As part of their Pride Night celebration, a Dodgers official received a commemorative scroll from Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath before the team opened its three-game series against the San Francisco Giants.
“It is truly my pleasure to be celebrating Pride with the Dodgers,” Horvath said. “Especially a time like this to have the Dodgers look at our community and see all of us, and celebrate everyone, especially our LGBTQ community, it is just so incredibly special.”
In almost any other time, Horvath’s presentation would have inspired, well, pride — specifically, pride in how the Dodgers started celebrating Pride Nights when they weren’t commonplace in sports.
On Friday night, however, with many parts of Los Angeles terrorized by large-scale immigration sweeps, the county supervisor’s words evoked an entirely different range of emotions.
Demonstrations against the federal raids have been staged in downtown for more than a week, but the Dodgers have remained silent. Angel City FC and LAFC released statements sympathizing with the residents experiencing “fear and uncertainty,” but the Dodgers have remained silent.
If the Dodgers really see everyone, as Horvath suggested, they’re ignoring what’s happening right in front of them.
Literally.
The Dodgers boast that more than 40% of their fan base is Latino, but they can’t even be bothered to offer the shaken community any words of comfort.
A protestor wearing a Dodgers cap is detained and carried by law enforcement after helping close the 101 Freeway on June. 8.
(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)
How ungrateful. How disrespectful. How cowardly.
Don’t expect this to change.
“We’re not going to comment,” Dodgers executive vice president and chief marketing officer Lon Rosen said.
“We’re not going to comment on anything,” Rosen said.
When the Dodgers announced they accepted Trump’s White House invitation, team president Stan Kasten claimed the decision had “nothing to do with politics.” Kasten sounded as if he was counting on the fans to give the team a pass for visiting an aspiring tyrant, either because their love of the Dodgers overwhelmed their disgust for Trump or because they lacked the intellectual faculties to connect Trump’s racist rhetoric to real-life consequences.
But what were once abstract concepts proposed by Trump and other right-wing extremists are now realities, and these realities have struck Los Angeles particularly hard.
The detention of working immigrants outside of Home Depots. The breaking up of families. The racial profiling that has resulted in law enforcement harassing American citizens. The propaganda campaign to portray the largely-peaceful demonstrations as an insurrection. The invasion of federal troops. The general feeling of unease that has swept over the city.
The team had said nothing about any of this. Manager Dave Roberts, the franchise’s designated public-relations meat shield, was the only person to acknowledge the situation.
“I just hope that we can be a positive distraction for what people are going through in Los Angeles right now,” Roberts said on Monday in San Diego.
The Dodgers are once again asking a significant portion of their fans to look the other way, but how can they look the other way when these developments affect many of them directly?
Dodgers fans honor Fernando Valenzuela at a memorial outside Dodger Stadium on Oct. 24, 2024.
(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)
All because the Dodgers are afraid of offending the 32% of Los Angeles County voters who cast their ballots for Trump in the most recent presidential election, many of whom don’t expect ICE agents to ever show up at their workplace.
The Dodgers have abdicated their social responsibilities, and in doing so, they have once again let down many of their most loyal fans — the fans who made the Dodgers a part of their family because of Fernando Valenzuela, the fans who passed down the love of the team to their children and grandchildren, the fans who wear their merchandise around town.
That won’t stop the likes of Kasten and Rosen from reaching into their pockets, of course. A couple of hours before their team’s 6-2 loss to the Giants on Friday night, a commercial featuring an upcoming promotion was shown on the Dodger Stadium video scoreboard.
With Los Angeles reeling from immigration sweeps and unsettled by nightly clashes between protesters and police, Mayor Karen Bass was asked by a reporter: What she did she have to say to President Trump?
Bass, standing before a bank of news cameras, did not hold back.
“I want to tell him to stop the raids,” she said. “I want to tell him that this is a city of immigrants. I want to tell him that if you want to devastate the economy of the city of Los Angeles, then attack the immigrant population.”
After taking office in 2022, L.A.’s 43rd mayor carefully avoided public disputes with other elected officials, instead highlighting her well-known penchant for collaboration and coalition-building.
The high-profile Democrat, who spent a dozen years in Congress, largely steered clear of direct confrontation with Trump, responding diplomatically even as he attacked her over her handling of the Palisades fire earlier this year.
Those days of tiptoeing around Trump, and avoiding head-to-head conflict, are over.
Bass is now sparring with the president and his administration at a perilous moment for her city and possibly for democracy.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers point non-lethal weapons at protesters.
(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
At the same time, the tumultuous events of the past week have given her a crucial opportunity for a reset after the Palisades fire, recalibrating her public image while leading her city through another historic crisis.
“Having two moments of crisis during the first six months of this year has really tested her mettle as mayor,” said GOP political strategist Mike Madrid, a long-standing Trump critic. “I think it’s fair to say she did not perform to expectations during the fires. I think she’s considerably improved during the current situation.”
Since agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal authorities fanned out across the region, searching for undocumented immigrants at courthouses, car washes and Home Depot parking lots, Bass has accused Trump of creating a “terrible sense of fear” in her city.
Bass said Trump is on track to waste more than $100 million on troops who were neither requested nor needed. On multiple occasions, she said Trump wrongly gave credit to the National Guard for bringing calm to downtown L.A. on Saturday, when those troops had not even arrived yet.
In many ways, Trump has emerged as the ideal foil for a mayor who, for much of the past six months, had been on her back feet.
In the immediate aftermath of the Palisades fire, which erupted when she was out of the country, Bass struggled to show a command of the details and was savaged by critics over what they viewed as her lack of leadership. Months later, she released a budget that called for the layoffs of 1,600 workers, drawing an outcry from labor leaders, youth advocates and many others.
Bass has been quicker to respond this time around, announcing a nightly curfew for downtown, warning of consequences for those who vandalize or commit violence and spelling out the real-world impacts of the ICE arrests on her constituents.
The pushback reached a crescendo on Thursday, when — with just a few hours notice — Bass assembled more than 100 people from religious, community, business and civic groups to denounce the raids. It made for a potent tableau: a multi-ethnic, multiracial crowd of Angelenos cheering on the mayor as she declared that “peace begins with ICE leaving Los Angeles.”
An ICE agent during a news conference in Los Angeles.
(Luke Johnson / Los Angeles Times)
Bass said she had received reports of ICE agents entering hospitals, workers not showing up to their jobs, parents afraid to attend their own children’s graduations. An immigrant rights advocate said Trump had brought cruelty and chaos to Los Angeles. A church pastor from Boyle Heights said his parishioners “feel hunted.”
Trump and his administration have disparaged Bass and her city since the raids began. Stephen Miller, the president’s deputy chief of staff, accused Bass on X of using “the language of the insurrectionist mob” while discussing her city. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem called L.A. “a city of criminals” whose law breakers have been protected by Bass.
Republicans have begun threatening reprisals against outspoken Democrats, including Bass, with some hinting at criminal prosecution.
Asked about Bass’ comments over the past week, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said ICE agents would not be “deterred from carrying out their mission.”
“We will not apologize for enforcing immigration law and carrying out the mandate the American people gave President Trump in November: Deport illegal aliens,” she said.
Fernando Guerra, who heads the Center for the Study of Los Angeles at Loyola Marymount University, said Angelenos fully expect their mayor to confront the president head on. Democrat Kamala Harris secured more than 70% of the vote in L.A. during last year’s presidential election, while Trump received less than 27%.
“I’m not surprised by what she’s doing,” Guerra said. “I would even suggest she push a little more. I don’t think there’s a cost to her politically, or even socially, to taking on Trump.”
Mayor Karen Bass speaks to the media at City Hall.
(Luke Johnson / Los Angeles Times)
The mayor is regularly calling in to TV and radio stations, as well as securing prime-time hits on national cable shows. In appearance after appearance, she has warned that L.A. is becoming “a grand experiment” — a testing ground for Trump to see if he can usurp the authority of Democratic mayors or governors in other states.
On Tuesday, while addressing troops at Fort Bragg, Trump described L.A. as “a trash heap,” with entire neighborhoods being controlled by “transnational gangs and criminal networks.” Hours later, Bass clapped back on MSNBC, saying: “I have no idea what he’s talking about.”
Bass has spoken repeatedly about traumatized Angelenos who could not locate loved ones caught up in the ICE raids.
“For the most part, the people that have been detained have been denied access to legal representation,” Bass said during an appearance at the city’s Emergency Operations Center. “This is unprecedented.”
The raids, and their impact on families and children, are deeply personal for a mayor who cut her teeth organizing with immigrant rights activists decades ago.
