Gov. Jerry Brown announced Wednesday he will call up 400 California National Guard troops with some conditions. This isn't the first time California has responded to a president’s request.
At the Arnie’s Point, outside Otay Mesa in 2006, the California National Guard showed reporters some of the things they were doing as part of Operation Jump Start.
Then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger sent 1,200 national guard troops to patrol the border on the request of the Bush administration. On Arnie’s Point, the guard manned an infrared camera. Along the California border, they built roads and fixed fencing. They moved a 250,000 cubic yards of dirt before leaving in 2008.
The governor agreed to send troops to the border again in 2010 under the Obama administration. Both times the mission was structured to steer clear federal law which limits the military’s ability to act as domestic law enforcement.
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Debbie Kang is a visiting professor at the Center for Comparative Immigration Studies at University of California San Diego. She is the author of "Making Immigration Law on the US-Mexico Border, 1917-1954" She questioned the value of putting the National Guard on the border either in the past or at this moment.
“For fiscal 2017, illegal immigration fell to approximately 300,000 and that’s the lowest number since 1971 so I’m not sure what sort of crisis they will be addressing,” she said.
She questioned the idea of having the guard at the border, since Gov. Brown has typically been a strong opponent of President Trump’s immigration policy.
In his letter, Brown referenced past missions and the fact that the guard has 250 troops working with the federal government on drug enforcement and counter-terrorism, including 55 in the San Diego area. Brown says the 400 additional troops would be used in similar roles.
