By Matthew D.

Sacramento, California- Gavin Newsom, the Governor of California, signed a decree on Monday that entails the National Guard’s withdrawal from the US/Mexico border in a rebuttal to the President’s efforts to stop illegal immigration.

Newsom stated that he does not want the troops taking any part in what he calls a “political theater” and will instead focus them on the needs of the state, like wildfire rehab or the efforts to counter drug cartels.

His move was not the first of its kind, however, with New Mexico’s governor Michelle Lujan Grisham also withdrawing her state’s troops this month. She responded to the president’s claim of the overwhelming need for border security that “New Mexico will not take part in the president’s charade of border fear-mongering by misusing our diligent National Guard troops.”

Newsom has been applauded by many pro-immigration officials for his efforts. Patricia Gandara, the co-director of the civil rights movement at UCLA, stated in alignment to him that “I think we grew up and we realized that immigrants were not a threat. We’re the fifth-largest economy in the world. And we have the largest percentage of immigrants in our state. How do you reconcile that if you think immigrants are taking our jobs and bringing down the economy?”

Newsom called the issue “a manufactured crisis” made by the Trump Administration and stated that California “provides shelter to all who need it and sanctuary to all who seek it — where opportunity abounds for all who will work for it.”

He has also made it clear that California will take no part in the president’s border affairs and instead has pledged 25 million to local nonprofit agencies that provide aid to immigrants.

Finalizing his views on immigration, Newsom reported that young immigrants “shouldn’t be ripped away from their parents at the border and nor should they be left hungry while politicians seek to pour billions into a wall that should never be built,” referencing to the Trump Administration’s policy of separating immigrant families.