President Donald Trump has called off plans to send federal forces into San Francisco just days before the operation was scheduled to begin.
According to the Daily Caller, the decision followed a phone conversation with the city’s mayor, Daniel Lurie, where the president was assured local leaders were beginning to get a handle on the city’s well-documented crime issues.
Earlier in the week, Trump had been vocal about deploying a federal surge into the city to address public safety concerns, but reversed the plan Thursday after hearing positive updates from what he called “friends in the area” and the mayor himself.
Trump Pulls Federal Action After Mayor’s Call
The shift came within days of Trump speaking from the Oval Office that a National Guard deployment might be necessary to restore order in San Francisco—a city he recently criticized for being overrun by what he dubbed “woke” mismanagement.
“I spoke to Mayor Lurie last night and he asked, very nicely, that I give him a chance to see if he can turn it around,” Trump posted on Truth Social Thursday, echoing a rare tone of cooperative restraint from the typically aggressive law-and-order president.
According to the White House, Trump’s willingness to withhold federal involvement—for now—signals a readiness to collaborate when mayors show genuine initiative, a sentiment echoed during a Thursday press briefing by Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.
Local Progress Temporarily Halts Federal Forces
Despite Trump’s doubt over Lurie's ability to act swiftly under current California laws, he acknowledged encouragement from prominent locals who believe in the city’s turnaround potential. Business figures like Jensen Huang and Marc Benioff reportedly contacted Trump to urge patience and optimism.
“Great people like Jensen Huang, Marc Benioff, and others have called saying that the future of San Francisco is great,” Trump said. “They want to give it a ‘shot.’ Therefore, we will not surge in San Francisco on Saturday. Stay tuned!”
That caveat—“stay tuned”—is doing a lot of heavy lifting. Trump made clear that the break is conditional, and any slippage in progress could quickly bring federal involvement back to the table.
Mayor Faces Conditional Support from Washington
Leavitt said the president told Lurie directly, “‘If I feel as though you continue to fail your citizens, the federal government may have to step in.’”
It’s a warning that’s likely to echo in the mayor’s ears as he races against the clock to demonstrate effectiveness without the aid of federal boots on the ground.
Trump, notoriously impatient with bureaucratic red tape, didn’t hide his skepticism: “I told him I think he’s making a mistake, because we can do it much faster, and remove the criminals that the Law does not permit him to remove.”
Prior Federal Deployments Shape Context
While this decision marks a pause in intervention, it’s hardly out of character for the Trump administration, which has already dispatched the National Guard this year to Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, and Memphis—all cities struggling under the weight of rising crime and faltering leadership.
The San Francisco plan had reached a preparatory stage, with Trump previously confirming via social media that the “federal government was preparing to ‘surge’ San Francisco,” before the mayor’s late-game outreach prompted a reassessment.
The mayor’s office referred the press to a scheduled briefing on Thursday, where further details about the city’s strategy are expected to emerge.
