Within the group of activists resisting ice

Orange County’s rapid response network is a loose association of volunteers (organizers and attorneys and hundreds of residents concerned) who help immigrants fight detention and deportation. On Monday morning, the group’s hotline was running received an abnormal number of calls. Uniform agents from the Department of Homeland Security have been found at various locations west of the county town of Santa Ana. They aired from a maroon truck in the parking lot of Home Depot and then chased the day laborers, waiting to be hired outside. They raided the car wash and arrested someone at the bus stop. “We were treated with a series of hits and we mobilized the first responders to confirm the witness,” Casey Conway, one of two full-time staff at OC Rapid Response, told me. The network issued a warning on social media, approached immigration attorneys, and guided family members through kits to adopt “immediate steps to support loved ones immediately.”

OC Quick Response was established at the beginning by a group of advocates and lawyers Donald Trump’s First semester. Another employee, Sandra de Anda, joined the volunteer that year. De Anda from the Latino and Cambodian community of Santa Ana ice Always present. “We see targets for immigration and customs law enforcement officers at home,” she said. Orange County sits under Los Angeles, with a population of 3.2 million, 30% of whom were born outside the United States. Some parts of the county have strong immigration status, while others are proudly localists. For example, the surfing town of Huntington Beach passed an ordinance earlier this year declaring itself “illegal immigrants to prevent crimes.”

However ice Conway told me that President Joe Biden’s policy was to have family arrests during Trump’s first term, to get people “directly detained from prison.” De Anda explained that this targeted enforcement seems to have ended. “It’s about numbers now.” After Trump returned to his term, he issued an executive order to “significantly increase” the number of immigration officials and speed up the removal, an accelerated deportation process that was previously only used at the border, which is a default policy. In February, the Department of Homeland Security launched a series of raids in Los Angeles last month. ice Despite city and state asylum policies, agents began arresting and detaining asylum seekers and other newcomers in the immigration court in Santa Ana. A reporter named Ben Camacho found that since Trump’s inauguration, Santa Ana police have known immigrant police officers in more than forty times to operate in the city. (A spokesperson for the City of Santa Ana and its police department declined to speak with me. ice My request for comment was not responded. )

Last Friday, ice Leading an operation by Los Angeles clothing wholesaler Ambiance Apparel, detaining workers and sparking daily protests. At least some workers have been deported. “We saw what was going on in Los Angeles, and we were probably the time when they arrived in Orange County,” DeAnda said.

On Monday, the government announced it would deploy 4,000 National Guard and 700 Marines to Greater Los Angeles, claiming the need to “enable federal law enforcement officers to perform their duties safely.” OC Rapid Response received reports of at least seven raids that morning. The network issued an immediate “Call for Action” outside of Civic Center Plaza, a government complex where arrested immigrants were handled:

Now!
Large-scale ice attack
Orange surroundings
County is
Processed here.
Let’s show them how
OC keeps its people
Safe.

Detained immigrants travel to and from the government building with large white vans with tinted windows. Members of the network line up along the driveway leading to the building and flocked to it. Conway calculated 15 vans in a few hours. OCs’ quick responses can’t save people from detention, but they can slow down the process and try to prevent deportation by attracting people’s lawyers. Around noon, federal agents in Riot Gear pushed for clearing the road for the van. They pushed an old woman, fired rubber bullets, and used pepper spray on protesters, including Conway. The liquid grabbed the glasses and dripped onto his eyes.

By the time I arrived, the weather was clear and hot, and the demonstrations had gone far beyond the direct connection of the Internet. Hundreds of people filled the driveway. Every passing car seemed to tweet and cheer for support. Orange County Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento was present. “I was saddened to see six people being taken away at my warehouse this morning,” he told the crowd. One organizer instructed them to write “Catch Y Llama Este #9233#” on their sign (“Record yourself and call this number”) and lift the van as it passes. This number links detainees to legal aid. Fernando, a thirty-one-year-old delivery driver, told me he was here because ice “Just kidnapping.” He continued, “I’m Mexican, and I have a family that I’m afraid of. I don’t even want my mom out.” On the street, about twelve federal agents armed and helmets stood at the front entrance of the building.

Later in the afternoon, a lawsuit by a group of Santa Ana police officers appeared on the other side of the street. Protesters moved away in the direction of federal agents. People threw plastic water bottles and agents responded with pepper balls and tear gas. People ran away. Amid chaos, two white trucks pass the gap created by Santa Ana police officers ice Processing center.