Bass’ own family reflects the multiethnic nature of her city. Her late ex-husband was the son of immigrants from Chihuahua, Mexico. Her extended family includes immigrants from Korea, Japan and the Philippines. Immigration agents were recently seen making arrests outside her grandson’s Los Angeles school, she said.
The arrival of ICE, then the National Guard, then the U.S. Marines has caused not just Bass but several other Democrats to step out in ways they might have previously avoided.
Sen. Alex Padilla is removed from a news conference with Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem at the Wilshire Federal Building.
(Luke Johnson / Los Angeles Times)
U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla, a soft-spoken political figure for decades, was handcuffed and forcibly removed from a news conference in Westwood on Thursday after interrupting Noem’s remarks.
Gov. Gavin Newsom recently accused Trump of a “brazen abuse of power,” calling him “unhinged” and filing a lawsuit to block the deployment of the National Guard — not a huge departure for Newsom, who relishes both confrontation and the spotlight.
Head-to-head accusations are much more out of character for Bass, who spent her first two years at City Hall boasting of her success in “locking arms” with her fellow elected officials on homelessness and other issues. In recent months, the mayor has praised Trump for the speedy arrival of federal resources as the city began cleaning up and rebuilding from the Palisades fire.
Long before winning city office, Bass prided herself on her ability to work with other politicians, regardless of party affiliation, from her early days as a co-founder of the South L.A.-based Community Coalition to her years in Congress.
Bass’ strategy of avoiding public spats with Trump during the first few months of his administration was no accident, according to someone with knowledge of her thinking who was not authorized to speak publicly. The mayor, that person said, viewed an extended tit-for-tat as an impediment to securing federal funding for wildfire relief and other urgent needs.
“That’s more her brand — to get things done with whoever she needs to get them done with,” said Ange-Marie Hancock, who leads Ohio State University’s Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity.
Mike Bonin, who heads the Pat Brown Institute for Public Affairs at Cal State L.A., said he thinks that Bass’ career of building multiracial, multiethnic coalitions makes her uniquely suited to the moment.
Now that Trump has “all but declared war on Los Angeles,” Bass has no choice but to punch back, said Bonin, who served on the City Council for nearly a decade.
“I don’t see that she had any political or moral alternative,” he said.
WASHINGTON — When Donald Trump promised on the campaign trail to unleash the largest deportation campaign in U.S history, he said his second administration would start by going after people with criminal records.
But now, disappointed with the pace of arrests, the Trump administration is following through on his campaign promise: targeting anyone deportable.
Raids in California have taken place at courthouses, during scheduled check-ins with immigration authorities, at clothing factories, Home Depots, car washes, farms and outside churches. But officials say the state is hardly being singled out. Raids are coming for other sanctuary jurisdictions, too, said Tom Homan, President Trump’s chief advisor on border policy.
“This operation is not going to end,” he told The Times.
Across the country, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is stepping up new strategies and tearing down precedent to meet the White House’s demands. Homan acknowledged the pace of deportations had not met expectations and that while the administration still prioritizes removing those who threaten public safety and national security, anyone in the country illegally is fair game.
“I’m not happy with the numbers,” he said. “We need to find these people.”
Arrests are being made in places previously considered off limits, and the administration earlier this year rescinded a policy that prohibited enforcement actions in hospitals, schools or houses of worship. Agents who typically focus on drug and human trafficking are seeing their duties shifted to immigration enforcement.
The government is also now appealing to the public to help find and deport people in the country without authorization. The Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency, released a poster on social media this week that depicts Uncle Sam urging people to call a hotline to “report all foreign invaders.”
And in Los Angeles, the National Guard and U.S. Marines were mobilized without the consent of state and local leaders — a tactic that Trump administration officials said could be repeated elsewhere. Trump claimed the deployments have been effective — “Los Angeles would be a crime scene like we haven’t seen in years,” Trump said Thursday — but local leaders have said the protests against ICE raids had not gotten out of control and that Trump’s actions only inflamed tensions.
As protests reached their seventh day in Los Angeles, incidents of violence lessened, though some tensions remained. Even so, White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller wrote Wednesday on X that “America voted for mass deportations. Violent insurrectionists, and the politicians who enable them, are trying to overthrow the results of the election.”
California Democrats say the enforcement actions are about retribution against the state for its policies that protect immigrant residents, as well as an attempt to distract the public from congressional Republicans’ attempts to pass the president’s tax-and-spending bill, which would add more than $150 billion for immigration and border enforcement. They say the president is testing the bounds of his authority and wants protests to spiral so that he can crack down further by invoking the Insurrection Act to establish martial law.
Invoking the Insurrection Act would allow military troops to arrest civilians. Further unrest, Trump critics say, would be welcomed by the president.
“This is about if it bleeds, it leads,” said Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-Los Angeles). “So he has created and manufactured violence so that he can have a show on the television. But other people — older people, folks who are disabled, young people — are going to be bleeding when Medicaid gets cut, when people are evicted from their homes.”
While public attention has focused on the arrests of employees, the administration says it’s also looking at employers who hire workers in the country illegally.
“It’s not just about arresting illegal aliens, it’s about holding employers responsible too — but there’s a burden of proof,” Homan said. “If we can prove it, then we’ll take action.”
One former Homeland Security official in the Biden administration said immigration laws could be enforced without escalating public tension. “Why aren’t they doing I-9 audits instead of just going after people?” said the former official, Deborah Fleischaker, of forms used to verify an employee’s identity and eligibility to work in the U.S. “There are ways to do this in ways that are less disruptive and calmer. They are choosing the more aggressive way.”
In many ways, the current immigration crackdown reflects exactly what Trump said during the presidential campaign, when he declared that millions of people would be deported.
The new expansive approach appears to be a response to a late May meeting, first reported by the Washington Examiner, in which Miller lambasted dozens of senior ICE officials, asking them “Why aren’t you at Home Depot? Why aren’t you at 7-Eleven?”
“Well, now they’re all of a sudden at Home Depots,” Fleischaker said.
Homan said the agency has recently arrested around 2,000 people a day, up from a daily average of 657 arrests reported by the agency during Trump’s first 100 days back in office. The increase is reflected in rising detention numbers, which have topped 50,000 for the first time since trump’s first presidency, according to TRAC, a nonpartisan data research organization.
Asked about complaints of overcrowding and substandard conditions in detention facilities, Homan acknowledged some facilities are overcrowded during intake. Some of the immigrants detained in California since Friday have been transferred to other states, he said.
“California has been pretty stringent and they want to shut down immigration detention,” he said. “It doesn’t mean we’re releasing these people. The less detention space we have in California, the more action they take in not helping us with detention beds, then we’ll just simply move them out of state.”
The work of immigration agents — sometimes hours of surveillance for a single target — can be slow. Jason Houser, who was ICE’s chief of staff under the Biden administration, said law enforcement agents, when given quotas, will always find the easiest way to fulfill them.
Miller, he said, knows ICE “doesn’t have enough resources or staff to get them to a million removals” by the end of the year.
Houser said that’s where the military troops come in. Homeland Security officials said military personnel already have the authority to temporarily detain anyone who attacks an immigration agent until law enforcement can arrest them. Houser predicted that soldiers could soon begin handling arrests.
Critics of the administration’s tactics, including former Homeland Security officials, said the White House’s strategy boils down to frightening immigrants into leaving on their own. It costs a few hundred dollars a day to detain an immigrant; deportation can cost thousands, and some countries are reticent to accept the return of their citizens.
“They arrest one, they scare 10,” said one former senior ICE official. “That’s a win.”
The former official, who asked not to be named in order to speak freely, said that’s an about-face from the Biden administration, during which agents answered to lawyers and precedent.
“Everything was vetted and vetted … to the detriment in some ways of the agency,” the former official said. “But to see them just doing whatever they want when they want, it’s a little stunning and it’s like, look at all the things we could’ve done if we had that attitude. But they seem to have so little regard for consequences, lawsuits, media, public opinion — they have no constraints.”
Homan said protests in Los Angeles have made enforcement actions more dangerous but have not prevented agents from making as many arrests as planned.
“If the protesters think they’re going to stop us from doing our job, it’s not true,” he said. “We’re going to probably increase operations in sanctuary cities, because we have to.”
OXNARD, Calif. — At 6 a.m. Wednesday, Juvenal Solano drove slowly along the cracked roads that border the fields of strawberry and celery that cloak this fertile expanse of Ventura County, his eyes peeled for signs of trouble.
An eerie silence hung over the morning. The workers who would typically be shuffling up and down the strawberry rows were largely absent. The entry gates to many area farms were shut and locked.
