While there are more than three months left in the fiscal year, one estimate has found that the agency is already $1 billion over budget, according to Axios. Legislators in both parties have raised concerns about the speed at which the agency is spending its funds, which may prompt President Donald Trump to seek additional funds from other agencies to support his deportation efforts.
A raid in Montebello, Calif., has stirred fears that federal agents are detaining and racially profiling U.S. citizens of Hispanic descent.
They swept into the Southern California car lot last Thursday at 4:32 p.m. — masked and armed Border Patrol agents in an unmarked white S.U.V.
One agent soon twisted Jason Brian Gavidia’s arm and pressed him against a black metal fence outside the lot where he runs an auto body shop in Montebello, a working-class suburb east of the Los Angeles city limits. Another officer then asked him an unusual question to prove whether he was a U.S. citizen or an undocumented immigrant.
“What hospital were you born at?” the Border Patrol agent asked.
Mr. Gavidia, 29, was born only a short drive from where they were standing, in East Los Angeles. He did not know the hospital’s name. “I was born here,” he shouted at the agent, adding, “I’m an American, bro!”
Mr. Gavidia was eventually released as he stood on the sidewalk. But another U.S. citizen, Javier Ramirez, 32 — Mr. Gavidia’s friend and co-worker — had been forced facedown to the ground by two agents in the car lot. Mr. Ramirez was put inside a van and driven to a federal detention center, where he remains in custody. Mr. Ramirez’s lawyer said that officials at the detention center had denied his request to speak to his client.
“I know enough to know this is not right at all,” Mr. Gavidia said in an interview. “Latinos in general are getting attacked. We’re all getting attacked.”
The episode on Thursday was captured on video by Mr. Gavidia’s friend and the car lot’s security cameras, and described in interviews with Mr. Gavidia, Mr. Ramirez’s lawyer and another man who was at the shop during the raid.
This is America? Sooner or later one of their victims will kill some of these thugs in self defense.
The spokesperson said one person had attempted to flee the scene, had assaulted an agent in the process and was arrested for having assaulted and interfered with agents. Another person was detained on the street for investigation for interference but was released after being confirmed to be a U.S. citizen. And a third person, the official said, was determined to be “an illegal alien” and was taken into custody without incident.
Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Homeland Security Department, which oversees the Border Patrol as well as Customs and Border Protection, said in a statement that Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem, the homeland security secretary, “has been clear: If you lay a hand on a law enforcement officer, you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
Payback is coming. It’s only a matter of time before the victims start responding with force of their own. The ICE thugs will get no sympathy from me.
As agents questioned Mr. Gavidia on the sidewalk, they pressed him against the fence and he repeatedly and loudly told them he could show identification to prove his citizenship. They dropped his arms and he reached for his California driver’s license.
The agents then confiscated both his license and his cellphone, Mr. Gavidia said. He pleaded with them for several minutes and the officer eventually returned his phone but never gave his license back, Mr. Gavidia said.
F*ck*ng ICE pigs stole his ID.
“That’s the new gang of L.A. right there,” he said on the video, adding: “This is not fair at all, bro. We’re all American here, man.”
Masked and unidentified ICE agents lurking near schools and homeless shelters spark fear and confusion in majority-Latino enclaves outside New York.
Run, scum, run!
See scum run!
Run, run, run!
A dozen or more masked men, some with long guns, tried to enter a men’s homeless shelter without identifying themselves in a rural town with a long-standing immigrant community on eastern Long Island in New York. Officials from the local police department later admitted they didn’t know where the masked men came from — only adding to local residents’ concerns.
At the same time, 50 miles to the west, six unmarked cars with masked agents from U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, parked within hundreds of feet of an elementary school in a working-class town with a large Latino population. In response, a group of residents gathered to shame the agents, accusing the agents with ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations, or HSI, of lying in wait to snatch the parents of students when school let out.
…
On Long Island, the two federal raids on Tuesday saw emergency communiqués from schools to parents, incorrect information distributed to area media by local authorities, a confrontation with angry demonstrators, and a car accident.