That night, De Anda and Conway brought training courses to those interested in becoming.ice Observer. “The network has more than twenty people activities every month or so. She writes novels and has a comedy beside her. ice There isn’t much luck getting into people’s homes now, and it seems that the outdoor area is prioritized now. She mentioned a recent court ruling that without a judicial arrest warrant, immigrant police officers were unable to enter the area around the residence (a covered porch, carport or backyard). (I learned a new word: “Curtilage.”) Conway was exhausted by protests and pepper spray; he played a supporting role and ordered pizza for the crowd.

OC Rapid Response is one of two dozen similar networks in California, including Ventura County Defenders and Stand Together. Several members of the partner group are undergoing training, including Amina Fields, an immigration attorney for the California U.S. Islamic Relations Council. Earlier that day, she held aNo hatred/no ban“The signing at Los Angeles International Airport opposes Trump’s new travel restrictions on citizens of the Middle East, Africa and the Caribbean. ice custody. “The OC responds quickly to create a list of people recorded in detention, and now we are experiencing it,” she told me. “Legal, once detained, it’s hard.” Like De Anda and Conway, the children of Vietnamese refugee, Fields have personal connections with these efforts. When she was young, she immigrated from Vietnam through Thai refugee camps, and she spent ten years in the U.S. Air Force before attending law school. Trump is angry about deploying the National Guard and Marines. “To put them against their own community members, their own family members – there is no need to call the army here,” she said.

On Tuesday morning, the OC Quick Response Hotline was still buzzing. Hundreds of people gathered outside the building again to be detained and met through tactical vehicles and a frightening display of the National Guard. “It feels like a career,” DeAnda told me. “They are following instructions to destroy our communities and our economic stability.” Report ice The raid spread. On Instagram, the network distributes any information it can verify the Homeland Security campaign. “We received an anonymous prompt ice Today or tomorrow, it will be in the Orange County Social Service Building on South St. Ana.

On that day, Pete HegsethThe Secretary of Defense told the House Subcommittee that members of the National Guard and the Marines could be in Greater Los Angeles for another two months. The estimated cost is $10 billion, just to pay for food, transportation and accommodation. “I think we are entering another stage, especially under President Trump, who focuses on the homeland,” he said. The National Guard will be a “key component.” (The federal court of appeals will soon consider whether to uphold the decision of the lower court to temporarily block the mobilization.)

Military convoys drove away on Interstate 5; one ice The checkpoints rise at the exit near the school. Governor Gavin Newsom Hegseth spoke after testifying, saying, “Other countries are next. Democracy is next.” There are parades in Austin, Philadelphia, New York, San Francisco and Seattle. In Southern California, rapid response has become the current strategy. Every union and nonprofit organization seems to be promoting helplines and understanding their rights materials. Community group chats focus on specific communities and proliferate on signals. Protesters yelled outside the Hilton Garden Inn and hit the instrument for twelve hours in Arcadia, northeast of Los Angeles. ice Officer; by Tuesday night, officers pack up their luggage. Trump’s border chest Tom Homan acknowledged that the demonstrations made law enforcement “more difficult”. He told right-wing activist and podcast Charlie Kirk ice More resources are needed for mass deportation: “We need more officials. More beds. More planes are needed.”

OC responds quickly to try to celebrate a small victory. In tracing arrested community members iceThe network’s “online detention locator system” found that the city of Glendale, Los Angeles County, had an active federal contract to jail immigrants. The contract clearly predates the state’s 2017 asylum law and is allowed exceptions. Glendale canceled the contract a few days after OC responded quickly to members and attorneys who announced the issue on behalf of members of the community. The city said the decision was “not a political drive.”

This means a fewer stations, but community members are still in custody. As of this month, more than 50,000 immigrants are ice Detention is the highest number since 2019 and is also the largest private facility in California, owned by Geo Group, the recently restored business Adelanto Detention Center, after class action lawsuits against unsafe conditions were settled during the pandemic. In the second half of last year, the facility held only three inmates due to the lawsuit. Now it can accommodate one hundred and nine hundred. “In this work, you have to accept David’s role as David and the Giants,” Conway told me. “A lot of victory will be like loss, but it’s still resistance.” ♦