For 25 years, Emma De Paz got up at two every morning to prepare soup, roasted chicken, and tamales to sell to construction workers who were getting supplies for the day at the Home Depot.
In a makeshift village that served as a sort of haven for Latino immigrants in the Hollywood neighborhood, she joined other immigrant merchants who were set up under tents and over grills along the side streets. Together with his spouse, Abelino Perez Alvarez sold water, soda, and orange juice. In the hopes of finding work, day workers waited outside the parking lot, scrolling through their phones.
The refuge was destroyed Thursday morning around 7:30. Numerous armed operatives, many wearing masks, gathered in the parking lot, obstructing gates and encircling the lots that are often occupied by street sellers and day laborers.
Migraci n! Migraci! People screamed and dispersed.
They rushed down streets and hopped into automobiles. They concealed themselves inside soil bags in the Home Depot gardening area, in stores, and on building sites. Alvarez’s wife leaped into a passing automobile after opening the door.
According to Diego Rueda Hernandez, they entered from all directions. He rushed behind bags of dirt in the parking lot with others out of fear, despite being a resident with legal status.
He said, “Agarraron los indios.”The dark-skinned individuals were taken.
Due to protests, intermittent violence, and the deployment of the National Guard and U.S. Marines during peacetime, the immigration raids in Los Angeles during the past two weeks have drawn international attention. However, each roundup has caused extremely personal misery to those who are drawn into it, shattering families, creating terror, and depriving them of resources to pay their rent and feed their children.
All of this occurred quickly on Thursday morning in Hollywood at the local Home Depot, which is the focus of the Trump administration and the source of financial stability for many working-class immigrants around the country.
Agents apprehended over a dozen vendors, day workers, and consumers, including a U.S. citizen, according to witnesses and activists who assisted in gathering information from family members following the sweep.
Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security Tricia McLaughlin announced in a statement Thursday afternoon that Customs and Border Protection had detained nine illegal aliens in San Fernando and Pacoima and thirty illegal aliens in Hollywood, California. According to her, someone crashed his car into a police car during the day’s operations.
California
There is a growing conflict between individuals attempting to protect immigrants and immigration officers making arrests on the street. A 20-year-old Walmart employee was taken into custody following a contentious altercation with police in the Pico Rivera suburb of Los Angeles.
During the operation, CBP agents also experienced verbal harassment and abuse, according to McLaughlin.
Hollywood witnesses reported that the agents dispersed over the lot, swiftly arrested individuals, and then departed in about 30 minutes. The target was unclear. However, there were unverified claims of agents grabbing someone by smashing a car window.
Carlos Barrera De Paz, whose sister was stolen, stated, “All of the workers that come to this corner, we are a united community here.” They took our community along with us.
Broken glass was scattered across the parking lot as distraught family members congregated in the aftermath. The normally busy stands where workers start their days by purchasing coffee, juice, and tamales were deserted. Orange peels were scattered, tortillas were left on barbecues, and eggshells were cracked.
Silvia Menendez arrived early to distribute Know Your Rights cards because she knew that Home Depots had been top targets. She started shooting while people fled when the agents arrived. She witnessed one individual being thrown to the ground by six agents. Those who were arrested were dragged into vans and trucks by officers with assault guns and masks. She was being filmed by one of the masked agents.
She described it as frightening and eerie.
An armed Border Patrol officer yelled at those filming to return to the sidewalk in one of the videos! Another agent advised onlookers to just let them work while recording. Someone yelled for them to perish.
Job Garcia, a 33-year-old Claremont College PhD student, was at Home Depot picking up a customer’s purchase. Around 7:59 a.m., he texted his brother Elias Garcia, saying, “Hey Elias, me agarro ICE.”I got ICE.
Elias claimed that he has been unable to speak with his brother to learn the reason behind his arrest and subsequent booking into a federal detention center located in the downtown area.
Was he attempting to assist another undocumented individual, or was he engaging in racial profiling? “I’m not sure what it might be,” he replied.
On the pavement outside the Home Depot on St. Andrews Place, where her father, Abelino Perez Alvarez, 58, has been selling orange juice for seven years, Veronica Perez was crying. Her 50-year-old mother, who wished to remain anonymous, was also employed on this street. Due to the numerous attacks, the family decided to reduce their regular two stalls to only one.
Perez’s mother heard screams of “Migracion!” and fled toward the street as immigration officers surrounded the area. When a driver noticed that everyone was sprinting, they stopped.
Someone begged the stranger driver, “Ayudanos, ayudanos.”Assist us.
