Community stands in support of local Mexican restaurant after employees detained
LIBERTY, Mo. — One week after federal agents made an unannounced visit to El Potro Mexican Café in Liberty, their community came to help the restaurant on Valentine's Day.
'Let's focus on Valentine's Day,' said Jackson County Legislator Manny Abarca.
'Let's put the Super Bowl behind us and help out in the kitchen side of things because this is a very busy day on Valentine's Day for restaurants.'
Abarca and others didn't come to just show their support at El Potro, they came to be put to work.
Abortion facility licensing requirement lifted by Missouri judge
'When we asked them what they needed, this is what they needed,' Abarca said.
'They needed help immediately, as 12 of their dedicated employees were taken from them.'
Last week, restaurant staff said that Homeland Security Agents surrounded El Potro, before detaining and leaving with 12 employees. Clay County Sheriff Will Aikin told FOX4, at the time, that the agents had come to the restaurant to serve a warrant for a single person.
El Potro closed another location in order to staff their Liberty store, which stayed open. Now, Abarca and others are helping out around the restaurant on one of their busiest days of the year.
Abarca says it's time for local leaders to step up about decisions being handed down from the federal level.
'Local officials, I think now more than ever, are going to have to step up to the plate and do this for a myriad of issues right now, not just for the Latino community, or for immigration broadly, but for any federal issue that is now coming down that challenges our current existence. There is some level of accountability that folks in Liberty and in the Clay County community should be asking of their own elected officials. And if anyone's going to show them how to do it, I'm happy to help.'
Neighbors and Liberty residents who offered their support on Friday brought signs that read 'Immigration Built This Nation' and 'We Support Immigrants and Refugees'.
One of those signs was held by Laura Gitterman, an English teacher who regularly works with immigrants.
'Unfortunately, I'm not surprised because I fear that something like this would be in the works and would come to fruition,' she told FOX4.
Some details released in Independence chase that led to police shooting
She says her students have been worried for weeks about operations like this, and some have expressed their fears to her.
'I've had students ask me for their parents, where can they be adopted if the parents get deported?' she said.
'I have had students saying, 'I'm carrying my papers with me to school because I'm afraid ICE is coming. How many windows, how many doors do we have in school? Will I be safe?' And then when I heard that this happened in Liberty and I'm from Liberty, Missouri, I felt like I needed to take a stand and show the support and solidarity for my community.'
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Los Angeles Times
5 hours ago
- Los Angeles Times
Chaos erupts at Paramount Home Depot as protesters confront immigration agents
An hourslong standoff between protesters and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents erupted Saturday morning at a Home Depot in Paramount, as federal officials warned of further immigration raids to come in Los Angeles. The confrontation near a Home Depot at 6400 Alondra Boulevard escalated into a fiery and tumultuous clash. At least one person was injured, ABC-7 reported. Chants of 'Fuera ICE' — ICE, get out —could be heard as flash-bang grenades lit up the scene; it was unclear who deployed the weapons. A Times reporter watched one protester gather a bag of trash and light it on fire in the middle of Alondra Boulevard, half a block away from where immigration agents were gathered. The scene followed raids across Los Angeles on Friday that led to the arrests of 44 people on suspicion of immigration violations, and another on suspicion of obstructing justice. 'Federal law enforcement operations are proceeding as planned this weekend in Los Angeles County,' U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli said on X as the standoff unfolded. 'I urge the public to refrain from interfering with these lawful actions. Anyone who obstructs federal agents will face arrest and prosecution.' In Paramount, a city that is 82% Latino, protesters gathered along Alondra Boulevard after reports that immigration officers were targeting people at a Home Depot, where day laborers commonly gather in search of work. A group of protesters stationed themselves near the Alondra exit of the 710 freeway, as a second gathered at the Home Depot. 'ICE has brought their terror tactics and masked agents to #Paramount this morning — in my district,' wrote U.S. Rep Nanette D. Barragán, whose district includes Paramount, in a post on X. 'This is unacceptable. We will demand answers and accountability. For those out there - please stay safe, protest peacefully, and KNOW YOUR RIGHTS.' By Saturday afternoon, bright orange shopping carts from Home Depot and a blue recycling bin were scattered across the boulevard. The air was acrid with smoke. Helicopter footage from the scene showed law enforcement vehicles blocking access as they closed the road. Border Patrol agents stood lined up. As a white bus with U.S. Marshals Service markings approached the scene, protesters stood in front of the vehicle in an attempt to stop it. Protesters burned an American flag, and others began lining the boulevard with large cement bricks. Federal officials struck an ominous tone. 'Multiple arrests have already been made for obstructing our operations,' FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino said on X. 'More are coming. We are pouring through the videos for more perpetrators. You bring chaos, and we'll bring handcuffs.'
