EXCLUSIVE: VA Dept says LA riots forced community center closures impacting more than 600 veterans

FIRST ON FOX: Department of Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins sent letters to California Governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass this week alerting them to the impact the anti-ICE riots there are having on the city’s veteran community.

The letter cites the “violent” riots as the reason why the VA decided to close its Los Angeles Ambulatory Care Center for at least five days. It stated that local agency leaders made the “difficult decision” after the building’s outer walls were defaced with graffiti threatening the lives of federal immigration officials.

In total, more than 600 veteran appointments were affected.

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“In other words, your state’s failure to maintain law and order in Los Angeles is coming between Veterans and the healthcare they have earned,” the letters, signed by Secretary Collins, stated. “What has struck me the most about the city and state’s response to this ordeal is that your primary concern seems to be virtue signaling your opposition to President Donald J. Trump’s efforts to restore law and order throughout the city rather than protecting the hardworking Angelenos who are being victimized by violent rioters and other criminals.”    

Collins added that the city and state’s “lackadaisical response to the riots” raises questions about the safety and security of veterans, particularly those who benefit from federal VA programs, after the National Guard and other federal law enforcement leave the area.

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The letter requested both Newsom and Bass respond with specific steps they are currently taking to restore law and order in the area where the VA care center was shutdown. It also requested a status update on state and local investigations into the defacement of the care center that was closed, and requested that state and local authorities pay to repair the damage to the building since, according to Collins’ letter, it was their lack of police presence that led to the defacement.

Both Newsom and Bass opposed any federal intervention to quell the riots, calling it unconstitutional and an overreach. Eventually, Newsom, with support from California Attorney General Rob Bonta, filed a federal lawsuit against the Trump administration seeking an emergency restraining order to block National Guard and other military personnel from assisting federal agents with immigration enforcement. 

“Defendants, including President Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth have sought to bring military personnel and a ‘warrior culture’ to the streets of cities and towns where Americans work, go to school, and raise their families,” Newsom’s lawsuit states. “Now, they have turned their sights on California with devastating consequences, setting a roadmap to follow across the country.”