Still, Solano, a director with the Mixteco Indigena Community Organizing Project, felt relieved. Silence was better than the chaos that had broken out Tuesday when immigration agents raided fields in Oxnard and fanned out across communities in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties that grow a considerable portion of the state’s strawberries, avocados and celery.
The organization, part of a broader rapid-response network that offers support and counsel for workers targeted by immigration raids, was caught off guard when calls started pouring in from residents reporting federal agents gathering near fields. Group leaders say they have confirmed at least 35 people were detained in the raids, and are still trying to pin down exact numbers.
In the past week, Solano said, the organization had gotten scattered reports of immigration authorities arresting undocumented residents. But Tuesday, he said, marked a new level in approach and scope as federal agents tried to access fields and packinghouses. Solano, like other organizers, are wondering what their next move will be.
“If they didn’t show up in the morning, it’s possible they’ll show up in the afternoon,” Solano said. “We’re going to stay alert to everything that’s happening.”
While agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol showed up at food production sites from the Central Coast to the San Joaquin Valley, much of the activity centered on the Oxnard Plain. Maureen McGuire, chief executive of the Ventura County Farm Bureau, said federal agents visited five packing facilities and at least five farms in the region. Agents also stopped people on their way to work, she said.
In many cases, according to McGuire and community leaders, farm owners refused to grant access to the agents, who had no judicial warrants.
California, which grows more than one-third of the nation’s vegetables and more than three-quarters of its fruits and nuts, has long been dependent on undocumented labor to tend its crops. Though a growing number of farm laborers are migrants imported on a seasonal basis through the controversial H-2A visa program, at least half the state’s 255,700 farmworkers are undocumented immigrants, according to UC Merced research. Many have lived in California for years, and have put down roots and started families.
Juvenal Solano, with Mixteco Indigena Community Organizing Project, said Tuesday’s raids in Ventura County farm fields marked a dramatic escalation in tactics.
(Michael Owen Baker / For The Times)
Until this week, California’s agricultural sector had largely escaped the large-scale raids that the Department of Homeland Security has deployed in urban areas, most recently in Los Angeles and Orange counties. California farmers — many of them ardent supporters of Donald Trump — have seemed remarkably calm as the president vowed mass deportations of undocumented workers.
Many expected that Trump would find ways to protect their workforce, noting that without sufficient workers, food would rot in the fields, sending grocery prices skyrocketing.
But this week brought a different message. Asked about enforcement actions in food production regions, Tom Homan, Trump’s chief adviser on border policy, said growers should hire a legal workforce.
“There are programs — you can get people to come in and do that job,” he said. “So work with ICE, work with [U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services], and hire a legal workforce. It’s illegal to knowingly hire an illegal alien.”
Ventura County strawberry fields had far fewer workers Wednesday, a day after federal agents targeted the region for immigration raids.
(Michael Owen Baker / For The Times)
California’s two U.S. senators, both Democrats, issued a joint statement Wednesday decrying the farm raids, saying that targeting farmworkers for deportation would undermine businesses and families.
“Targeting hardworking farmworkers and their families who have been doing the backbreaking work in the fields for decades is unjustified and unconscionable,” Sens. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff said in their statement.
The California Farm Bureau also issued a statement, warning that continued enforcement would disrupt production.
“We want to be very clear: California agriculture depends on and values its workforce,” said Bryan Little, senior director of policy advocacy at the California Farm Bureau. “We’re still early in the season, with limited harvest activity, but that will soon ramp up. If federal immigration enforcement activities continue in this direction, it will become increasingly difficult to produce food, process it and get it onto grocery store shelves.”
Arcenio Lopez, executive director of MICOP, said he is especially concerned about the prospect of Indigenous workers being detained, because many cannot read or write in English or Spanish, and speak only their Indigenous languages. The organization’s leaders suspect that many of those detained Tuesday are Indigenous, and are rushing to find them before they sign documents for voluntary deportation that they don’t understand. They’re urging that anyone who gets arrested call their hotline, where they offer legal assistance.
Rob Roy, president of the Ventura County Agricultural Association, said he has been warning growers since November that this time would come and providing training on their legal rights. Many know to ask for search warrants, he said. But that still leaves undocumented workers vulnerable on their way to and from work.
“I think overall here, they’re fairly safe on the farms or the building,” Roy said. “But when they leave work, they’re very concerned.”
Elaine Yompian, an organizer with VC Defensa, said she is urging families to stay home, if possible, to avoid exposure.
“We actually told a lot of the families who contacted us, if you can potentially not work today, don’t go,” Yompian said, adding that they are able to provide limited support to families through donations they receive.
Families whose loved ones have been detained are struggling to understand what comes next, she said.
“People are terrified; they don’t know at what point they’re going to be targeted,” Yompian said. “The narrative that they’re taking criminals or taking bad people off the streets is completely false. They’re taking the working-class people that are just trying to get by.”
This article is part of The Times’ equity reporting initiative,funded by the James Irvine Foundation, exploring the challenges facing low-income workers and the efforts being made to addressCalifornia’s economic divide.
As looming fear over ongoing ICE raids in the greater Los Angeles area continues, one group of music enthusiasts is using their platform to call out for more visibility and support from famed artists — underscoring tense conversations about influence in the Latino music scene.
Since 2021, the “Agushto Papá” podcast — founded and hosted by Jason Nuñez, Diego Mondragon and Angel Lopez— has played a key role in chronicling the rise of música Mexicana by giving up-and-coming artists a platform to showcase their talent and personalities. Popular genre acts like Xavi, Eslabon Armado, Becky G, DannyLux, Ivan Cornejo and more have appeared on their YouTube channel, which has amassed over 635,000 subscribers to date.
However, on Monday, the trio strayed away from their standard entertainment content, uploading an Instagram reel reflecting disappointment over ICE sweeps, which have targeted communities of Paramount, Huntington Park, Santa Ana and other predominantly Latino communities.
“It’s super unfortunate to see what’s happening within our Latino community,” Nuñez states in the clip. “I think it’s very important that we stay united and spread as much awareness as possible.”
The video initially highlighted efforts by Del Records, who are providing free legal assistance to members of the community who are facing deportation orders; earlier this year, the Bell Gardens label was caught in a web of guilty court verdicts due to their links to cartels. Still, the label is one of the few Latino-led music entities outspoken about providing resources for affected individuals, “but I definitely think they shouldn’t be the only ones,” added Nuñez in the video.
Podcast co-host Lopez prompted viewers to tag their favorite artist in the comment section if they would like for them to speak up, he said, “I think it’s fair and just that [artists] show some of that love back to the community that’s in need and that is hurting.”
“I think that [artists] do play a big role because I think we see them as role models or leaders in our community,” said Lopez in a Tuesday interview with The Times. “These are times when we need those leaders to speak up and for us and people that maybe can’t speak up as well.”
The topic of immigration hits close to home for two of the members; Nuñez and Mondragon are both DACA recipients and openly discuss their unique experience on the podcast. The Obama-era program, which provides temporary relief from deportation and work authorization, has also come under attack in recent years by Trump-appointed judges and is currently recognized as unlawful by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, although application renewals remain.
“I feel betrayed because with [“Agushto Papá”], we have a lot of artists and companies and labels reach out to us to promote albums, tours,” said Mondragon. “We’ve actually reached out to some of these companies [and] they’ve been ignoring us.”
While Mondragon won’t disclose names, he says that many individuals have not spoken out because, “their artists are not born in the U.S.” To that he quips, “We don’t have papers as well, and we’re still using our platform.”
There’s a sense of betrayal, the group says, especially given how various artists and labels came out to support Californians during the January wildfires, “but now when it comes down to bringing awareness to things that are happening to their people, it’s just unfair that they’re keeping quiet,” says Nuñez.
Still, the “Agushto Papá” podcast is not alone in this sentiment; if you scroll across the comment sections of trending música Mexicana acts, you’ll likely come across comments asking them why they’re staying silent about recent sweeps, which immigration-leaders say have totaled at least 300 people.
“I think my big let down is that these companies/artists are vocal about their culture, their heritage, their ethnicity every chance they get, but now I feel like they’re picking and choosing only when it matters,” said Lopez.
In days following public demonstrations and protests, several Mexican American artists have vocalized their support of the immigrant communities including big acts like Ivan Cornejo, Becky G, and Chiquis.
On Tuesday, the boisterous San Bernardino band Fuerza Regida, uploaded a statement to their 9.1 million followers, sharing support for the Latino community. The podcast trio later thanked in a follow-up video.
