While this past week’s anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement riots in California have undoubtedly wrought disaster on most involved, it’s not all necessarily bad news, at least according to the GOP.
Republicans — spearheaded by Sen. Tom Cotton — think that there is a golden messaging opportunity amid the Los Angeles chaos, and it’s there largely thanks to their Democratic counterparts.
According to an Axios scoop, Cotton is urging his fellow GOP lawmakers in the Senate to “double down” on the riots to accentuate the Democratic Party’s ongoing messaging struggles when it comes to illegal immigration.
“This gives us an opportunity to remind Americans how extreme the Democratic party is on immigration,” Cotton wrote to communication staff on Monday.
The Arkansas lawmaker continued, “Americans have a choice between Republicans’ law & order vs. the Democrats’ car-burning, illegal alien rioters,” before adding, “So far, every Senate Democrat who has spoken out has backed the rioters…”
Indeed, the accepted rhetoric among Democrats and the left is that President Donald Trump’s deployment of the National Guard, followed by the Marines, had only escalated the situation in California.
It’s a line of thinking that prominent Republicans have already publicly attacked, per Cotton’s proposed strategy shift:
People who were already violating the law are only violating the law because President Trump started enforcing the law.
This is the logic of Newsom and his stooges. https://t.co/LRnmxuCtu6
— JD Vance (@JDVance) June 9, 2025
Do you think Democrats are too soft on crime and illegal immigration?
“People who were already violating the law are only violating the law because President Trump started enforcing the law,” Vice President J.D. Vance mockingly posted to X. “This is the logic of [Democratic California Gov. Gavin] Newsom and his stooges.”
Cotton himself has similarly taken to social media to amplify the message being sent by the likes of Vance.
Law enforcement officers were assaulted, cars were set on fire, and highways were blocked.
This was not a “peaceful protest” this was an uncontrolled riot. pic.twitter.com/UFzVmT2K1N
— Tom Cotton (@SenTomCotton) June 9, 2025
“Law enforcement officers were assaulted, cars were set on fire, and highways were blocked,” Cotton posted. “This was not a ‘peaceful protest’ this was an uncontrolled riot.”
Cotton would triple down on his rhetoric in a piece for The Wall Street Journal:
The threat from the radical left is clear: Don’t enforce immigration laws. If you do, left-wing street militias will burn down cities, and Democratic politicians will back the rioters.
The president is absolutely right to reject this threat. https://t.co/n6ISLyLySi
— Tom Cotton (@SenTomCotton) June 10, 2025
“The threat from the radical left is clear: Don’t enforce immigration laws,” Cotton wrote in the piece published Tuesday. “If you do, left-wing street militias will burn down cities, and Democratic politicians will back the rioters.
“The president is absolutely right to reject this threat, enforce immigration laws, and restore civil order.”
Cotton added: “Democrats put such violent illegal aliens and their anarchist sympathizers ahead of the police, law-abiding citizens and legal immigrants whose communities are being terrorized.
“Is anyone surprised?”
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