President Trump's deployment of the National Guard in Los Angeles has sparked a political showdown between Democrats and his administration.

On that and more, we turn now to our Politics Monday duo.

That's Amy Walter of the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter and Tamara Keith of NPR.

It's great to see you both.

Good to be back.

So let's start with what's happening in Los Angeles with the deployment of the National Guard,

the federalizing of those troops, and then add to that the roughly 700 U.S. Marines who've been deployed.

They're now on standby.

Tam, this is clearly a fight that Donald Trump wants.

What is his strategy in escalating their response?

President Trump, if you go back to his first term in office, he wanted to use the military, use force against protesters.

He sees the violent imagery. He sees it on television, and his reaction is to want to send in the military.

You know, back in 2020, he said, quote,

if the looting starts, the shooting starts,

there were, that was in Minnesota that he was referring to,

but there were also protests that turned violent in California back then.

Now he's saying, if they spit, we will hit.

He seems to have a rhyme for every occasion.

And he's into this.

He wants this fight.

He wants this fight with the state of California.

Even before this happened over the weekend, late last week, he was talking about wanting

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