“There’s still a lot of artists that are staying silent and we hope by this week they speak out about what’s going on,” states Mondragon in the video, urging artists to spread awareness, or perhaps, if they’re bold, front a portion of their millions to the community, even if it means opting for first class instead of their private jet, he says.
A number of Latinx musicians have expressed their solidarity and support for immigrant communities via social media in the wake of immigration raids that have resulted in the arrest of 330 people in Southern California and the Central Coast.
In a lengthy Instagram video posted Saturday, TV personality and two-time Grammy-nominated singer Chiquis held back tears as she addressed the raids and reminded her fans to “treat people like you want to be treated.”
“United we stand, divided we fall apart, you guys,” she said. “If all humans would to get together and be kinder and hold each other’s hands and push people a little bit more in a positive way, uplift people, we would be so powerful.”
Música Mexicana artist Ivan Cornejo shared in an Instagram post Tuesday that his father had been granted amnesty by the Reagan administration during the ‘80s. He punctuated his post by sharing the information for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights and added that he’ll continue to raise funds for CHIRLA throughout his tour.
“Words cannot express the sorrow that I feel for my community,” the “Estas Dañada” singer, a native of Riverside, said. “I see my mom, my dad and myself in many of you. I am speechless at the inhumanity that is affecting our Mexican and Hispanic communities.”
“The people being attacked today are not ‘illegal aliens,’ they are human beings with RIGHTS,” pop star Becky G said Tuesday in an Instagram post that paid tribute to her immigrant grandparents. “We must understand that an attack on them is an attack on OUR DEMOCRACY and an attack on what this country was made to stand for.”
The “Otro Capitulo” singer also shared information about what to do if confronted by immigration agents, and listed several advocacy organizations to support.
In the same post, Los Aptos provided information on what to do if ICE knocks on your door and an infographic with the rights a person has if they are arrested.
Fuerza Regida, one of the most streamed Latin music acts, offered their “love and strength” to the Latinx community in an Instagram post Tuesday.
“We’ve been deeply moved by the events of this past week,” the band wrote in the statement. “These are our people, our fans, the very communities that inspire our music.”
Fher Olvera, the lead singer of legendary rock en español band Maná, posted a video on the group’s official Instagram on Wednesday expressing his support for the immigrant community in L.A., and asked protesters to remain peaceful.
“That’s how you are going to win,” Olvera said in Spanish.
Eight-time platinum artist Junior H also chimed in Wednesday, sharing a photo captioned with “No one is illegal in stolen land.” The “Rockstar” singer also shared a post from his fashion brand, Sad Boyz Clothing, announcing that a portion of its sales would be donated to “help cover the legal fees for families impacted by ICE Raids.”
“It’s a small gesture, but one we believe matters— because when one of us hurts, we all do,” read the company’s statement.
“We stand with you. As immigrants, we understand the pain, uncertainty and fear that many are experiencing,” the group said. “It hurts to see our people go through this and that’s why we want to speak out. We support you and we will never stop fighting for our community.”
Alarm spread through California agricultural centers Tuesday as panicked workers reported that federal immigration authorities — who had largely refrained from major enforcement action in farming communities in the first months of the Trump administration — were showing up at farm fields and packing houses from the Central Coast to the San Joaquin Valley.
“Today we are seeing an uptick in the chaotic presence of immigration enforcement, particularly the Border Patrol,” said Elizabeth Strater, vice president of the United Farm Workers. “We’re seeing it in multiple areas.”
Department of Homeland Security officials declined to confirm specific locations, but said enforcement actions were taking place across the southern area of state. Advocates from numerous immigrant advocacy groups said their phones were lighting up with calls, videos and texts from multiple counties.
The Times reviewed a video that showed a worker running through a field under the cover of early morning fog, with at least one agent in pursuit on foot and a Border Patrol truck racing along an adjacent dirt road. Eventually, the worker was caught.
In Tulare County, near the community of Richgrove, immigration agents emerged near a field where farm laborers were picking blueberries, causing some workers to flee.
In Oxnard in Ventura County, organizers responded to multiple calls of federal immigration authorities staging near fields and entering a packing house at Boskovich Farms. Hazel Davalos of the group Cause, said there were reports of ICE agents trying to access nine farms in Oxnard, but that in many cases, they were denied entry.
In Fresno County, workers reported federal agents, some in Border Patrol trucks, in the fields near Kingsburg.
Strater said she did not yet have information about the number of people detained in the raids, but said the fear among workers was pervasive. At least half of the estimated 255,700 farmworkers in California are undocumented, according to UC Merced research.
“These are people who are going to be afraid to take their kids to school, afraid to go to graduation, afraid to go to the grocery store,” Strater said. “The harm is going to be done.”
The expansion into rural communities follows days of coordinated raids in urban areas of Los Angeles County, where authorities have targeted home improvement stores, restaurants and garment manufacturers. The enforcement action has prompted waves of protest, and the Trump administration has responded by sending in hundreds of Marines and National Guard troops.
Two Democratic members of Congress who represent the Ventura area, Reps. Julia Brownley and Salud Carbajal, released a statement condemning the raids around Oxnard.
““We have received disturbing reports of ICE enforcement actions in Ventura County, including in Oxnard, Port Hueneme, and Camarillo, where agents have reportedly stopped vehicles, loitered near schools, and attempted to enter agricultural properties and facilities in the Oxnard Plain,” they said. “These actions are completely unjustified, deeply harmful, and raise serious questions about the agency’s tactics and its respect for due process.”
They added that “these raids are not about public safety. They are about stoking fear. These are not criminals being targeted. They are hardworking people and families who are an essential part of Ventura County. Our local economy, like much of California’s and the country’s as a whole, depends on undocumented labor. These men and women are the backbone of our farms, our fields, our construction and service industries, and our communities.”
Farmworker advocates noted that Tuesday’s raids came despite a judicial ruling stemming from a rogue Border Patrol action in Kern County earlier this year.
ACLU attorneys representing the United Farm Workers and five Kern County residents sued the head of the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Border Patrol officials, alleging the Border Patrol’s three-day raid in the southern San Joaquin Valley in early January amounted to a “fishing expedition” that indiscriminately targeted people of color who appeared to be farmworkers or day laborers.
Judge Jennifer Thurston of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California said in an 88-page ruling that evidence presented by the ACLU lawyers established “a pattern and practice” at the Border Patrol of violating people’s constitutional rights when detaining people without reasonable suspicion, and then violating federal law by executing warrantless arrests without determining flight risk.
Thurston’s ruling required the Border Patrol to submit detailed documentation of any stops or warrantless arrests in the Central Valley and show clear guidance and training for agents on the law.
AUSTIN, Texas — Protests that sprang up in Los Angeles over immigration enforcement raids and prompted President Trump to mobilize National Guard troops and Marines have begun to spread across the country, with more planned into the weekend.
From Seattle to Austin to Washington D.C., marchers have chanted slogans, carried signs against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency and snarled traffic through downtown avenues and outside federal offices. While many were peaceful, some have resulted in clashes with law enforcement as officers made arrests used chemical irritants to disperse crowds.
Activists plan more and even larger demonstrations in the coming days, with so-called “No Kings” events across the country on Saturday to coincide with Trump’s planned military parade through Washington.
The Trump administration said it would continue its program of raids and deportations despite the protests. “ICE will continue to enforce the law,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem posted Tuesday on social media.
A look at protests sprouting up across the country:
AUSTIN
Four Austin police officers were injured and authorities used chemical irritants to disperse a crowd of several hundred demonstrators Monday night that moved between the state Capitol and a federal building that houses an ICE office. State officials had closed the Capitol to the public an hour early in anticipation of the protest.
Austin police used pepper spray balls and state police used tear gas when demonstrators began trying to deface the federal building with spray paint. The demonstrators then started throwing rocks, bottles and other objects at a police barricade, Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis said. Three officers were injured by “very large” rocks and another hurt a shoulder while making an arrest, she said.
Austin police arrested eight people, and state police arrested several more. Davis said her department is prepared for Saturday’s planned protest downtown.
“We support peaceful protest,” Davis said. “When that protests turn violent, when it turns to throwing rocks and bottles …. That will not be tolerated. Arrests will be made.”
DALLAS
A protest that drew hundreds to a rally on a city bridge lasted for several hours Monday night before Dallas police declared it an “unlawful assembly” and warned people to leave or face possible arrest.
Dallas police initially posted on social media that officers would not interfere with a “lawful and peaceful assembly of individuals or groups expressing their First Amendment rights.” But officers later moved in and local media reported seeing some in the crowd throw objects as officers used pepper spray and smoke to clear the area. At least one person was arrested.
