Indio protesters rally against ICE actions in Coachella Valley

Dozens of people gathered outside the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Border Patrol station in Indio on Sunday to protest recent actions by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the Coachella Valley.

The rally came two days after one man was detained by ICE in Cathedral City and after a weekend of sweeps across Southern California that have stoked fear and paranoia in the communities targeted.

Organized by Comité Latino and attended by people of all ages, speakers on Sunday rallied to remind each other of their civil and human rights in the face of deportations and detainments of immigrants.

The Indio Police Department posted on Facebook that in accordance with California law, “We do not enforce federal immigration laws and communications with federal agencies may only occur on very serious criminal matters, such as violent felonies, human trafficking, and terrorism-related investigations.”

Communities were already on edge after the Trump administration sent more than 200 migrants to a mega-prison in El Salvador, even though a large number of those detained had no prior convictions in the United States. After Friday’s arrest, reports and rumors about ICE and Border Patrol surveilling local shopping centers spread fast on social media.

Speakers said some in the community are now afraid to attend work or other daily activities after federal law enforcement officers were seen on camera arresting day laborers outside of a Home Depot in Los Angeles and reports of raids on grocery stores, restaurants, and other places of work. 

All weekend, social media was flooded with confirmed and unconfirmed sightings of immigration authorities throughout the valley, spreading panic amongst the community. A grassroots effort emerged on social media to take pictures and spread information about ICE activity.

Often emotional, attendees spoke of the need for community and how to help each other, like offering to buy groceries for neighbors too afraid to leave their house, and spreading the word about the legal rights of immigrants in the U.S., legal or illegal.

The protest in Indio wasn’t the only gathering over the weekend, about a hundred people gathered along Ramon Road in Cathedral City on Saturday to protest the arrest, and the Inland Congregations United for Change hosted a press conference alongside Comité Latino, United Farmworkers Foundation, TODEC Legal Center, and the Inland Coalition for Justice.

Pastor Rick Saldivar of Cathedral City said he saw the immigration authorities gathering as he was headed to his son’s fifth grade promotion, “It brought me to think, how many families were going to go celebrate this promotion, and how many didn’t make it out there?” 

“My community was shaken up,” he said. “It was very sad.” 

Amid the ongoing protests, the federal government activated 5,000 California National Guard troops and sent them to Los Angeles, followed by another 700 Marines from the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center and Marine Air Ground Task Force Training Command in Twentynine Palms.

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