The “unscrupulous nature of the enforcement” had stunned her and left the families and communities of those snatched up in the recent spate of immigration raids “irreparably” traumatized, Angelica Salas, Executive Director for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA), told City Council during a special session last week.
Salas was there to bring councilmembers up-to-date on the rash of immigrant enforcement actions seen around the county and the hurdles L.A.’s Rapid Response Network – a network of 23 organizations and three dozen trained volunteers – had faced in trying to track, communicate with, and provide support to detainees.
She then went into excruciating detail regarding the two operations underway in L.A. The first had begun at federal buildings at the end of May, sweeping up immigrants and the family members, including children, that had accompanied them to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) check-ins, Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) interviews, asylum hearings, and other immigration-related matters. “We have several cases of individuals where children have been actually deported with their parents,” she said, while noting that those being held in the detention center lacked access to food, water, beds, and counsel.
The second, launched Friday, June 6, involved “warrantless arrests and mass racial profiling,” she said. Ambiance Apparel was hit with two raids (one at the storefront and one at the warehouse), resulting in the arrest of 35 workers. Six workers were snatched from the day labor center at the Westlake Home Depot. Another 25 laborers and street vendors were picked up outside the day labor center at the Cypress Park Home Depot. Another person was taken from a doughnut shop at Hoover and 8th, while others were arrested just walking along the street.
Over that weekend, Salas continued, another 22 workers and customers were arrested from car washes in Culver City and Inglewood. And on Monday, June 9, the arrest of seven people at a Home Depot in Huntington Park sent parents attending a nearby elementary school graduation into panic. Agents spotted around the Home Depot in Cerritos resulted in a warning to students from the college. And when workers ran from a worksite raid in Whittier, “immigration authorities roamed the neighborhood,” knocking on doors and looking for those workers. She reported ICE also took workers from a nursing home in Santa Monica and grabbed roofers in Westminster.
The width of the nets being cast meant that many of those the 300-plus people that had been swept up in that first set of raids had both been in the U.S. for decades and had never had any previous contact with immigration. So while the administration might claim they already had outstanding orders of deportation, Salas said, “Most of these folks have never had any contact with immigration.”
Meanwhile, lawyers were being denied access to facilities. Family members were reporting they’d been threatened with $5,000 fines and coerced into waiving their rights and signing voluntary departure notices. Many had no idea where their loved ones were or if they were even in state – one family member reported their uncle had called them from Texas.
“Our communities are being terrorized. We’re in a state of terror,” Salas said of the combination of militarized federal force and the federal government’s utter disregard of the law. “It’s not just the site or the location of the place that is being raided. It’s the entire community that is witnessing what’s happening…and see[ing] their family members with crosshairs on their backs.”
That terror has only deepened since then. So has the disruption to daily life and livelihoods, particularly among outdoor workers.
L.A. TACO reports a number of taqueros have shut down. The L.A. Times reports MacArthur Park – long a hub for immigrants and for street vending and already struggling after police closed off some prime vending locations to address crime – has gone quiet and that some street vendors fear that if they abide by the laws, seek permits, and file their taxes, the IRS will share their identifying information with ICE. Boyle Heights Beat reporter Alma Lucia captured scenes of deserted vendor spots, shuttered business, and streets devoid of patrons in the overwhelmingly Latino community. Rep. Judy Chu tweeted out alarming video of a raid at a bus stop where ICE agents appeared to point a gun at a bystander. And community celebrations are being canceled out of an abundance of concern, caution, and care.
Gardeners across the Southland told the L.A. Times they have been trying to maintain a low profile to avoid crossing paths with ICE. Radio Jornalera reports community members have begun showing up to job sites to help keep an eye out for agents. Other community groups have ramped up their street monitoring while protesters have turned to chasing ICE out of hotels.
But with roving patrols of masked men disappearing vendors and their customers and ensnaring citizens simply for being Latino in public or for assisting those ICE is targeting, it’s hard for immigrants to feel anywhere is safe.
The scars it will leave on the L.A. landscape may never fully heal.
As noted in a moving call to action written for Nonprofit Quarterly by Rudy Espinoza, Executive Director of Inclusive Action for the City, street vendors are integral to the fabric of this city in every possible way.
It took them decades of organizing just to win the right to be on our streets. They’ve asked to be legalized and regulated so they could formally participate in the economy and – with the members of the L.A. Street Vendor Campaign (Community Power Collective, East L.A. Community Corporation, Inclusive Action, and Public Counsel) – spent years educating public agencies about the best way to do that. They’ve also had to sue the city of L.A. to get it to uphold its own rules, stop shutting them out of prime locations, and reimburse them for the expensive citations used to chase them out of those areas.
Yet they enliven underutilized spaces. They are integral to the economic ecosystem. They make communities safer by serving as “eyes on the street.” And they help knit together the disparate corners of our sprawling city by being the beacons around which Angelenos of every stripe can and do regularly gather. They are also so much more – valued friends, family members, neighbors, and community members. And they are under attack just for being who they are.
The L.A. Street Vendor Campaign reports many are already struggling.
Empty streets means no sales. The vendors themselves are afraid to be sitting ducks on a corner. And the stories of relatives and friends seeking assistance in identifying missing vendors’ whereabouts adds to their distress.
Even in the best of times, street vendors average just over $10,000 a year in income, have little savings to fall back on, and have few places they can turn to for help.
So the Campaign coalition has once again joined forces to help vulnerable vendors and their families stay afloat.
The gofundme currently has received over $43,000 in donations.
The organizers are hoping for $300,000. As with previous fundraisers aimed at assisting outdoor workers through the pandemic emergency and, earlier this year, the wildfires, 100 percent of the donations will go directly to street vendors.