“Peaceful protesting is legal,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, posted on X. “But once you cross the line, you will be arrested.”
SEATTLE
About 50 people gathered outside the immigration court in downtown Seattle on Tuesday, chanting with drums and holding up signs that said “Free Them All Abolish ICE” and “No to Deportations.” The protest was initially peaceful but protesters began putting scooters in front of the entryways to the building before police arrived.
Mathieu Chabaud, with Students for a Democratic Society at the University of Washington, said they were there in solidarity with the protesters in Los Angeles, “and to show that we’re opposed to ICE in our community.”
Legal advocates who normally attend the immigration court hearings as observers and to provide support to immigrants were not allowed inside the building. Security guards also turned away the media. The hearings are normally open to the public.
SANTA ANA
In Santa Ana near Los Angeles, armored vehicles blocked the road Tuesday morning leading into the Civic Center, where federal immigration officers and numerous city and county agencies have their offices.
Workers swept up plastic bottles and broken glass from Monday’s protests. Tiny shards of red, black and purple glass littered the pavement. Nearby buildings and the sidewalk were tagged with profane graffiti slogans against ICE and Trump’s name crossed out.
A worker rolled paint over graffiti on a wall to block it out. National Guard officers wearing fatigues and carrying rifles prevented people from entering the area unless they worked there.
Vertuno writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Martha Bellisle in Seattle and Amy Taxin in Santa Ana contributed.
As Immigration and Customs Enforcement carries out raids across Los Angeles, former daytime talk show host Dr. Phil McGraw and his TV network MeritTV are covering the actions and protests in the city.
McGraw conducted an interview Friday with White House border advisor Tom Homan, who was leading the agency’s raids. A portion of the interview was posted on MeritTV’s website and the network plans to air a conversation between the men that was “taped the day before and the day after the L.A. operation” in two parts beginning Monday at 5 p.m. PT, according to a network spokesperson reached via email. MeritTV, which launched late last year, primarily features McGraw’s show “Dr. Phil Primetime,” where he comments on the news and interviews figures ranging from New York City Mayor Eric Adams to businessman and former L.A. mayoral candidate Rick Caruso.
The TV host has previously embedded with ICE officials during raids, including in Chicago earlier this year, where he and his crew taped arrests. However, that wasn’t the case this time around in L.A., but crews from his network did capture footage from the enforcement action over the weekend.
“MeritTV news crews were on the ground during the recent ICE operation in L.A. on Friday,” a MeritTV spokesperson said. “In order to not escalate any situation, Dr. Phil McGraw did not join and was not embedded, as he previously was in Chicago.”
The interview was taped at the Homeland Security Investigations’ downtown field office. ICE declined to comment on the interview and whether McGraw was given advance notice of the raids.
McGraw was previously the host of his eponymous talk show, which ended in 2023 after 21 seasons. At the time, CBS Media Ventures, which syndicated the talk show, and McGraw said he wanted to expand his audience in a new venture because of “grave concerns for the American family.” During the 2024 election, McGraw spoke at then-presidential candidate Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden, though he claimed it wasn’t an endorsement. However, he has been a proponent of the administration’s positions on immigration and he was recently named to the president’s religious liberty commission.
Can someone explain to me what, exactly, Dr. Phil has to do with immigration policy or constitutional law in these United States?
Many outrageous and unsettling things happened in Los Angeles over the weekend. On Friday, multiple immigration raids, in downtown’s Fashion District and outside a Home Depot in Paramount, sparked a not unusual response that led to police involvement, during which many, including union official David Huerta, were arrested.
Ostensibly dissatisfied with the handling of the situation, President Trump, over objections from both L.A. Mayor Karen Bass and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, made the highly unusual — and potentially illegal — decision to send in the National Guard. Tensions escalated and by Sunday, portions of L.A. freeways were shut down as some protesters and/or outside agitators vandalized downtown stores, defaced buildings, hurled rocks from downtown overpasses onto law enforcement vehicles and set fire to a few Waymo cars. Trump’s border advisor, Tom Homan, threatened to arrest Newsom if citizens of this sanctuary state continued to interfere with immigration raids, and Newsom publicly dared him to do it, adding that California would be suing the Trump administration for making the situation worse by sending in the National Guard. On Monday, Homan appeared to backtrack on his threat while Trump said he would support it.
It was both a little — no one should have been surprised that ICE raids in L.A. would spark protests and these were, relatively speaking, small and nonviolent — and a lot. Sending in the National Guard was an obvious military flex, designed to to bait Angelenos while perhaps distracting Americans from Trump’s far greater troubles.
But nothing said “this is a made-for-TV event brought to you by the same reality-star-led administration that proposed making legal immigration into a television competition” as the presence of Phil McGraw. Who, after being embedded with ICE officials during raids in Chicago earlier this year, spent some of this weekend kicking it with Homan in L.A.’s Homeland Security headquarters.
As first reported by CNN’s Brian Stelter, Dr. Phil was there to get “a first-hand look” at the targeted operations and an “exclusive” interview with Homan for “Dr. Phil Primetime” on MeritTV, part of Merit Street Media, which McGraw owns.
Dr. Phil is, for the record, neither a journalist nor an immigration or domestic policy expert. He isn’t even a psychologist anymore, having let his license to practice (which he never held in California) lapse years ago.
He is instead a television personality and outspoken Trump supporter who was on hand to … I honestly don’t know what. Provide psychological support to Homan as he threatened to arrest elected officials for allowing citizens to exercise their constitutionally guaranteed right to free speech while using local law enforcement to prevent any violence or destruction of property that might occur? Offer Homan another platform on which he could explain why Trump is breaking his own vow to target only those undocumented immigrants who have committed violent crime?
Or maybe just provide a familiar face to help normalize rounding up people from their workplaces and off the street and sending in the National Guard when this doesn’t appear to be happening smoothly enough.
There is, of course, the chance that McGraw asked Homan some tough questions. In a clip from the interview posted on X, he appears to begin his interview by asking what exactly happened this “busy” weekend in L.A. Homan replies that multiple law enforcement agencies were “looking for at-large criminals” and serving search warrants as part of a larger money laundering investigation, including at one company where “we knew about half of their employees were illegally in the United States” and in “service of those warrants, we arrested 41 illegal aliens.”
Still, after years of claiming to be nonpolitical, McGraw gave the president a full-throated endorsement at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally in 2024 while denouncing diversity initiatives. McGraw said the name of his media company pays homage to Americans who made it “on hard work … not on equal outcomes or DEI.”
McGraw’s presence during immigration raids, and his choice as the person who should interview Homan even as things escalated in L.A., would seem downright weird if it weren’t so politically perilous. Merit Street Media is one of a growing number of new news outlets claiming to offer “fresh perspective” on “American values” while hewing almost exclusively to Trump’s MAGA message and offering “safe spaces” to conservatives. Then-presidential candidate Trump told Dr. Phil in August — in reference to those involved in his felony conviction — “revenge can be justified” and that he would win California if Jesus were counting the ballots.
Using McGraw as a platform to explain Trump and Homan’s divisive immigration policy and incendiary decision in L.A. most certainly underlines the criticism that these raids, and the fallout they will inevitably cause particularly in sanctuary states and cities, are being conducted with maximum spectacle awareness. If McGraw isn’t a direct part of the policy, he appears to be a big part of its publicity.
Which is a bit alarming. Over the years, McGraw has been criticized about his treatment of guests (some of whom sued) and staff. In 2020, he issued an apology for comparing the mounting deaths from COVID-19 to the (far smaller) number of deaths due to drowning in swimming pools.
After his fellow Oprah alum, Dr. Mehmet Oz, ran for the Senate last year, McGraw shrugged off the notion that he would ever follow suit, saying he “doesn’t know enough about it.” “When you start talking to me about geopolitics and all the things that go into that — I’m a neophyte, I don’t think I would be competent to do that.”
Nor is there any indication that he is well-versed in immigration or constitutional law. If Trump and Homan honestly wanted a recognizable TV brand to help walk Americans through the legal complications of what happened in L.A. over the weekend, they should have asked Judge Judy.
SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom resisted a fight with President Trump over transgender youth in women’s sports. He forced his way onto a runway tarmac to make peace with the Republican leader after the Los Angeles wildfires.
Just last week, he hesitated before speaking out when rumors swirled about a massive federal funding cut to California.
Newsom’s restraint ended when Trump usurped the governor’s authority over the weekend by deploying the California National Guard to the streets of Los Angeles to quell protests against immigration raids.