Perez’s mom didn’t hold out. She climbed into the car after opening the door. According to Perez, another female hawker was apprehended by agents after failing to leap in quickly enough.
The two had run in different directions. Perez’s father was captured, but her mother managed to escape.
Many people’s hearts continued to race as they attempted to piece together what had transpired and the whereabouts of their loved ones.
As Perez sobbed, Maegan Ortiz, executive director of the nonprofit organization Instituto de Educaci n Popular del Sur de California, or IDEPSCA, gave her a firm embrace.
In a notebook where she was recording the names of everyone who had been taken, she had jotted down Perez’s father’s name and birthdate.
Lo siento. “We will make every effort to locate him,” Ortiz assured Perez.
Perez pulled up her phone log, which showed that her first call to her mother listed as madresita went out at 7:35 a.m. According to Perez, she just has a daughter and her parents; she has no siblings.
I have nothing else. According to Perez, it’s the three of us. The family had been applying for a U visa a type granted to certain crime victims after her mom became the victim of a violent attack.
Perez stated, “We have that hope.”
California
Border Patrol agents on roving patrol arrest U.S. citizen on assault charges. Fear of widespread racial profiling gains momentum as Home Depots and car washes raided.
Many of the workers were registered with IDEPSCA s day laborer program. Their families trickled in after the sweep looking for them, picking up cars and talking to others who already felt a void.
Lourdes also got taken, one person told another.
Emma De Paz, 58, was nowhere to be found when her brother arrived at her stand. Barrera De Paz, who wore paint-splattered blue jeans, works as a handyman and had rushed over from Long Beach after seeing a live video on TikTok of arrests unfolding.
If anything happens to her, it will be the responsibility of the authorities that took my sister, he said.
Emma, who lost her husband after his heart transplant last year, has suffered from depression ever since and faces several medical issues.
My sister needs her medicine. She has diabetes. She needs medicine for her blood pressure and her heart, he said. By Thursday afternoon, they were able to drop off her medication.
I think of Germany, Hitler and the persecutions there, I thought that was just history, he said. Now, it felt like history repeating.
With the stands empty, many were enraged.
Despicable doesn t even begin to describe what this is, said Hugo Soto-Martinez, a Los Angeles City Council member who represents the area. You hear about this happening in military dictatorships and totalitarian governments. To happen here in the second-largest city in America is I don t have words, just outrage.
Organizers are working to find legal representation for some, but Soto-Martinez said the response should be nonviolent protest.
Nonviolent, direct action broke Jim Crow. It brought down apartheid. We are experiencing that at a national level. We know what works, we have to commit ourselves to that type of movement, he said.
Federal officials insist they are focusing mainly on criminals. Border Patrol Sector Chief Greg Bovino posted a video this week on his Instagram page featuring Assistant Chief Patrol Agent David Kim.
Roving patrols in an urban environment like Los Angeles County presents a lot of challenges for us. It s not as easy as people think it is, Kim said. But there is that narrative out there where people think that just because you re at a Home Depot that you re a hard worker and that s all you ve ever done.
He pointed out that they d picked up a Mexican national at a Cerritos Home Depot on Tuesday who d been convicted of sex with a minor younger than 16. We have a lot of people hiding in the country that should not be here. It takes us getting out on the ground, looking for these folks and it s just a lot of hard work that goes into it. We ll continue doing it.
In May, White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Millerreportedlydirected top Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials to go beyond target lists and have agents make arrests at Home Depot or 7-Eleven convenience stores as they sought to crank up their daily arrest numbers to 3,000.
Federal agents raided another Home Depot on Thursday in San Fernando. The city s vice mayor, Maria Elena Solorio, said on anInstagram post thatshe was looking for answers and had only the first names of those taken. She pleaded for help, alongside Los Angeles City Councilwoman Monica Rodriguez.
We need to protect one another in these very scary times, Rodriguez said. She urged people to report immigration agent sightings to a rapid response line and cautioned those to remain peaceful and not interfere.
This is a systematic attack against the most vulnerable members of the migrant community, said Pablo Alvarado, co-executive director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. It is the working poor. That s who they are going after. These are the spaces where they feel they can do this. They don t even have legal parameters.
Edwin Guevara says the people taken are those building Los Angeles. He runs a construction crew and got a call from one of his workers around 7:20 a.m. The man was buying lumber for a hotel job when immigration arrived. He told the man to hide inside Home Depot.
Us here at the Home Depot, we build this community, we build society to what it is. We re the ones who build the economy to where it s at, Guevara said. Without us building buildings, without us building homes, without us building restaurants for people to go eat, shops to shop at, Target, there would be no money in those places.
