Padilla says in Senate ‘it's time to wake up' after forced removal from Noem's event
'I was handcuffed and marched down a hallway repeatedly asking, 'Why I am being detained?'' Padilla said as several of his colleagues from both major political parties sat in their chairs and listened. 'Not once did they tell me why.'
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He said he wondered in the moment if he was being arrested — he wasn't — and, if he was, what the city and his family would think.
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'What will a city already on edge from being militarized think when they see their U.S. senator being handcuffed for just trying to ask a question?' Padilla said.
In a statement afterward, the Department of Homeland Security said that Padilla 'chose disrespectful political theater' and that the Secret Service 'thought he was an attacker.' The statement claimed erroneously that Padilla did not identify himself — he did, as he was being pushed from the room.
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Senator Alex Padilla, D-Calif., is pushed out of the room as Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem holds a news conference regarding the recent protests in Los Angeles, Thursday, June 12, 2025.
David Crane/Associated Press
'Padilla was told repeatedly to back away and did not comply with officers' repeated commands,' the statement said, adding that officers acted appropriately.
Padilla said he attended the press conference amid the immigration raids that have led to protests in California and around the country and as the Republican president sent military troops to his state. He said he spoke up after he heard Noem say that they wanted to 'liberate' Los Angeles from Mayor Karen Bass and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, both Democrats.
'Let that fundamentally un-American mission statement sink in,' Padilla said.
Padilla and his angry Democratic colleagues have framed the episode as intimidation by the Trump administration, especially as it came days after Democratic Rep. LaMonica McIver was indicted on federal charges alleging she assaulted and interfered with immigration officers outside a detention center in New Jersey while Newark's Democratic mayor, Ras Baraka, was being arrested after he tried to join a congressional oversight visit at the facility.
Padilla encouraged Americans to speak out.
'No one is coming to save us but us,' Padilla said. 'And we know that the cameras are not in every corner of the country. But if this administration is this afraid of just one senator with a question, colleagues, imagine what the voices of tens of millions of Americans peacefully protesting can do.'
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