Yahoo
6 hours ago
- Yahoo
Opinion: A smarter, fairer way to fund Medicaid for people like me
In 2004, I broke my neck and became a quadriplegic. I was 24 years old and completely paralyzed below my shoulders. Without Medicaid, I wouldn't have survived those early years — let alone gone on to earn a law degree. But I also wouldn't have stayed poor as long as I did. That's the problem with how Medicaid currently works for people with disabilities. To keep Medicaid, you often have to stay below poverty-level income and asset thresholds. Want to work? You risk losing your coverage. Want to save for a car? Not so fast. We need a Medicaid model that guarantees coverage for vulnerable populations and recognizes both the dignity of independence and the value of work. Here's my proposal: shift the primary responsibility for funding Medicaid to the states, while the federal government reimburses the states for Medicaid spending on: • Children in low-income families • Low-income elderly adults • People with disabilities ages 16-64 who are either progressing students (full reimbursement) or working (reimbursement up to the amount of their taxable income) The states would be required to provide Medicaid coverage for all people with disabilities regardless of income, assets, and work or student status, but both the states and federal government could require people with significant income to obtain private supplemental insurance — relieving states of some Medicaid costs. This plan does three essential things. First, it aligns financial incentives. Under current rules, the states have little reason to invest in helping disabled adults live meaningful lives, including pursuing education or working. Under this model, the more someone earns or pursues valuable education, the more their state receives in federal reimbursements. Helping disabled adults enter and remain in the workforce becomes not just morally right but also financially sound. Second, this plan unleashes human potential. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the 2024 labor force participation rate for people with disabilities ages 16-64 was a tragically low 40%, compared to 78% for those without disabilities. The unemployment rate among people with disabilities was 8%, more than double the less than 4% rate of those without disabilities. These disparities aren't simply the result of individual limitations — they reflect a system that undermines work for people with disabilities, trapping them in poverty and limiting their potential. My plan removes that disincentive. Third, this plan brings fiscal discipline to Medicaid. In 2024, total Medicaid spending was over $900 billion, with about two-thirds covered by the federal government and one-third by the states, according to the National Association of State Budget Officers. We can target those funds better. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation's 2021 data, adults with disabilities ages 18-64 account for about one-third of Medicaid spending. My proposal would incentivize states to use Medicaid to help people with disabilities to pursue education, employment and independence, while encouraging state-led innovation to deliver those services more efficiently. States are better equipped to tailor care programs. They are 'laboratories of democracy.' With clearer authority and direct financial incentives rewarding their success, states will be free to pursue innovative care models: consumer-directed services, telehealth, supported employment or customized in-home care, whatever works best for the people of their state. Critically, this approach also elevates education as a path out of dependency. If a student with disabilities is making 'substantial academic progress' — a term that could be precisely defined in federal regulation — their state would qualify for full reimbursement of their Medicaid costs. This rewards long-term investment in human potential and acknowledges the added effort it takes to pursue education while managing a serious disability. For someone like me, this is more than policy — it's personal. Medicaid made my education possible. But the rules also penalized me for every financial step forward. That's not just inefficient — it's inhumane. We can do better. We can fund Medicaid in a way that values work, education and independence — while targeting federal dollars more precisely and empowering states to find better ways of delivering care. Let's stop trapping people with disabilities in poverty and start treating them as full participants in our economy. Let's build a Medicaid system that sees us not as burdens, but as investments.
Los Angeles Times
7 hours ago
- Los Angeles Times
ICE arrested a California union leader. Does Trump understand what that means?