…
Late Tuesday morning in Westbury, in western Nassau County, parents and nearby residents noticed what they immediately recognized as unmarked federal agent vehicles parked within feet of Park Avenue Elementary School, two eyewitnesses told The Intercept. One of those residents, Allan Oscar Sorto, picked up his phone and began streaming live on Facebook.
As he streamed, a dozen or so people began congregating near the cars, two Nissan Altimas and several Ford SUVs with flashers. People can be heard explaining that they’ve seen these cars around the neighborhood in recent weeks, part of immigration raids. Now the sight of the cars parked so close to the elementary school seemed to spark heightened outrage and fear that federal immigration agents were lurking to surprise parents going to pick up their children from school.
Sorto, from nearby Hempstead, estimated that there were four cars near the school, some within 10 feet of the schoolyard fence, and two other cars on the next block. Another eyewitness, who asked not to be named out of fear of law enforcement retaliation, told The Intercept that he could see uniformed HSI agents sitting in all the cars, most masked.
“No son padres ustedes?” a woman in the video says to the closed window of one of the parked Nissans: “Are you not parents?”
People on the sidewalk yelled at the cars in Spanish and English. “Show your face!” “You feel proud?” “None of us are criminals, we work, we pay taxes like you do.” “Leave the school grounds!”
The Westbury residents’ fears seemed well-founded, considering reports from around the country….
The Car Crash:
In Westbury, the HSI agents didn’t respond to the gathered crowd. After a few minutes, the agents drove away. A commotion erupted down the road, off-camera, and onlookers began rushing toward the corner.
One of the Nissans, carrying two of the HSI agents, had crashed into a black pickup truck that happened to be passing through the intersection. Three eyewitnesses told The Intercept that the agents’ car had sped away. Two of the witnesses believe the Nissan blew a stop sign, causing the crash. (Nassau County police referred questions about the accident to ICE, which did not respond to an inquiry.)
After the accident, the crowd gathered around the scene, according to the video stream. The two agents got out of the crashed car, seemingly panicked and, witnesses told The Intercept, appearing to avoid eye contact with bystanders. The agents got into another HSI vehicle.
A third agent, an unmasked man with a black polo shirt covering his tactical vest, stood near the crashed car, remaining stoic as people questioned him on the livestream.
“You’re looking for criminals in the school?” one bystander asked, as the agent remained expressionless.
…
Soon, the federal agents left, leaving the smashed Nissan with the passenger side airbag deployed behind, and many in the crowd dispersed.
The driver of the pickup truck involved in the accident was placed in a stretcher and left in an ambulance….
“Now you’re clogging up the street and people have to work,” one of the remaining bystanders can be heard to say during the stream. “How is this making America great again?”
…
The Long Island newspaper Newsday first reported the Westbury incident with a quote from Nassau County police that the action was not immigration-related and that the agents were not working for ICE on Tuesday afternoon.
Late Tuesday, however, an ICE spokesperson issued a statement that contradicted the Nassau police.
“ICE Homeland Security Investigations Long Island personnel were conducting an operation associated to an ongoing federal investigation,” the statement said. “During the operation special agents were confronted by multiple anti-law enforcement agitators, which prohibited the enforcement action. ICE HSI personnel departed the location and, shortly thereafter, a member of the law enforcement team was involved in a motor-vehicle collision.”
Homeless Shelter Raid:
A week earlier, ICE raids using another Long Island fire department sparked outrage in the community. The fire department subsequently issued a statement that fire officials were not previously informed that ICE would be using their parking lot.
Several hours after the men were seen at the Riverhead Fire Department, they were spotted again. Twelve to 14 of the masked men, some reportedly carrying long guns, were trying to get into a Riverhead men’s homeless shelter, according to a video shared by several immigrant advocates in the area. They would not identify themselves, a shelter employee told local news outlet RiverheadLOCAL.
