2 days ago
White House sends National Guard to protests against LA immigration raid
Protests against immigration raids across Los Angeles have spilled to a second day in what the White House has labelled an anti-US "insurrection".
The rallies first kicked off in the Paramount area on Friday, local time, after Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested 44 people from locations across the city on alleged immigration violations.
ICE agents executed search warrants at three locations, including a clothing warehouse in LA's fashion district where a tense scene unfolded as a crowd tried to block agents from driving away.
The Associated Press was told people were also detained outside Home Depot stores and a doughnut shop.
By Friday evening, protesters had gathered outside a federal detention centre where lawyers said the arrested people had been taken, chanting "set them free, let them stay".
Other protesters held signs that said "ICE out of LA!" and led chants and shouted from megaphones. Some scrawled graffiti on the building facade.
The demonstration outside the centre prompted a police response that included tear gas, flash-bangs and the arrest of a union leader.
The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that "1,000 rioters surrounded a federal law enforcement building and assaulted ICE law enforcement officers, slashed tires, defaced buildings, and taxpayer-funded property".
The claims were not independently verified.
Confrontations continued into Saturday, with Reuters video showing dozens of green-uniformed security personnel with gas masks lined up on a road strewn with overturned shopping carts as small canisters exploded into gas clouds.
The officers, who appeared to be from Border Patrol, not local LA police, stood guard outside an industrial park in Paramount and deployed tear gas to disperse crowds.
"ICE out of Paramount. We see you for what you are," a woman announced through a megaphone.
"You are not welcome here."
One hand-held sign said, "No Human Being is Illegal."
The Trump administration indicated on Saturday evening that it would deploy the National Guard, a military reserve force activated by a state governor as part of an emergency response.
"We're already mobilising. We're gonna bring National Guard in tonight and we're gonna continue doing our job. This is about enforcing the law," Donald Trump's border czar Tom Homan told Fox News.
However, California Governor Gavin Newsom appeared to have been against the call, saying on X that the federal government was "taking over" the California National Guard.
"That move is purposefully inflammatory and will only escalate tensions … there is currently no unmet need," he said.
"This is the wrong mission and will erode public trust."
White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller wrote on X that the demonstrations constituted an "insurrection against the laws and sovereignty of the United States".
ICE representatives did not immediately respond to AP inquiries about weekend enforcement activities.
The LA Police Department did not take part in the immigration enforcement.
It was deployed to quell civil unrest after crowds protesting the deportation raids spray-painted anti-ICE slogans on the walls of a federal court building and gathered outside a nearby jail where some of the detainees were reportedly being held.
Arrests by immigration authorities in LA come as the Trump administration pushes to fulfil promises to carry out mass deportations across the country.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said the ICE raids were meant to "sow terror" in the nation's second-largest city.
Speaking to NBC4 later, she threw her support behind the LA community.
"We are going to fight for all Angelenos, regardless of when they got here, whether they have papers or not," Ms Bass said.
"We are a city of immigrants, and this impacts hundreds of thousands of Angelenos."
California is home to the United States' largest immigrant population, having 10.6 million foreign-born residents.
That accounts for 22 per cent of the total foreign-born population across the country.
According to the Pew Research Center, 1.8 million immigrants in California, or about 17 per cent of the total number, were undocumented in 2022 and 83 per cent either held US citizenship or another legal residency status.
That data, based off information from the US Census Bureau, also found that from 2019 to 2022, California was the only one of seven US states whose unauthorised immigrant population did not increase.
Since Mr Trump's return to office, ICE agents have been particularly active in California, Illinois, and New York, all historically blue states, according to analysis published by Axios last week.
Those are also states whose respective legislations prohibit local law enforcement authorities from assisting in federal immigration arrests.
In a statement on Saturday, ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons chided the LA mayor for the city's response to the protests.
"Mayor Bass took the side of chaos and lawlessness over law enforcement," he said.
"Make no mistake, ICE will continue to enforce our nation's immigration laws and arrest criminal illegal aliens."
ABC/wires
