Protests live updates: Marines make 1st temporary detention in LA

President Donald Trump is defending his decision to send the National Guard into Los Angeles and said California Gov. Gavin Newsom should be "happy."

"He should only be happy I sent in the military, because if I didn't send them and you would’ve had a problem, they're the likes of which we haven't seen in a long time," Trump said at a roundtable Monday.

Trump implied that the situation in LA is improving.

"It's lucky for the people in Los Angeles and in California that we did what we did. We got it just in time," Trump said. "It's still simmering a little bit, but not very much."

In 2020, Trump said at an ABC News town hall that "we can't call in the National Guard" to cities "unless we're requested by a governor."

Trump’s comments came after he sought to respond to racial justice demonstrations in cities in the summer of 2020.

"I can call insurrection but there's no reason to ever do that," Trump said at the time.

On Monday, when asked by ABC News what’s changed since 2020, Trump said that the National Guard shouldn't be sent in without approval from local officials but the difference is that California has an "incompetent governor."

"He's destroying one of our great states. And if I didn't get involved, if we didn't bring the guard -- and we would bring more in if we needed it -- because we have to make sure there's going to be law and order," Trump said.

-ABC News’ Michelle Stoddart, Ben Siegel and Karen Travers

Seven-hundred Marines in California have been ordered to assist in Los Angeles and they’re expected to arrive over the next 24 hours, a U.S. official confirmed.

The Marines are from the 2nd Battalion, 7th Marines at Twentynine Palms, California, whom U.S. Northern Command had said Sunday were on a "prepared to deploy status" if the Defense Department needed them.

Minutes before the Marines' deployment was confirmed, President Donald Trump was asked by ABC News if he planned on sending Marines to LA, and he said, "We’ll see what happens."

"I mean, I think we have it very well under control," Trump said. "I think it would have been a very bad situation. It was heading in the wrong direction. It's now heading in the right direction."

-ABC News' Luis Martinez and Karen Travers

President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social that if protesters spit in the faces of National Guardsmen in Los Angeles, they'll "be hit harder than they have ever been hit before."

"IF THEY SPIT, WE WILL HIT," Trump wrote. "Such disrespect will not be tolerated!"

"The Insurrectionists have a tendency to spit in the face of the National Guardsmen/women, and others. These Patriots are told to accept this, it’s just the way life runs. But not in the Trump Administration," Trump said.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom said in response to Trump's post, "You sent your troops here without fuel, food, water or a place to sleep."

The guardsmen are "forced to sleep on the floor, piled on top of one another," Newsom wrote on social media. "If anyone is treating our troops disrespectfully, it is you @realDonaldTrump."

-ABC News’ Michelle Stoddart

Border czar Tom Homan deferred to President Donald Trump when asked by ABC News if active duty Marines should be dispatched to LA, but he said he thinks more resources are needed.

"What we saw last night, I would ask for more resources, absolutely," Homan told ABC News Monday, warning that the "sky-high" rhetoric could cause protests to turn deadly.

Earlier on Monday, Homan refuted claims that he was going to arrest LA Mayor Karen Bass and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, telling Fox News that an interview from this weekend was taken out of context.

"The reporter asked about, 'Could Governor, Governor Newsom, or Mayor Bass, be arrested?' I said, 'Well, no one's above the law, if they cross the line and commit a crime. Absolutely they can,'" Homan explained. "So there was no discussion about arresting Newsom."

Homan said he was speaking broadly that if anyone "crosses the line," they will be prosecuted.

But hours later on Monday, Trump said it would be a "great thing" if Homan arrested Newsom.

"The president is backing me up," Homan explained to ABC News. "He knows better than anybody … no one is above the law."

If Newsom "broke the laws like any other U.S. citizen, we’ll ask the attorney general to investigate," Homan said.

Newsom is slamming the Trump administration sending the National Guard into LA as "authoritarian tendencies," but Homan said he disagrees.

Homan said the guard is in LA because Newsom "failed," and he said Trump "made a great move" sending the guard in to "protect property, officers and the general public."