A shelter resident told RiverheadLOCAL that one of the men, wearing a black U.S. Marshals vest, came to the front door seeking entry but would neither show credentials or a warrant, nor give his name. (A representative for the shelter did not respond to inquiries.)
A representative for the Riverhead Fire Department told The Intercept, “We had no idea who they were.”
Clock the links for more, it’s a long article:
ICE Agent Fled From Angry Residents Outside New York School — and Got in a Car Crash
Masked and unidentified ICE agents lurking near schools sparked fear, confusion, and a car crash in Latino-heavy New York suburbs.
President Donald Trump’s administration is following conspiracy theories that the protesters in Los Angeles are being paid.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem revealed in a news conference Thursday that agents of the IRS have been deployed on the ground in Los Angeles to investigate who is “paying them” to protest.
The claim is a familiar one. As CNN pointed out, Trump has spent years claiming that anyone protesting him was being paid to do so.
*yawn* Maybe they’ll catch a leprechaun, too? Or a tooth fairy?
Meanwhile our joke of a National Security Director is hard at work:
Gabbard cited Craigslist ads that request protesters, promising to pay thousands of dollars. However, anyone can create a Craigslist ad for anything without requirements for verification that it’s authentic. As an example, there is currently a Craigslist ad in Washington, D.C. offering $1,000 for “seat fillers” at Trump’s birthday parade on Saturday.
Gabbard said that protesters are “obviously” being “orchestrated.”
Trump admin unleashes IRS on LA protests over right-wing conspiracy theory
Video footage posted to Padilla’s account on X, formerly Twitter, showed the senator identifying himself, but he appeared to do so after he began approaching the podium and was blocked by agents.
“I am Senator Alex Padilla. I have questions for the secretary,” Padilla said before agents pushed him into a hallway, where FBI agents forced him to the ground and placed him in handcuffs. The senator was released shortly after.
The customary lies and misrepresentations from Bimbo #2 Noem:
In an interview with Fox News, [Bimbo #2] Noem said Padilla “did not identify himself and was removed from the room.”
“This man burst into the room, started lunging toward the podium, interrupting me and elevating his voice and was stopped,” [Bimbo #2] Noem said. “Did not identify himself and was removed from the room. So as soon as he identified himself, you know, appropriate actions were taken.”
“I had a conversation with the senator after this,” she continued. “We sat down for 10 to 15 minutes and talked about the fact that nobody knew who he was. He didn’t say who he was until he already had been lunging forward, and people were trying to detain him for quite a period of time.”
[Bimbo #2] added, “He was never arrested. Nobody knew who he was when he came into the room creating a scene.”
But:
Padilla said in a video posted on his social media channels: “I introduced myself. ‘I’m Senator Alex Padilla, and I have a question.’ And it took all of a second for multiple agents to forcibly remove me from the room, to pin me on the ground and handcuff me.”
Did Senator ID himself when Kristi Noem’s guards wrestled him?
Footage on social media shows Senator Alex Padilla of California identifying himself while being blocked by agents, but not before.
Guardian analysis sharply contradicts president’s claim that officials are targeting ‘criminals’ for deportation from US
The federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agency has exponentially increased the arrest and detention of immigrants without any criminal history since the second Trump administration took office, a data analysis by the Guardian shows.
The information sharply contradicts Donald Trump’s claims the authorities are targeting “criminals” for deportation as part of his aggressive anti-immigration agenda.
According to numbers gathered from Ice and the Vera Institute of Justice, after Trump returned to the White House in late January there was a steep surge in arrests of immigrants, in general. One of the sharpest increases in arrest numbers has been of immigrants with pending charges, who have not yet been convicted of any crimes.
But the biggest increase has been people with no charges at all. Between early January, right before the inauguration, and June, there has been an 807% increase in the arrest of immigrants with no criminal record.
In other words the incessant chants of “Criminals! Criminals! Criminals!” coming from the White House / Homeland Security / ICE are a bunch of BS. They’re deporting anyone they can drag out of home or work or snatch off the streets.
