months of statements by the president to target the progressive municipality. The state's leader Gavin Newsom condemned the decision, calling it “right out of the authoritarian playbook”.

“He dispatches unidentified officers, he sends out Border Patrol, he deploys federal agents, he instills concern and apprehension in the population so that he can take credit for solving that by sending in the national guard,” he declared. “This mirrors the arsonist extinguishing the fire.”

City Preparation

San Francisco is the latest large urban area singled out by the administration's initiative of widespread apprehensions. The operation is likely to cause a standoff between the federal government and municipal authorities who have pledged to prevent paramilitary operations in the city.

San Franciscans have been readying for an extended period for Trump to carry out ongoing warnings to dispatch personnel to the city. At a Wednesday public announcement, San Francisco’s mayor reiterated that the city was prepared.

“For months, we have been anticipating the chance of a potential federal deployment in our city,” said the mayor, explaining that he had taken further executive actions on Wednesday to “enhance the city’s support for our immigrant communities, and ensure our offices are organized prior to any national intervention.”

Judicial Framework

Despite judicial disputes to deployments in a several municipalities, including Chicago, Oregon and LA, Trump has claimed “complete control” to dispatch the national guard in cities, referencing the Insurrection Act which allows presidents certain rights to send forces on American territory.

Community Response

Newsom – who once held office as San Francisco’s city leader – had vowed to intervene “without delay” to a deployment in the city. “The notion that the White House can send forces into our cities with no justification grounded in reality, no monitoring, no answerability, no consideration of regional control – it constitutes an attack on the rule of law,” he said on Wednesday.

Public associations, including advocacy organizations formed in the previous presidential term, have prepped to rapidly assemble a large protest in the city, as well as peaceful assemblies at community centers.

Local Effect

In San Francisco’s Mission area, a predominantly Latino community, city supervisor told reporters last week she and her residents had been bracing for this moment. “The point that people stop going to work, when anyone Black or brown can’t freely walk outside without the fear of Trump’s federal agents targeting based on race and apprehending them, the time when parents stop sending kids to school, are too scared to go to the food market or physician,” she said. “The readiness efforts in the Mission is fundamentally a halt the scale of which we have not witnessed since the health crisis.”

National Guard Situation

About 300 out of 4,000 California state soldiers stay under federal control under an order from Trump. Roughly two hundred of them had been dispatched to Oregon, where they were waiting in limbo during a judicial dispute over their deployment.

This week, Newsom said he had requested the California national guard troops under his control to operate distribution centers during the government shutdown.