Like a lithium battery on fire, the ferocity of the anti-ICE riots in Los Angeles will inevitably come to your city with the same or even greater intensity. What we've witnessed earlier this week is merely a warm-up to a meltdown during a blistering summer.
The real target of the protestors' wrath is not ICE, rather Donald Trump, whose presidential victory last November and aggressive and sometimes unilateral (albeit legal) fulfilment of his campaign promises, has enraged the Democrats.
The Shadow Civil War
Trump, by federalizing the California National Guard, undertook the rare action when California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) refused to request their services despite growing violence and looting in the streets of downtown Los Angeles.
Supported by extensive video footage by citizen journalists, the National Guard's orders are to protect federal buildings, not crowd control in supplement local law enforcement. Soon after US Marines were sent to support the National Guard.
The presence of the National Guard and Marines unburdened the responsibility of local law enforcement so that they can apply all their human and equipment resources in containing the urban mayhem. Governor Newsom even attempted to halt the arrival of the military but backed down after a California Supreme Court judge rejected his request.
Although constitutionally this crisis appears to be an issue of federal vs state rights, the toxic political chasm between the Democrats and Republicans, pushes the stakes to another far more dangerous level.
With respect to economic heft, according to the IMF's 2024 World Economic Outlook, if California were a separate country, it would be the 4th highest nominal GDP in the world at $4.1 trillion behind the US, China and Germany, greater than Japan's $4.02 trillion.
Powder Keg Weekend: A Troika of Trouble
The website of a protest/defiance group called "No Kings", is organizing an anti ICE/anti-Trump protests nationwide called 50501 Movement (50 protests, 50 states, one movement) this Saturday, June 14 not coincidentally happens to be:
- Flag Day
- The US military's 250th anniversary
- President Trump's 70th birthday
Their website includes dozens of cities, locales and hours they plan to organize these protests. The map below is an overview; all particulars can be found on the aforementioned website link.
How these protests play out is anyone's guess. It may be nothing more than a lot of noise or a series of full-blown riots. Either way, I'm sure that law enforcement and local businesses have dusted off the BLM playbook to contain and/or minimize damage to their establishments respectively.
Tempest Spinoffs
Often times the protestors are loud and contained by law enforcement with minimal issues. However, powerful storms, especially tornados, spawn an unpredictable number of smaller ones.
These smaller groups include the omnipresent paid and unpaid agitators and looters, none of whom care about the protesting issues. With law enforcement stretched to the max, sometimes smaller storms spawn during or shortly after the main protest making it a challenge to contain like a fiery device with lithium batteries.
Conclusion & Takeaways
These protests and their consequences in Los Angeles are merely the warm-up trailers to a possible sustained level of protests throughout the summer. The next big date is the Fourth of July, a potentially brutal weekend since the holiday falls on a Friday.
Worse yet, during the summer there's no shortage of potential young protestors from the universities, nomad workers, the unemployed and under-employed.
Economically, businesses that are devastated by violent protests are unlikely to return depriving the community of essential resources and workers of employment.
As major retailers pull out permanently, these areas will be fallow and potentially be classified as "eminent domain". Present-day or future going concerns will find doing business in these areas unaffordable with respect to insurance or even uninsurable. It's the creation of another urban desert, not caused by climate change.
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The Cerulean Council is a NYC-based think-tank that provides prescient, beyond-the-horizon, contrarian perspectives and risk assessments on geopolitical dynamics and global urban security.