“Squad” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., downplayed the recent riots in Los Angeles, attributing the chaos to unruly teens – not violent anarchists – and blaming former President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown for the unrest.

Ocasio-Cortez took to the social media platform Bluesky on Tuesday and said Democrats don’t need to “answer for every teen who throws a rock” and that her party was falling into a Republican trap by trying to explain why parts of the sanctuary city had gone up in flames. 

She instead blamed President Trump for the chaotic scenes that have resulted in property burned and rocks and Molotov cocktails thrown at law enforcement as some agitators waved Mexican flags.

CALIFORNIA SHERIFF SAYS NEWSOM ‘ENCOURAGED’ LA RIOTS AS ICE ARRESTS VIOLENT ILLEGAL ALIENS

The ugly scenes that kicked off on Friday prompted Trump to deploy the National Guard and the U.S. Marines. 

“It is 100% carrying water for the opposition to participate in this collective delusion that Dems for some reason need to answer for every teen who throws a rock rather than hold the Trump admin accountable for intentionally creating chaos and breaking the law to stoke violence,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote. “They are in charge.”

Rioters have been seen throwing rocks on police cars and at police while one violent individual was caught on video pelting several moving law enforcement vehicles in Paramount, California, as they drove past him.

U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said Elpidio Reyna has been identified as a suspect who threw rocks at federal officers, which was caught on film. (US Attorney Bill Essayli X)

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He was identified as Elpidio Reyna, and an image of Reyna released by U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli clearly shows he is an adult. He is still at large and the FBI initially offered a $50,000 cash reward for information leading to his arrest. 

In a second post, Ocasio-Cortez blamed Trump for the unrest, writing that his decision to send Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) out to apprehend illegal migrants triggered the response in Los Angeles. Trump swept to victory in November promising to carry out the largest deportation effort in U.S. history and arrested more than 66,000 people and deported approximately 65,000 in the first 100 days of his second presidency. 

“Everything was fine until Trump decided to unleash violent raids w/o grounds in elementary schools, shopping areas, & peaceful public spaces. ICE then illegally blocked Members of Congress entry into the facilities they are disappearing people into, escalating the situation,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote, referring to members of Congress recently turning up at a New Jersey ICE detention center unannounced.

WATCH: Border Patrol agents government vehicle pelted with rocks

“Let’s start there,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote on Bluesky, a competitor to X. She did not post her comments to X and instead shared the bluesky posts to her Instagram stories. 

Meanwhile, the Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday announced that ICE arrested a previously deported illegal immigrant from Mexico after he allegedly threw a Molotov cocktail at law enforcement amid rioting in Los Angeles on June 7. He’s been charged with attempted murder. 

Rioters have also set off fireworks at police officers and vehicles, vandalized property with graffiti, looted businesses and smashed windows of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) headquarters.

California Gov. Gavin Newson and L.A. Mayor Karen Bass have also tried to pin the blame on Trump.

A protester waves the Mexican flag in front of a burning Waymo vehicle during an anti-ICE protest in downtown Los Angeles on June 8, 2025. (Getty Images)

The president and his allies, meanwhile, maintain that he acted boldly and that the situation would have escalated further had he not done so.  

“If our troops didn’t go into Los Angeles, it would be burning to the ground right now, just like so much of their housing burned to the ground,” Trump posted to Truth Social on Wednesday morning. “The great people of Los Angeles are very lucky that I made the decision to go in and help!!!”

Lancaster — A California law aimed at reducing the amount of climate-harming greenhouse gases at landfills is exacerbating the problem of illegal dumping in the Antelope Valley, according to local officials and residents.

The law, dubbed California’s Short-Lived Climate Pollutant Reduction Strategy, requires residents and businesses to separate food waste, yard trimmings and other organic waste from their trash to reduce the amount of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, being emitted into the atmosphere.

Signed into law in 2016, the bill mandated a gradual increase in the amount of organic waste that must be diverted away from landfills to sites where the waste could be treated and composted, thus reducing the emission of greenhouse gases. The law required the diversion of 50% of all green and food waste from landfills by 2020; by 2025, that number was to hit 75%.