“I’m still willing to do what I can to have the backs of the people I represent and whatever it takes to advance that cause, I’ll do, but I’m not going to do it when we see the trampling of our Constitution and the rule of law,” Newsom said in an interview with The Times. “So we all have our red lines. That’s my red line.”
Newsom said the arrival of troops in the largest city in the Golden State escalated tensions between protesters and law enforcement, which he blamed Trump for intentionally inflaming to sow chaos. Whether Newsom likes it or not, the president’s actions also catapulted the governor to the front lines of a Democratic resistance against Trump that he has been reluctant to embrace after his party lost the presidential election in November.
On Monday, Trump said his border czar Tom Homan should follow through on threats to arrest the governor. The president has cast California as out of control and Newsom incompetent for not stepping in and ending the unrest, or protecting federal immigration agents from protesters.
“I would do it if I were Tom,” Trump said. “I think it’s great. Gavin likes the publicity, but I think it would be a great thing. He’s done a terrible job.”
Newsom also baited Homan: “Come and get me, tough guy.”
Newsom’s position as the leader of a state that has become an immigration target for the federal government offers both risks and rewards for a governor considering a 2028 run for the White House.
Democrats and progressives are thirsty for a leader to challenge Trump and his controversial policies. The National Democratic Party quickly took to social media to publicize the governor’s challenge to Homan to arrest him. Being carted away in handcuffs by officials in Trump’s Justice Department would probably elevate Newsom to Democratic martyr status.
President Trump speaks to members of the media on the South Lawn of the White House after arriving on Marine One on June 9, 2025. Trump on Monday suggested California Gov. Gavin Newsom should be arrested over his handling of the unrest in Los Angeles.
(Yuri Gripas / Abaca/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“In a way, he was channeling Trump, because he knows how much Trump benefited in the Republican Party from his own criminal conviction,” said John Pitney, the Roy P. Crocker Professor of American Politics at Claremont McKenna College.
Even without an arrest, the political battle is likely to boost Newsom’s standing with Democrats.
But immigration is one of Trump’s best policy issues with voters and it’s not an ideal political fight for any Democrat with presidential aspirations.
“This is the brilliance of Donald Trump,” said Thad Kousser, a professor of political science at UC San Diego. “He’s picking these fights over executive power and over the power of federal government on a political terrain in which he’s most popular: immigration, transgender athletes, DEI, ‘woke’ universities. He’s picking these governance fights where he thinks he can win on the politics.”
For Newsom, the raids provide an opportunity to challenge the president’s narrative that his immigration policy is all about removing criminals and protecting the border, Kousser said.
In interviews, Newsom has repeated that the Trump administration is targeting children in elementary school classrooms and law-abiding citizens who have been in California for a decade or more.
He’s also framing Trump’s deployment of troops to Los Angeles as about more than immigration.
“This is something bigger,” Newsom said. “This is certain power and control over every aspect of our lives. This is about wrecking the constitutional order. This is about tearing down the rule of law. This is about, literally, the cornerstone of our founding fathers, and they’re rolling in their graves.”
Trump’s Los Angeles takeover could derail the work the governor has put in to showcase his more moderate policy positions to America.
While judiciously picking and choosing his battles with Trump, Newsom used his podcast this year to air his belief that it’s unfair for transgender athletes to compete in women and girls’ sports. Through interviews with controversial conservative figures such as Stephen K. Bannon, the governor attempted to demonstrate his ability to be cordial with anyone regardless of their political affiliation.
Newsom has been strategic about the attacks he makes against Trump, such as criticizing the tariffs that are a political vulnerability for the president.
“Anybody who wants to lead the Democratic Party needs the support or at least the acquiescence of the progressive wing of the party, but Democrats need to appeal to the broader general public, and so far, this situation is not helping,” Pitney said of the battle over immigration.
The images streaming out of Los Angeles also create an electoral vulnerability for the governor.
“Perchance Newsom were the Democratic nominee in 2028, you would expect to see pictures of burning Waymos on the streets of Los Angeles with the tagline of ‘what Newsom did for California, he’ll do for America,”’ Pitney said.
Kousser contends that Newsom, in a presidential campaign, will be held responsible for all of California’s shortcomings, regardless of whether he stood up to Trump’s immigration raids.
Although the governor is fighting in the courts with a lawsuit announced Monday, by supporting peaceful protests and using his public podium, there’s little he can do to stop the federal government. The situation highlights the challenge for Newsom and any state leader with interest in the White House.
“This is the blessing and the curse of a governor who wants to run for higher office. When something happens in their state, they get the eyes of the nation upon them even if it’s not the political ground on which they’d rather fight,” Kousser said.
California National Guard troops arrived in Los Angeles on Sunday in a show of force following scattered clashes between immigration agents and protesters and amid a widening political divide between California and the Trump administration.
The move by President Trump to activate nearly 2,000 guardsmen marked the first time since 1965 that a president has deployed a state’s National Guard without a request from that state’s governor. The decision was met with stern rebukes from state and local officials, including Gov. Gavin Newsom who said the deployment was “not to meet an unmet need, but to manufacture a crisis.”
Newsom’s office on Sunday afternoon sent a formal letter to the Trump administration asking them to rescind their deployment of troops.
“There is currently no need for the National Guard to be deployed in Los Angeles, and to do so in this unlawful manner and for such a lengthy period is a serious breach of state sovereignty that seems intentionally designed to inflame the situation, while simultaneously depriving the state from deploying these personnel and resources where they are truly required,” the letter reads.
On Sunday afternoon, there were tense moments outside a federal detention center in downtown L.A., with officers firing tear gas and nonlethal rounds at protesters.
But other areas that had seen unrest over the last few days, including the Garment District, Paramount and Compton, seemed calm.
It was unclear exactly how many troops were deployed to Los Angeles as of Sunday afternoon. The National Guard’s 79th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, based in San Diego, said Sunday that 300 personnel were on the ground to protect federal property and personnel.
Trump administration officials have seized on the isolated incidents of violence to suggest wide parts of L.A. are out of control. On Sunday, Trump took to social media to claim “violent, insurrectionist mobs are swarming and attacking” federal law enforcement.
“A once great American City, Los Angeles, has been invaded and occupied by Illegal Aliens and Criminals,” he wrote, blaming Democratic politicians for not cracking down earlier.
While officials have not said how long the immigration enforcement actions will continue, Trump told reporters Sunday, “we’re going to have troops everywhere. We’re not going to let this happen to our country.”
Many California officials, who have long been at odds with Trump, say the president was trying to exploit the situation for his political advantage and sow unneeded disorder and confusion.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass called the deployment of federalized troops a “chaotic escalation” and issued a reminder that “Los Angeles will always stand with everyone who calls our city home.”
While most demonstrators have gathered peacefully, some have hurled objects at law enforcement personnel, set garbage and vehicles on fire and defaced federal property with graffiti.
Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin and Republican politicians who support Trump’s immigration actions have characterized the protests as riots intended to “keep rapists, murderers and other violent criminals loose on Los Angeles streets.”
Representative Maxine Waters speak to the media at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles on Sunday.
(Jason Armond/Los Angeles Times)
On Sunday morning, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) addressed roughly two dozen National Guard soldiers posted outside the Metropolitan Detention Center on Alameda Street. She had arrived at the center to inquire about Service Employees International Union California President David Huerta, who was injured and detained while documenting an immigration enforcement raid in downtown Los Angeles on Friday.
“Who are you going to shoot?” Waters asked the solders. “If you’re going to shoot me, you better shoot straight.”
Remnants of tear gas used by law enforcement during protests Saturday lingered in the air around the building, at times forcing Waters to cough. Waters, an outspoken critic of the president, called the deployment of National Guard troops an unnecessary escalation of tensions and accused Trump of “trying to make an example” out of Los Angeles, a longstanding sanctuary city.
Leonard Tunstad, a 69-year-old Los Angeles resident, rode his bike up to the edge of the loading dock where troops were stationed and asked them if they really wanted to be loyal to a president that “had 34 felony convictions.” He said he felt compelled to shout facts about Trump at the guardsmen because he feared the young men have been “indoctrinated against their own citizens.”
Tunstad said he believed the deployment was a gross overreaction by the Trump administration, noting the city has been home to far more raucous protests that were handled by local police.
“This is just a show. This is just a spectacle,” he said.
A Department of Homeland Security officer approached one of the louder demonstrators saying that he “didn’t want a repeat of last night” and didn’t want to “get political.” He told protesters as long as they stick to the sidewalk and don’t block vehicle access to the loading dock there wouldn’t be any problems.
Later, DHS and California National Guard troops shoved dozens of protesters into Alameda Street, hitting people with riot shields, firing pellets into the ground and deploying tear gas to clear a path for a caravan of DHS, Border Patrol and military vehicles to enter the detention center.