Unions in California are different from those in other places. More than any state in our troubled country, their ranks are filled with people of color and immigrants. While unions have always been tied closely with the struggles of civil rights, that has become even more pronounced in the years since George Floyd was killed by a police officer in Minneapolis. In the subsequent national soul-searching, unions were forced to do a bit of their own. But where that conversation has largely broken down for general society under the pressure of President Trump's right-wing rage, it took hold inside of unions to a much greater degree — leading to more leadership from people of color, sometimes younger leadership and definitely an understanding from the rank and file that these are organizations that fight far beyond the workplace. Which is why the arrest of David Huerta, president of SEIU-USWW and SEIU California, by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Friday is going to have a major impact on the coming months as deportations continue. 'They have woke us up,' Tia Orr told me Saturday morning. She's the executive director of the 700,000-strong Service Employees International Union California, of which Huerta is a part, and the first African American and Latina to lead the organization. 'And I think they've woke people up across the nation, certainly in California, and people are ready to get to action,' she added. 'I haven't seen that in a long time. I don't know that I've seen something like that before, and so yes, it is going to result in action that I believe is going to be historical.' While unions have voiced their disapproval of mass deportations since the MAGA threat first manifested, their might has not gone full force against them, taking instead a bit of a wait-and-see approach. Well, folks, we've seen. We've seen the unidentified masked men rounding up immigrants across the country and shipping them into life sentences at torturous foreign prisons; we've watched a 9-year-old Southern California boy separated from his father and detained for deportation; and Friday, across Los Angeles, we saw an anonymous military-style force of federal agents sweep up our neighbors, family members and friends in what seemed to be a haphazard and deliberately cruel way. And for those of you who have watched the video of Huerta's arrest, we've seen a middle-aged Latino man in a plaid button-down be roughly pushed by authorities in riot gear until he falls backward, and seems to strike his head on the curb. Huerta was, according to a television interview with Mayor Karen Bass, pepper-sprayed as well. Then he was taken to the hospital for treatment, then into custody, where he remains until a Monday arraignment. U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli wrote on social media that 'Federal agents were executing a lawful judicial warrant at a LA worksite this morning when David Huerta deliberately obstructed their access by blocking their vehicle. He was arrested for interfering with federal officers ... Let me be clear: I don't care who you are—if you impede federal agents, you will be arrested and prosecuted. No one has the right to assault, obstruct, or interfere with federal authorities carrying out their duties.' I have covered protests, violent and nonviolent, for more than two decades. In one of the first such events I covered, I watched an iconic union leader, Bill Camp, sit down in the middle of the road in a Santa suit and refuse to move. Police arrested him. But they managed to do it without violence, and without Camp's resistance. This is how unions do good trouble — without fear, without violence. Huerta understands the rules and power of peaceful protest better than most. The union he is president of — SEIU United Service Workers West — started the Justice for Janitors campaign in 1990, a bottom-up movement that in Los Angeles was mostly powered by the immigrant Latina women who cleaned commercial office space for wages as low as $7 an hour. After weeks of protests, police attacked those Latina workers in June of that year in what became known as the 'Battle of Century City.' Two dozen workers were injured but the union did not back down. Eventually, it won the contracts it was seeking, and equally as important, it won public support. Huerta joined USWW a few years after that incident, growing the Justice for Janitors campaign. The union was and has always been one powered by immigrant workers who saw that collective power was their best power, and Huerta has led decades of building that truth into a practical force. He is, says Orr, an organizer who knows how to bring people together. To say he is a beloved and respected leader in both the union and California in general is an understatement. You can still find his bio on the White House website, since he was honored as a 'Champion of Change,' by President Obama. Within hours of his arrest, political leaders across the state were voicing support. 'David Huerta is a respected leader, a patriot, and an advocate for working people. No one should ever be harmed for witnessing government action,' Gov. Gavin Newsom posted online. Perhaps more importantly, AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler, speaking for her 15 million members, issued a statement. Huerta 'was doing what he has always done, and what we do in unions: putting solidarity into practice and defending our fellow workers,' she said. 'The labor movement stands with David and we will continue to demand justice for our union brother until he is released.' Similar statements came from the Teamsters and other unions. Solidarity isn't a buzzword to unions. It's the bedrock of their power. In arresting Huerta, that solidarity has been supercharged. Already, union members from across the state are making plans to gather Monday for Huerta's arraignment in downtown Los Angeles. Meanwhile, Stephen Miller, the Santa Monica native and architect of Trump's deportation plans, has said the raids we are seeing now are just the beginning, and that he would like to see thousands of arrests every day, because our immigrant communities are filled with 'every kind of criminal thug that you can imagine on planet earth.' But in arresting Huerta, the battleground has been redrawn in ways we don't fully yet appreciate. No doubt, Miller will have his way and the raids will not only continue, but increase. But also, the unions are not going to back down. 'Right now, just in the last 14 hours, labor unions are joining together from far and wide, communities are reaching out in ways I've never seen,' Orr told me. 'Something is different.' Rosa Parks was just a woman on a bus, she pointed out, until she was something more. George Floyd was just another Black man stopped by police. Until he was something more. Huerta is the something more of these immigration raids — not because he's a union boss, but because he's a union organizer with ties to both people in power and people in fear. The coming months will show what happens when those two groups decide, together, that backing down is not an option.
