2 days ago
Deportation flights draw weekly protests at Sonoma County airport
For many in the San Francisco Bay Area, political protests have become a regular weekend activity, and that is especially true in recent days.
One demonstration in Sonoma County is being noted, not for its size, but for its persistence.
"Fight the power! Fight the power!..." blared the music from a speaker set up alongside a protest at the Sonoma County airport. Tamara Mucha said she could think of better things to do on a Sunday, but none more important.
"Standing out here in a public place, in the sun, in my free time, when there's more fun things to do than this?" she said. "But, you know, you've got to stand up. You've got to say what you stand for."
Mucha said she has attended hundreds of protests, but this was only her second time on Airport Boulevard in Santa Rosa. A local chapter of the activist group Indivisible has been holding a sidewalk vigil every Sunday for more than two months.
It's because Charles Schulz Airport is one of the hubs for Avelo Airlines, a small air carrier that has accepted a lot of money from the Department of Homeland Security to transport undocumented immigrants out of the country.
"And this company that has taken a $150 million contract to participate in that," said Mucha. "I think business owners and retirees like myself, and even people coming by and honking their horns, you know, we all have a part to play."
The company's CEO, Andrew Levy, acknowledged the deal. In a written statement, he said:
"We realize this is a sensitive and complicated topic. After significant deliberations, we determined this charter flying will provide us with the stability to continue expanding our core scheduled passenger service and keep our more than 1,100 Crewmembers employed for years to come."
But it's not doing much to expand business in Sonoma County. The airport released numbers that show Avelo has seen a 32% drop in ridership year-to-year, while Alaska and American have increased their passenger load.
No one can say for sure if the protests are having an effect on that.
"Well, they're only flying a couple of connecting flights out here anymore," said Mucha. "So, what they say is it's unrelated. But, you know, it's awfully coincidental."
Either way, the weekly airport demonstrations are giving people a chance to express their concerns about the direction of the country. A man named Steve from Petaluma said protests and boycotts may be the only power the people have in the fight.
"I've been to probably, in the last six or eight weeks, 30-odd protests," he said. "We've noted that there's been first timers at a lot of these actions. It's a watershed period in our history and we're watching our democracy slip away with the rule of law and what's coming out of the White House."
Lisa Rice, an organizer with the activist group Indivisible, agreed.
"It's either sit at home, be depressed and scared, or go out and do something and change the world," said Rice. And she said it doesn't have to be a massive event with thousands of people, that even a small gathering can have an impact, "because we're all connected, each little handful is another drop in the bucket."
And she said she is happy to be one of those drops. But at the airport, a man named Jimmy from Willits, who supports the president, said he doesn't even understand why people are protesting at all.
"Why are they protesting here? People are in the country illegally. They're being deported. That's how it should be," he said. "Come legally. They shouldn't be here illegally. Deport 'em. They should buy the tickets anyway. Support that airline."
Avelo said it is basing its international deportation flights out of an airport in Mesa, Arizona. Any immigrants transported from the Sonoma Airport would be connecting to that location.
Currently, the airline operates few passenger flights out of Charles Schulz, but now that they're focusing on the charter flight business, they can probably expect a welcoming committee out on the street for some time to come.
