SAN JOSE — Images of aggressive immigration enforcement and clashes with protesters in Minneapolis and Chicago have sparked national outrage. But members of the Bay Area community have seen local people detained at court hearings, held in “substandard” conditions in facilities not designed for people, and even hospitalized after being dragged from their vehicles.
“Fear is rampant,” said Huy Tran, executive director of SIREN Immigrant Rights, after detailing these instances and more alongside lawmakers at a press conference denouncing ICE and its tactics Thursday afternoon in San Jose. “Despite our policies, we are not immune.”
Lawmakers, community representatives and faith leaders, led by U.S. Representatives Zoe Lofgren and Sam Liccardo, gathered at Mexican Heritage Plaza to condemn the recent violent actions of ICE, calling on the investigations of those involved in recent encounters and accountability for those in the Trump administration overseeing the agencies.
“The images and the videos that we’re watching on television and on our small screens should outrage every American,” Lofgren said. “When we see masked, armed, poorly trained ICE agents breaking down doors without warrants, dragging unclothed elderly people into the freezing cold, executing mothers and nurses in the street, we as federal and local officials have to take a stand.”
The calls for ICE to moderate its tactics came less than a week after ICE agents in Minneapolis fatally shot 37-year-old Alex Pretti, an intensive care unit nurse. It also follows the fatal shooting of 37-year-old Renee Good by an ICE agent in Minneapolis earlier this month. The shootings came amid an immigration crackdown on the city that has sparked widespread protests and vigils, both in Minneapolis and in the Bay Area, as residents call for ICE agents to leave the city. California and Bay Area lawmakers have also passed resolutions or introduced legislation limiting ICE’s operations in the region.
Lofgren acknowledged the “immense pain that is being felt in Minneapolis and around the country” and said that lawmakers and communities need to keep pressure on Senate Republicans.
Liccardo added that there has been an “outrage” committed by ICE every two hours. He said the announcement Thursday morning by White House border czar Tom Homan that thousands of ICE agents were being withdrawn from Minnesota is not satisfactory; Liccardo said the agency should instead be reformed. Everyone involved, including the agents who pulled the trigger and those who were accomplices, must face criminal investigation, he said.
“Never again. Never again can we see this kind of cruelty, this kind of chaos unleashed on communities throughout our country,” Liccardo said. “We won’t stand for it here, and we can’t stand for it anywhere in the United States of America.”
Lofgren denounced the Trump administration’s response to the fatal shootings of Good and Pretti; federal officials labelled the victims as “terrorists” and “lied to the American people about what we’ve seen with our own eyes,” she said. Liccardo pointed to the detention of five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos as an action that would provoke a “rally in outrage” under more normal circumstances and critiqued the frequent act of federal officers to completely conceal their identities.
“We need an unmasking of agents, and we need an unmasking of this agency and this administration,” Liccardo said.
Lofgren noted that she voted against a bill that was passed in the U.S. House of Representatives providing $10 billion in funding for the Department of Homeland Security; she characterized the money as having “no guardrails.” Democrats and the White House on Thursday reached a funding compromise that provides funding for DHS for two weeks while lawmakers continue to negotiate restrictions on ICE activity.
“It wouldn’t protect churches or hospitals or schools — even preschools — from ICE, wouldn’t do anything to require that ICE cooperate with state and local investigations and also wouldn’t do anything to unmask these agents and require them to identify themselves, and that is completely unacceptable,” she said before word of the deal broke Thursday afternoon. “Senate Republicans need to grow a spine and work with Democrats to stop the misuse of taxpayer dollars being used to brutalize our communities with impunity.”
San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, who on Thursday also confirmed that he is running for California governor, urged immigrant communities to continue placing their trust in the local government and pointed to legislation passed by the San Jose City Council earlier this month banning ICE from operating on any city-owned property. San Jose police are also not allowed to assist with immigration enforcement, and law enforcement personnel are not permitted to cover their faces. He added that all residents of the city should feel safe using city services and facilities.
“We’re gathered in memory of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, in solidarity with the untold number of people in our country who are living with fear instad of safety because the actions of this current administration have cost lives, eroded trust in government and raised serious questions, more than questions — condemnation, judgment, oversight, accountability at the highest levels of our government,” Mahan said.
Santa Clara County Sheriff Bob Jonsen addressed speculation that ICE will conduct operations in the Bay Area around the Super Bowl, saying that there has been no communication about such a move to local authorities, which has led to fear and anxiety in the community.
Both Lofgren and Liccardo expressed their support for the impeachment of Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, who oversees ICE.
“Donald Trump and Kristi Noem said their immigration enforcement would focus on violent felons — the worst of the worst — but that’s not what’s happening,” Lofgren said. “They’ve unleashed a virtual army onto our streets that’s detaining and deporting lawful residents and American citizens. They look like they’re out in Fallujah instead of American cities.”