Jose Longoria struggled to breathe as clouds of tear gas filled Alameda Street. He pointed to a white scuff mark on his shoe, saying that a tear gas canister had hit him in the foot, causing him to limp slightly.
“We’re not armed. We’re just peacefully protesting. They’re acting out,” Longoria said of the officers.
Julie Solis, 50, walked back and forth along Alameda Street holding a Mexican flag and urging the crowd to make their voices heard, but to keep the scene peaceful. She said she believes the National Guard was deployed solely to provoke a response and make Los Angeles look unruly to justify further aggression from federal law enforcement.
People march toward the Metropolitan Detention Center during an immigration march in downtown Los Angeles on Sunday.
(Luke Johnson/Los Angeles Times)
“They want arrests. They want to see us fail. We need to be peaceful. We need to be eloquent,” she said.
National Guard troops were last summoned to Los Angeles and other Southern California cities in 2020, during the George Floyd protests. Those deployments were authorized by Newsom.
However, the last time the National Guard was called on by a president without a request from a state governor was 60 years ago, when President Lyndon B. Johnson sent troops to Alabama to protect civil rights demonstrators.
Antonio Villaraigosa, former speaker of the California Assembly and a former L.A. mayor, said Trump’s move was “meant to incite more fear and chaos in our community.”
“Trump’s military-style mass deportation ICE raids in California have gone too far, tearing families apart and threatening public safety,” he said in a statement. “The raids at stores and workplaces are wrong, just as it’s wrong to separate families with raids at schools, graduations, and churches.”
In Paramount, a group of camouflaged National Guard troops were stationed in a business park with armored vehicles where a Department of Homeland Security office is located.
Jessica Juarez walked along Alondra Boulevard with a trash bag full of spent tear gas canisters on Sunday morning. Her voice grew hoarse as she helped a group of volunteers clean up after clashes between protesters and law enforcement the day before.
United States Attorney Bill Essayli told NBC in an interview that an officer suffered a broken wrist and others were injured by rocks and cement block pieces that were thrown at them during Saturday’s protest. He said it was “an extremely violent crowd,” but officials are “undeterred.”
An acrid odor still hung in the air from the gas and flash bang grenades law enforcement fired on protesters Saturday, while scorched asphalt marked the intersection outside a Home Depot where federal authorities had staged.
“I’m proud of our community, of the strength we showed,” said Juarez, 40. “It’s like they put so much fear into Paramount and for what? These guys didn’t even clean up after themselves.”
The images of Paramount shrouded in smoke and flanked by police in riot gear are unusual for this community of about 50,000 residents. In many ways, the city became the starting point for the escalating federal response.
“What else do you call it but an attack on Paramount and the people who live here?” said resident and union organizer Alejandro Maldonado. “People in the community were standing up to unjust immigration policies.”
For some, the fight between Los Angeles residents and the federal government is akin to David and Goliath. “It really does seem like they wanted to pick a fight with the little guy,” union organizer Ardelia Aldridge said.
Staff writer Seema Mehta and Brittny Mejia contributed to this report
Los Angeles witnessed a series of coordinated immigration raids by United States law enforcement officials on Friday, resulting in the arrest of dozens and igniting widespread protests.
The raids, which were carried out in a military-style operation, have intensified concerns about the force used by federal immigration officials and the rights of undocumented individuals.
Here is what we know about the raids and the latest on the ground.
What happened in LA?
Federal agents from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) conducted a series of “immigration enforcement operations” across Los Angeles on Friday morning.
Individuals suspected of “immigration violations and the use of fraudulent documents” were arrested. The arrests were carried out without judicial warrants, according to multiple legal observers and confirmed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), which did not take part in the raids, was called in to quell ensuing protests.
The raids focused on several locations in downtown LA and its immediate surroundings. These spots are known to have significant migrant populations and labour-intensive industries.
Angelica Salas, executive director of the Coalition of Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA), which covers California, said advocates had recorded enforcement activity at seven sites. This included two Home Depot stores in the Westlake District of Los Angeles, a doughnut shop and the clothing wholesaler, Ambiance Apparel in the Fashion District of downtown Los Angeles.
Other locations in which raids were carried out included day labour centres and one other Ambiance facility near 15th Street and Santa Fe Avenue in south Los Angeles.
How many people have been arrested?
ICE and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) reported the “administrative arrest” of 44 individuals for immigration-related offences.
An administrative arrest, unlike a criminal arrest, refers to detention for civil immigration violations such as overstaying a visa or lacking legal status, and does not require criminal charges. These arrests can result in detention, deportation, temporary re-entry bans and denial of future immigration requests.
Advocates believe the number of arrests made was higher, however. Caleb Soto, of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, told Al Jazeera that between 70 and 80 people had been detained, but only three lawyers have been allowed access to the detention centre where they were being held to provide legal advice.
Additionally, David Huerta, president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) California, was arrested for allegedly obstructing federal agents during the raids. Huerta was reportedly injured during the arrest and received medical treatment at Los Angeles General Medical Center before being taken into custody.
A protester attempts to evade a Department of Homeland Security officer [Jae C Hong/AP Photo]
What kinds of raids were these?
What sets these raids apart from typical civil enforcement actions was their military-style execution, experts say.
According to witnesses, legal observers and advocacy groups, federal agents involved in the operations were heavily armed and dressed in tactical gear, with some wearing camouflage and carrying rifles.
Agents arrived in unmarked black SUVs and armoured vehicles and, at certain points, sealed off entire streets around targeted buildings. Drones were reportedly used for surveillance in some areas and access to sites was blocked off with yellow tape, similar to measures which would be taken during a high-threat counterterrorism or drug bust operation.
The ACLU described the show of force as an “oppressive and vile paramilitary operation”. Civil liberties groups said the tactics used had created panic in local communities and may have violated protocols for civil immigration enforcement.
How did protests break out?
As news of the raids spread via social media and through immigrant advocacy networks, hundreds of protesters gathered outside the Edward R Roybal Federal Building in downtown Los Angeles, where detainees were being processed.
Demonstrators blocked entrances and exits to the building, chanted slogans and demanded the release of those arrested. Some spray-painted anti-ICE slogans on the building’s exterior walls. Several protesters attempted to physically stop ICE vehicles, leading to confrontations with law enforcement.
LAPD officers issued dispersal orders and warned protesters that they would be subject to arrest if they remained in the area. To enforce the order, officers in riot gear deployed tear gas, pepper spray and “less-lethal munitions”, including firing rubber bullets to disperse the crowd. A citywide tactical alert was also issued, requiring all LAPD officers to remain on duty.
What’s happening now?
Shortly after 7pm on Friday [02:00 GMT Saturday], the LAPD declared the protests to be an “unlawful assembly”, meaning that those who failed to leave the area could be subject to arrest. The declaration appeared to remain in effect until the crowd dispersed later that evening, though no formal end time was publicly announced.
US media outlets and rights groups reported that hundreds of detainees, including children, were held overnight in the basement of the federal building without access to beds, blankets or adequate food and water.
However, an ICE spokesperson told CBS News that the agency “categorically refutes the assertions made by immigration activists in Los Angeles”, stating that it takes its mandate to care for people in custody “seriously”.
The status of all individuals detained remains unclear. While some have been released, others continue to be held and details about their current locations or conditions have not been fully disclosed.
What are the reactions to the raids?
Local and state officials condemned the raids and the manner in which they were conducted.
In a statement shared on X on Friday, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said such operations “sow terror in our communities and disrupt basic principles of safety in our city”.
California Governor Gavin Newsom issued a statement describing the operations as “cruel” and “chaotic”, adding that they are an attempt “to meet an arbitrary arrest quota”.
All 15 members of the Los Angeles City Council issued a joint statement denouncing the raids.
Some Trump administration officials, on the other hand, defended the actions and criticised local leaders for pushing back. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, for instance, suggested that Mayor Karen Bass was undermining federal law.
You have no say in this at all. Federal law is supreme and federal law will be enforced. https://t.co/N53UBl3UM4
Protesters gathered after immigration agents took dozens of people into custody during raids across Los Angeles.
There have been tense confrontations in Los Angeles as riot police and demonstrators – protesting federal immigration raids – squared off in the downtown area.
Earlier on Friday, United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents took dozens of people into custody during raids across Los Angeles city.
Caravans of unmarked military-style vehicles and vans loaded with uniformed federal agents streamed through the city as part of the operation.
The ICE agents raided several locations, including an apparel store in the city’s Fashion District, a Home Depot in Westlake District, and a clothing warehouse in South Los Angeles, according to the Los Angeles City News Service.