Ice arrests of migrants with no criminal history surging under Trump
Guardian analysis sharply contradicts president’s claim that officials are targeting ‘criminals’ for deportation from US
In video taken of the incident that has since gone viral on social media, Padilla is seen being restrained and removed from the room by Secret Service agents.“I’m Senator Alex Padilla. I have questions for the secretary,” Padilla shouts, as he struggles to move past the men removing him from the premises. “Hands off!” he says at one point.Emerging afterward, Padilla, who is the ranking member of the judiciary subcommittee on immigration, citizenship and border safety, said he and his colleagues had repeatedly asked DHS for more information on its “increasingly extreme immigration enforcement actions” but had not received a response to his inquiries.
This tinhorn governor of a state where nobody lives, this puppy-murdering hack whose political career outside of MAGA World was as dead as Custer, now gets to sic her black-shirted thugs on the senior senator of a state that she and her criminal boss and all their attendant lords have been lying about, and about which she had flown to Los Angeles to lie about some more.
Dumbass in a ballcap says what? She just admitted they’re blowing up the town to get rid of the mayor and governor. If the courts ever get their teeth back, this gaffe will figure prominently in many filings.
Meanwhile, Padilla is hauled into a backroom and driven to the floor and handcuffed.
And not for nothing, but threatening and/or assaulting the holder of any federal office is a felony and could draw you five to ten in the pokey. And these goons are pretty identifiable.
In posts on X, the official DHS account and Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin released a statement attempting to justify wrestling Padilla to the ground and handcuffing him. “Senator Padilla chose disrespectful political theatre and interrupted a live press conference without identifying himself or having his Senate security pin on as he lunged toward Secretary Noem,” the statement read.
Tricia learned to lie like this at the AEI’s Leadership Institute.
But in a video of the altercation from Padilla’s office, the senator could be heard clearly identifying himself. “Hands off! I’m Senator Alex Padilla, and I have questions for the secretary,” said the California Democrat as a security guard pushed him out of the room.
It’s clear that the goons looked at him and just saw another angry brown face. And by their reactions, Tricia and her boss are similarly afflicted.
This is also all my bollocks. Noem knows who Padilla is and, if she doesn’t, she should, and he did identify himself. Third-rate hack with a fourth-rate alibi.
And what about Speaker Moses? What did you expect?
The day was not without its burlesque, however. In a House Oversight Committee hearing, Rep. Maxwell Frost asked Chairman James (Jughead) Comer to issue a subpoena for Noem regarding the events of the day. Comer, of course, refused, probably because Padilla was not carrying Hunter Biden’s laptop at the time. And then we were off.
Somehow Republicans Are Defending Kristi Noem After the Forceful Removal of Senator Alex Padilla
I thought assaulting someone holding federal office was a crime. Not anymore, apparently.
On Thursday night’s edition of CNN’s OutFront, Burnett picked up on a comment from CNN commentator Xochitl Hinojosa, and asked Padilla if his race had anything to do with the heavy-handed response:
BURNETT: I don’t know if you just heard what Xochitl was saying. She was saying that what she finds so unsettling as a Hispanic woman is that she feels that this happened to you because of how you look. And that as one of two sitting senators from California, those — those Secret Service agents would have known exactly who you were. And in fact, after you started talking, you said, “I’m Senator Alex Padilla”, and you said it multiple times.
Do you think that it was because of how you look?
SEN. ALEX PADILLA (D-CA): Look, I don’t know what the motives are. I think the point is this, Erin, and as I said, when I — when I came out of the building a little while after the incident, if this can happen to me, a United States senator representing the state of California, if this is how the Department of Homeland Security and the people around the secretary will treat a United States senator for having the audacity to ask a question, then imagine what they can do — imagine what they are doing to people in communities, not just throughout Los Angeles, but throughout the country.
CNN’s Erin Burnett Asks Padilla If Trump DHS Chief’s Agents Jacked Him Up ‘Because of How You Look?’