A separate law closed a legal loophole that had previously encouraged waste haulers to cover landfill debris with green waste.

Although experts say the law appears to be working in most regions of the state, the Los Angeles area has been a problem. They say the city of Los Angeles and many of its surrounding municipalities haven’t invested in the infrastructure needed to process increased organic waste, nor is there the agricultural demand for the finished product that there is farther north.

“Illegal dumping has been a problem in the Antelope Valley for decades,” said Chuck Bostwick, a senior field deputy for Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger, who represents much of the area. “But, since these laws were passed, it’s gotten markedly worse.”

Bostwick said state regulations have made disposal of organic waste “much more expensive and hard to deal with,” and therefore increased the financial incentives for waste haulers to dump illegally, thus circumventing the high processing costs of composting and treating the material.

Antelope Valley residents say there are dozens or more rogue dump sites across the region. Although a few are just straight-up garbage and trash, most of the more than 80 identified by residents appear to be some form of unprocessed mulch.

One such site, located in San Bernardino County near the El Mirage Dry Lake bed, gave off a rancid smell on a cool spring afternoon. The material underfoot was dark brown and appeared to be a mix of wood chips and woody debris, dotted with cast-off rubber and plastic — the shred of a Spalding basketball here, a purple plastic squirrel there. The stumps of dead Joshua trees jutted from the fetid ground cover, while a few others, still alive, appeared anemic and were adorned in wispy strands of plastic debris and dust.

A lawsuit filed this year in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles by Antelope Valley residents claims that waste-hauling companies including Athens Services and California Waste Services are dumping hazardous substances without authorization, which the companies deny. Athens noted that the law encourages the distribution of compostable material to “farmers and other property owners for beneficial use.”

It’s this interpretation of land-application that has caused consternation among the valley’s desert-dwelling residents: There are no laws preventing landowners from applying compost to their fields or property.

According to Bostwick and others, landowners in the Antelope Valley are granting permission for waste haulers to come and dump on their property in return for payment.

That’s completely legitimate, according to Lance Klug, a spokesman for CalRecycle, the state’s waste agency. Property owners can spread waste on their land, he said as long as the material is compostable and not mixed with non-organic material; contains less than 0.5% of plastic, metal or other contaminants; contains only minimal amounts of metals and pathogens; and is not deposited in piles higher than 6 inches.

At sites such as the one near El Mirage, the legality of the material is questionable. A spreadsheet compiled by CalRecycle officials during a visit in November describes the waste as “illegal.” But at other sites, the waste appears to be in line with state regulations.

But even if it is legal, its presence threatens to cause lasting damage to the desert ecosystem, said Wesley Skelton, assistant land manager at the Portal Ridge Wildlife Preserve, a protected area near the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve.

Yard trimmings often contain seeds of invasive plant species and toxic herbicides, he said, and mulching is also problematic, disrupting fragile ecosystems, contributing to poor air quality and potentially the spread of the dust-loving fungus that causes Valley fever.

“We’re concerned that these landowners aren’t having to do any environmental impact report when they do dump on their land,” Skelton said. “The effects of these dumpings are long-lasting habitat destruction, and introduction of invasive plants that’s going to affect the air quality of Lancaster and Palmdale for years to come.”

Trash is dumped at this Lancaster location north of E. Avenue J. on April 18.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

“We put in a lot of effort to combat these plants— the Russian thistle and the mustard and all the different grasses and everything,” Skelton said, naming two invasive species that are crowding out the native flora. “It’s a huge problem.”

Nick Lapis, director of Californians Against Waste, doesn’t think the composting laws are the problem in the Antelope Valley. He said dumping has been happening there for more than decade — long before the composting laws were in place.

A sneaker among the trash dumped at Adobe Mountain near Lancaster on April 18.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

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Irrespective of the cause, it is a big problem, he said, and state and local enforcement agencies need to stop it — both by requiring jurisdictions to track waste, at every step of its journey, and implementing a clear strategy for enforcement.

“It is outrageous that while some companies are investing millions in legitimate composting operations — real facilities with real customers and real climate benefits — others are just dumping raw green waste in the desert and calling it farming,” he said. “It’s a slap in the face to everyone doing the right thing.”