Los Angeles has become a flashpoint in the Trump administration’s escalating war on immigrants. On Friday, June 6, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raided a Home Depot parking lot in the city’s Westlake District, detaining several undocumented day laborers. Later, agents raided the city’s garment district.

But ICE is meeting fierce opposition from community members. The raids sparked demonstrations, with protesters chanting and throwing eggs and rocks at the agents and police officers, who responded with pepper spray and tear gas. Forty-four people were arrested, among them California SEIU president David Huerta. The labor leader has been treated for injuries, but still in federal custody.

The next morning, ICE targeted Home Depot in Paramount, a city in the South Bay area of Los Angeles county. Agents literally chased people down the street but were confronted by the community. The majority Latino and Black youth built barricades around the store, and responded to the agents’ flash bang grenades, rubber bullets, and tear gas with rocks and bottles. They changed, “Fuera!” (“Get out!”) and “Get Out of Our Community!” Border Patrol agents dressed in camo gear were forced into a corner.

As the day progressed, clashes took place in Compton, Inglewood, and Long Beach, led by Latino and Black youth. Vehicles, including a Border Patrol car, were burned and young people took over the streets, marching with Mexican flags, wearing keffiyehs, and demanding ICE out of their communities.

Highlighting the interconnectedness of our struggles, protesters commented that Los Angeles shares a common cause with Palestine; that “the enemy is not me or you, it’s them!” The fight for Gaza is also linked to the fight for immigrant rights — after all, the weapons and surveillance used on Palestinians is also used to attack our migrant siblings in the United States.

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