“Insane and Dangerous”: California Answers the President Who Throws His Own Cities to the Enemy

A president stands in the safety of the heartland and gives away millions of his own citizens. “Let them take out Los Angeles, let them take out San Diego. This is a very small price to pay.” That is how Donald Trump spoke Monday in Grand Island, Nebraska, a state he won in 2024 with more than 55 percent of the vote. He called the costs of the Iran war, for fuel and fertilizer, artificial and small, a sacrifice for the security of the world. The victory, he said, confirmed everything they had done, and one way or another, the whole thing would end. And then, almost casually, he put Los Angeles and San Diego on the table. This time the answer came within hours, from California, and not only from Democrats.

Trump: “With the war, it’s all just artificial. It’s a little expensive. That’s a small price to pay ... let them take out Los Angeles, let them take out San Diego. That’s a very small price to pay.”

Read also our article: Completely Insane Trump in Nebraska: “Let Them Wipe Out Los Angeles”

Governor Gavin Newsom called him “insane and dangerous,” and for once, the words fit. First Trump sent the National Guard and Marines into California to occupy it, now he is inviting the country’s enemies to take out those same cities. Newsom, his fiercest opponent and a possible 2028 contender, put the Nebraska appearance alongside the speeches in which the president had previously ordered troops into American streets. Against his own citizens, he sends in the military. To the enemy, he hands over their cities. Both from the same mouth, within a matter of weeks. The indifference is not new. He had already brushed off rising prices and played down the danger that Iran could strike American soil.

An American president is talking about Los Angeles and San Diego being “taken out.” Where the hell is Congress? This is dangerous. The time to stand up is now.

The most devastating response came from his own side. Jim Desmond, a Republican in a competitive district near San Diego, had had enough. The first duty of a commander in chief, he said, is to protect his own people. “No American city is expendable, and no American family should ever be treated as collateral damage.” Independent Kevin Kiley, who votes with Republicans, dryly called the words “not helpful.” When the president’s own party has to explain to him that you do not sacrifice cities, a line has been crossed that no campaign can talk away.

The White House twisted the whole thing into shape. Communications chief Steven Cheung blamed it all on media panic, saying Trump had only meant that a nuclear-armed Iran would have threatened American cities. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass was not buying it. She said she was not sure Cheung understood that people could very clearly hear what the president had said. His defense had nothing to do with the words that came out of Trump’s mouth. A recording cannot be talked away, no matter how loudly someone shouts over it.

San Diego and Los Angeles are the second-largest and largest cities in the state. San Diego alone is home to more than 115,000 active-duty service members, along with the largest naval base on the West Coast. The same soldiers Trump salutes in front of television cameras, he offered up that evening as firewood. Representative Sara Jacobs, whose district is there, wrote that her constituents, “including many service members, veterans and their families,” were not acceptable collateral damage in “Trump’s stupid war.”

That he named Los Angeles and San Diego was no accident. Both are in a state Trump despises, both are governed by Democrats. This is not how he governs a country. He manages a map sorted by color, red districts worth protecting, blue ones disposable. The best part came from his own defenders. Cheung proudly listed that Iran had “no nukes, no navy, no air force and no money.” So the fear of this supposed nothing is apparently so great that entire cities can be treated as the price. He invents the enemy and sends the bill to the gas station. The cities get thrown in on top. The lives of strangers count for nothing in his calculation as long as they live behind the wrong party color. Early voting had begun in California that same day, in a state where Republicans are hoping to make gains, all the way up to the governor’s office, and where Newsom changed the congressional map last year to their disadvantage after Trump pushed Texas in the opposite direction.