In response, crowds of demonstrators protesting the raids massed outside a jail where some of the detainees were believed to be held and spray-painted anti-ICE slogans on the walls of the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building in downtown Los Angeles.
Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) officers – who did not take part in the immigration raids – were called in to quell the unrest. Wielding batons and tear gas rifles, LAPD officers faced off with the demonstrators after authorities ordered them to disperse on Friday night.
Some protesters hurled broken concrete towards the LAPD officers, the Reuters news agency reports. Police responded by firing volleys of tear gas and pepper spray.
LAPD spokesperson Drake Madison said police on the scene declared the gathering an unlawful assembly, meaning that those who failed to leave the area were subject to arrest, according to Reuters.
It’s not immediately clear how many arrests have been made.
Stoking fear and terror
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass condemned the federal immigration raids, saying they “sow terror in our communities and disrupt basic principles of safety in our city”.
Caleb Soto, of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, told Al Jazeera that between 70 and 80 people had been detained, but only three lawyers have been allowed access to the detention centre where they were being held to provide legal advice.
“The chaotic manner of the raids that we saw today happening throughout Los Angeles and different day-labour worksites and garment worker work sites was an example of the purpose of what this Trump administration has set out to do, which is create as much fear as possible,” Soto told Al Jazeera.
He said the ICE agents conducting the raids did not obtain a judicial warrant required under US law, and granted by a judge if there is probable cause to carry out an arrest because of suspected criminal activity.
Soto said ICE agents were showing up at work sites “where they know that there are a lot of immigrant workers” and “people without documents”, and if someone starts running they use that as “reasonable suspicion” that the person is undocumented.
“They use that as the pretext to start arresting people who are there in that area and around them. We find that to be pretty unconstitutional,” he said.
The Los Angeles raids are the latest sweeps in several US cities over recent months as part of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Trump, who took immediate steps to ramp up immigration enforcement after taking office in January, has promised to arrest and deport undocumented migrants in record numbers.
In late May, his administration stated it would revoke the temporary legal status of 530,000 people in the country, including Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans.
United States President Donald Trump has lambasted his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, describing him as “absolutely crazy” after Moscow launched its largest aerial attack of the war on Ukraine, killing at least 13 people.
Trump’s comments, issued on his Truth Social platform late on Sunday, marked a rare rebuke of Putin.
“I’ve always had a very good relationship with Vladimir Putin of Russia, but something has happened to him. He has gone absolutely CRAZY!” the US president wrote.
“I’ve always said that he wants ALL of Ukraine, not just a piece of it, and maybe that’s proving to be right, but if he does, it will lead to the downfall of Russia!” he added.
The comments came as Ukraine’s Air Force said Russia had launched a record number of drones against Ukraine overnight on Sunday. It said Russian forces deployed 298 drones and 69 missiles, but that it was able to down 266 drones and 45 missiles.
The Russian attack was the largest of the war in terms of weapons fired, although other strikes have killed more people.
Ukraine’s emergency services described an atmosphere of “terror” across the country on Sunday, and regional officials said those killed included victims aged eight, 12 and 17 in the northwestern region of Zhytomyr.
More than 60 others were wounded.
“Without truly strong pressure on the Russian leadership, this brutality cannot be stopped,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on social media.
“The silence of America, the silence of others around the world only encourages Putin,” he said, adding: “Sanctions will certainly help.”
Sanctions
Trump has increasingly voiced irritation with Putin and the inability to resolve the now three-year-old war, which the US leader had promised he would do within days of returning to the White House.
He had long boasted of his friendly relationship with Putin and repeatedly stressed that Russia is more willing than Ukraine to reach a peace deal.
But earlier on Sunday, Trump made it clear that he is losing patience with the Russian president.
“I’m not happy with what Putin’s doing. He’s killing a lot of people. And I don’t know what the hell happened to Putin,” Trump told reporters as he departed northern New Jersey, where he had spent most of the weekend.
“I’ve known him a long time, always gotten along with him, but he’s sending rockets into cities and killing people, and I don’t like it at all.”
Asked if he was considering more sanctions on Russia, Trump said, “Absolutely.”
Trump also criticised Zelenskyy, a more frequent target of his ire, in his social media post, accusing him of “doing his Country no favours by talking the way he does”.
“Everything out of his mouth causes problems, I don’t like it, and it better stop,” he said of Zelenskyy.
Europe condemns Russia
A peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine remains elusive.
Last week, Trump and Putin held a two-hour phone call, after which the US leader said Moscow and Kyiv would “immediately start negotiations towards a ceasefire”.
Putin, however, made no commitment to pause his three-year invasion of Ukraine, announcing only a vague proposal to work on a “memorandum” outlining Moscow’s demands for peace.
That conversation occurred after Russian and Ukrainian officials met in Turkiye for the first face-to-face talks since 2022. But on Thursday, the Kremlin said no direct talks were scheduled.
The Russian attack against Ukraine prompted criticism from Europe, too.
The European Union’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, called for “the strongest international pressure on Russia to stop this war”. In a post on X, she said the attacks “again show Russia bent on more suffering and the annihilation of Ukraine. Devastating to see children among innocent victims harmed and killed”.
German Minister for Foreign Affairs Johann Wadephul also denounced the attacks, saying, “Putin does not want peace, he wants to carry on the war and we shouldn’t allow him to do this,” he said.
“For this reason, we will approve further sanctions at a European level.”
The massive attacks on Ukraine came as Russia said it had exchanged another 303 Ukrainian prisoners of war for the same number of Russian soldiers held by Kyiv – the last phase of a swap agreed during talks in Istanbul on May 16.
That marked their biggest prisoner swap since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022, with 1,000 captured soldiers and civilian prisoners in total sent back by each side.
Benidorm police carried out a series of raids on the nightlife venues in the area known as the ‘English zone’ in the Spanish resort, which is popular with British holidaymakers
Rita Sobot and Milo Boyd Digital Travel Editor and Commercial Content Lead
16:06, 14 May 2025
Officers in Benidorm arrested seven people for crimes against public health (stock photo)(Image: P A Thompson via Getty Images)
Benidorm police are conducting daily sweeps in the town’s infamous ‘English zone’ in a bid to crack down on drug peddling to Brit holidaymakers.
Cops have unearthed several ingenious hiding spots for contraband, from inside fire extinguishers and sofa covers to electrical boxes and even loo roll holders. They’ve sent a clear message to dealers that no matter where they stash their illegal wares, they’ll be rooted out.
In the latest clampdown, seven individuals were arrested for crimes against public health, with officers confiscating drugs valued at €30,000 (£25,300).
A Benidorm Local Police spokesperson reported that this month alone, six venues in the bustling party hub frequented by British tourists have been probed, leading to four being shuttered as a precaution. The haul included 200 grams of cocaine, 300 tabs of LSD and MDMA pills, 200 portions of marijuana (THC), 20 grams of hash, eight canisters of laughing gas, along with mobiles and €3,000 in cash.
The police in Benidorm uncovered the drug stashes (stock photo)(Image: fbatista72 via Getty Images)
Stashing narcotics in bizarre places has become a routine “modus operandi” for drug sellers in the area, acknowledged by repeated busts. For instance, just back in March, two culprits were collared for hoarding drugs at a local nightspot, where 85 doses of narcotics were discovered.
MDMA, ecstasy, cocaine, and cannabis were stashed away in fire extinguishers, toilet cisterns, and beneath the cash register.
Police have said that the pair arrested were tasked with minding the drugs at the pubs and raking in cash for them. Officers said they found them with a large sum of money. The police have vowed to keep up the daily raids.
Although most trips to Benidorm take place without any issues, tourists do occasionally face problems.
In April three men were apprehended in Benidorm after a tourist’s bank cards were stolen and used nine times in less than 20 minutes. The tourist was targeted near the town’s infamous Muggers’ Alley, located off Gerona Street next to the local tourist police station. The arrests were made after the victim received notifications on his mobile about the usage of his cards at various bars and restaurants around the town, leading detectives to one of these locations.
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Among those arrested were the alleged pickpocket, a getaway driver, and a third suspect who managed an unnamed bar where the Brit’s stolen cards had been charged.
In light of recent events, police issued a warning to tourists visiting Benidorm. They advised: “Always keep an eye on your personal belongings, especially in crowded areas. Do NOT keep cell phones or wallets in back pockets or easily accessible areas. Be wary of strangers who approach you with vague excuses or exaggerated gestures. In the event of a robbery, do not confront the offender directly and notify the police immediately.”
