Trump's immigration hammer bonks L.A. When will it smash down?

Los Angeles Times

a day ago

For months, Donald Trump and his deportation dream team — border czar Tom Homan, White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller and Homeland Security head Kristi Noem — have warned any city, state or county that seems even somewhat sympathetic to illegal immigrants that their day of reckoning will come.
For Los Angeles, it's now.
Since Friday, the city and its suburbs have seen federal officers from various agencies face off against protesters who have unsuccessfully tried to stop them from conducting workplace raids or transport people suspected of being in this country illegally to detention facilities.
The scenes haven't been pretty.
Federal agents have used flash-bang grenades and tear gas to disperse crowds from Paramount to downtown to the Garment District. They even arrested SEIU California President David Huerta for allegedly blocking a federal vehicle. Protesters, meanwhile, have fought back with rocks, bottles and fireworks. A row of Waymos was set on fire near Olvera Street on Sunday afternoon, emitting an eerie swan song of honks. A fleet of Highway Patrol vehicles parked near a 101 freeway underpass was pelted by protesters from above with cement shards, e-scooters and even paper set on fire.
In the proverbial thick of it are the Los Angeles police and L.A. County Sheriff's departments, whose leaders have continuously stressed that their agencies aren't involved in any immigration actions even as they have assisted la migra by keeping crowds away with batons and less-than-lethal rounds.
Some of the 2,000 National Guard troops Trump called up over the strenuous objections of Gov. Gavin Newsom and Mayor Karen Bass are now in Southern California. This is the first time something like this has happened since Lyndon B. Johnson sent the Guard to Alabama in 1965 to protect civil rights activists from white citizens and corrupt law enforcement.
Trump's incendiary move has set a city whose nerves have been frayed all year further on edge, fearing there's worse to come from him.
And worse things are coming, Angelenos, though not from activists and professional rioters: What we saw this weekend is Trump bonking L.A. with a toy mallet while itching to swing his federal sledgehammer.
One of the many news conferences held over the past three days by outraged community leaders happened Sunday at La Placita Olvera. We best remember it as the birthplace of Los Angeles, but this serene spot also offers a lesson from the past for what's happening today — and will probably happen soon.
On Feb. 26, 1931, about 400 people were hanging out at La Placita at 3 p.m. when dozens of federal agents from as far away as San Francisco and Arizona suddenly surrounded the plaza. A 2001 Times story noted that immigration authorities 'had for days been posting newspaper ads warning of an impending raid against 'Mexican aliens.''
LAPD officers stood at each exit to make sure no one could escape. For the next two hours, immigration agents demanded everyone detained show proof that they were in the country legally. La Opinión reported the following day that la migra explained to angry onlookers 'with smiles that they were following orders from superiors and that the [roundup] was completely in accord with the laws of the land.'
Sixteen immigrants ended up being detained, all men: 11 were Mexican, five Chinese and one Japanese.
La Placita was specifically chosen by the feds for such a huge raid 'for its maximum psychological impact' against Latinos in Los Angeles and beyond, according to 'Decade of Betrayal: Mexican Repatriation in the 1930s.' It was the federal government's kickoff to years of repatriation efforts against people of Mexican descent — more than a few American citizens — pushed by the Hoover and FDR administrations, leading to hundreds of thousands of them leaving the United States, some never to return.
Given Trump's love of spectacle, what his agencies have unleashed on L.A. over the weekend seems like the opening notes for something even bigger. Expect resistance from residents even stronger that what we've seen so far.
Trucha, Los Angeles — be vigilant, and be careful out there.
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Today's great photo is from Times photographer Gina Ferazzi in Compton, where Los Angeles residents pushed back against Immigration and Customs Enforcement sweeps.
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