CNN anchor Erin Burnett asked Alex Padilla (D-CA) if agents at Trump DHS Secretary Kristi Noem’s press conference attacked him “because of how you look?”
The day after Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA) was manhandled by homeland security secretary Kristi Noem’s security team before being forced to the ground and being handcuffed, MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin called out the Donald Trump appointee for her actions and comments as the lawmaker was dragged out.
After watching footage of the incident, Rubin said she focused on what Noem complained about as the altercation took place.
Pointing out that Padilla “was escorted into that room DHS and an FBI agent flanking him, so clearly, somebody in the Department of Homeland Security was well aware that Alex Padilla was not only in the building, but in the room.”
“The idea that Alex Padilla was an attacker and was not recognized by people affiliated with Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem, or that Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem herself didn’t recognize Alex Padilla and stop herself to say, ‘Well, wait a second, that’s California’s senior senator, Alex Padilla, but instead continues on her way as he’s being escorted from the room and then pushed to the ground and handcuffed – that is an incredibly disturbing moment.”
“I don’t know if you could hear this,” she told Cabrera, “But as Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem is continuing at her press conference, she’s talking about the danger of DHS agents being doxxed. I imagine that she was talking about the reasons for their wearing masks on the streets of Los Angeles and other places.”
“The idea that her concern was, in that moment, more about DHS agents being doxed while a sitting U.S. senator is being forcibly removed for nothing disruptive is chilling to the bone,” she remarked. “I saw that yesterday. I thought that I was incapable of more hyperbole, and I just don’t know where to muster it from anymore.”
What do you expect from a psychotic liar who shot her own family’s puppy and goat? All she cares about are herself and her Rollex. U.S. Senators being abused and brown people being disappeared are of no consequence to her.
Kristi Noem called out over her ‘disturbing’ comments as Padilla was cuffed
KTLA: DHS Secretary Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem attends ICE raid at Los Angeles County home
U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem joined federal immigration agents Thursday on a raid targeting a man with a criminal record at a Huntington Park, California, home, the agency said.
The raid occurred Thursday morning when about a half-dozen vehicles carrying heavily armed, masked U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents converged on a home occupied by a 28-year-old pregnant mother of four.
Sabrina Medina said she was in the shower around 6 a.m. when her brother-in-law first saw the menacing presence in front of the family’s home.
“I was just terrified, I’m not going to lie to you,” Medina told KTLA’s Rick Chambers. “I was shaking. I was scared. I’ve never gone through anything like this.”
Medina said she looked out the window and saw 10 men dressed in tactical military gear, all carrying rifles.
“I was like, ‘Am I dreaming or is this real?’” she said.
According to Medina, who is a U.S. citizen, the agents told her to exit her home with her children. Standing in the driveway, they showed her a warrant for her husband, listing his name as David Garcia.
As she explained that her husband’s name is Jorge and that he was not at the house, one of the agents was captured on an outdoor home surveillance camera turning the device away from what was transpiring.
Evidence tampering! (not a great surprise when ICE thugs are involved)
Cameras inside the home captured the heavily armed ICE agents going through the residence room by room, all while [Bimbo #2] Noem, wearing a bulletproof vest and ballcap, watched from the street.
DHS later posted on X that the target of the raid was “an illegal alien from Mexico who had previously been deported. His criminal history includes drug trafficking and assault.”
After hearing about the raid, L.A. County Supervisor Janice Hahn went to the Huntington Park neighborhood and spoke with some of Medina’s neighbors.
“I’m very disappointed in this government right now and what they’re doing,” she told KTLA.
Four months pregnant with her fifth child, the Huntington Park mother said if her husband is deported, the family’s future is bleak.
“I’m not going to be able to pay my rent when I have to pay it,” she explained. “My husband is not here. I don’t know if they’re going to pick him up tomorrow, the day after tomorrow. It’s sad.”
ICE agents, along with [Bimbo #2] Noem, eventually left the home empty-handed, and the children were allowed back inside.
DHS Secretary Kristi [Bimbo #2] Noem attends ICE raid at Los Angeles County home
