Trump Backs Off

Donald Trump and Jensen Huang in April (Chron)

President Trump threatened to send National Guard troops into San Francisco, but today he called off the move.

Under pressure from two of Silicon Valley’s most prominent executives, President Donald Trump on Thursday abruptly abandoned plans to deploy federal agents to “clean up” San Francisco — an idea the administration had floated since Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff suggested ahead of the Dreamforce conference earlier this month that the National Guard might be needed to address the city’s safety problems.

Now, after weeks of criticism from residents, colleagues and civic leaders, Benioff — alongside Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang — may have helped spare San Francisco from a federal invasion.

“Great people like Jensen Huang, Marc Benioff, and others have called saying that the future of San Francisco is great,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “They want to give it a ‘shot.’ Therefore, we will not surge San Francisco on Saturday. Stay tuned!”

Mayor Daniel Lurie, in a statement Thursday, confirmed the president “told me clearly that he was calling off any plans for a federal deployment in San Francisco.”

“Friends of mine who live in the area called last night to ask me not to go forward with the surge in that the Mayor, Daniel Lurie, was making substantial progress,” Trump wrote.

The mayor said he touted the city’s momentum during the call.

“San Francisco is on the rise,” he said. “Visitors are coming back, buildings are getting leased and purchased, and workers are coming back to the office” — and warned that “having the military and militarized immigration enforcement in our city will hinder our recovery.”

It always helps to have the CEO's of some of the nation's most prominent companies ask President Trump to do or not do something. They can be very persuasive. Pity poor Portland, which lacks anyone with such clout.