L.A. neighborhoods clear out as immigration raids send people underground
A week of immigration sweeps across Southern California has left some communities terrified, with fewer people on the streets and signs of an economic slowdown.
A week of immigration sweeps across Southern California has left some communities eerily quiet, with some residents saying they are avoiding going out and attending to routine business out of fear of being stopped.
Among the places where residents and merchants say foot traffic is way down include the normally bustling MacArthur Park area, downtown Downey and the Fashion District, which saw a large immigration raid June 6. Some car washes, which were a frequent target of agents last week, have also temporarily closed.
Here is a sampling of how life is changing:
These were the sounds you didnât hear coming from a school in South Los Angeles on Saturday â children laughing with their friends, parents whooping for their kidsâ first guitar solos and teachers burbling about the piano pupil who exceeded all expectations.
The music went silent this Fatherâs Day weekend at the Young Musicians Foundation.
The venerable school for working-class students canceled its traditional semester-ending concert and celebration because many of its students and parents were afraid that gathering would make them vulnerable to the Trump administrationâs immigration raids.
After a week of Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests around Southern California, many parents in the working class neighborhood east of USC pulled their kids from classes last week.
Even more families, including those legally in the U.S., said they wouldnât attend Saturdayâs now-cancelled concert, out of an abundance of caution that they could be sent arrested and have to spend weeks proving their legal status.
âOne by one, they were calling this week, saying âIt breaks our heart, but we are scared to death to come out,ââ said Walter Zooi, executive director of the Young Musicians Foundation. âFolks are being disconnected from their families, from their communities, from these kinds of opportunities, which they love.â
Instead of the traditional party â and an accompanying feast of pizza, papusas and other Mexican and Central American delicacies â students handed in their borrowed instruments Friday and quietly said their farewells. One mother said she was saddened but felt she had no choice but to pull her 12-year-old daughter out of classes at YMF.
âShe misses being with her friends and she is missing out on being inspired by the other students,â said the woman, who gave only her middle name, Esther, because she said she was concerned about being targeted. âAnd as parents we are missing seeing that happiness when they are done performing and the satisfaction they get from the applause and encouragement.â
Estherâs U.S.-born girl, who first struggled to plunk out âMary Had a Little Lambâ on piano, now sends her fingers flying over the keyboard, delivering American pop classics and tunes from her parentâs native Mexico.
âShe sees this place like an oasis,â said Esther, a computer tech, who says her daughter has sometimes struggled with anxiety. âThis program is like therapy. Itâs something that helps her, that makes her better.â
One of the YMF teachers is Andy Abad. Himself the L.A.-born son of immigrants, the guitarist went on to perform with Jennifer Lopez and the Backstreet Boys, among others, and to record with Lady Gaga and Bonnie Raitt.
He now teaches at USC and a couple days a week at the YMF school, tucked into the ground floor of a subsidized housing complex. He started teaching at the school to give a role model to students, many of whom have never had access to instruments or music lessons.
âThese immigrants work hard. They pay Social Security and other taxes. They just want to live,â said Abad. âThatâs something some current political leaders donât want you to realize. They want to demonize them and to scapegoat them.â
âItâs affecting everyone,â said Abad, âand especially these kids, who just want to learn and who just want to do more.â
On Friday morning, the area around MacArthur Park, a longtime immigrant hub west of downtown, was noticeably quieter than usual.
Gone were many of the vendors who once lined South Alvarado Street at all times of day, selling everything from baby formula to Lionel Messi jerseys.
âThereâs like sadness, maybe grief. I think a lot of fear, a lot of fear is going around these communities. And yeah, people are walking around just very cautious, very cautious,â said Cristina Serrano, 37, as she was doing mitt work at Panda Boxing Gym, near the corner of Westlake Avenue and 8th Street.
At Panda Boxing, the gymâs owner now regularly walks up and down the block looking for signs of trouble and to make sure that people in the gym feel safe, said Serrano.
âI mean, most of us are U.S. citizens, but again, if thereâs someone that we may know in the gym [who isnât], weâre gonna make sure we protect them and keep them safe,â she said. âIn general, thatâs where we stand as far as this gym.â
Even though she is a citizen by birth, she says that sheâs taken to carrying a copy of her birth certificate with her everywhere she goes as a precaution. She also has a lawyer on speed dial.
âI donât know who they want to stop, who theyâre targeting, to be honest, because theyâre targeting people that look like me,â she said.
She also said the Mexican restaurant next door abruptly closed its doors for two days, without explanation.
Over at Tonyâs Barber Shop on the next block over, one of the barbers dusted hair off her chair as her customer got up to leave.
The barber, who declined to give her name, explained in Spanish that business had almost disappeared.
Asked why, she exchanged an exasperated look with the customer, before saying that âla migraâ â slang for ICE â was popping up everywhere in the area, scaring off her customers.
On Friday morning, Julia Meltzer was on her way to work and had just turned left on Virgil Avenue from 6th Street when she saw a number of men in bulletproof vests. There was at least one vehicle, a silver Ford SUV with an Arizona licence plate, parked on the driveway of an apartment complex.
As she pulled up closer to the vehicle, she said she saw men handcuffing a man wearing an orange shirt and white shorts. Meltzer said she pulled over and began taking photos and videos after realizing she had just stumbled upon a federal immigration operation.
As she and other residents continued documenting, Meltzer came across a distraught woman who was the wife of the man the federal agents had just arrested.
On Thursday, federal agents stormed a Huntington Park home and were accompanied by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
Sabrina Medina, 28, was cleaning her patio Wednesday night when she saw a silver minivan slow down in front of her home in Huntington Park.
She said she saw the driver recording her and her brother-in-law at the home.
âI screamed at them: âWhy are you recording me?ââ she said. âI started screaming because I thought, you know, something bad was going to happen to me.â
She said the people in the van didnât respond. Scared for her four children, Medina went inside the house and called her husband, Jorge Saldana, 30, who was at a nearby laundromat washing clothes. She told him what happened and that he needed to come home.
She and her husband got into an argument about his immigration status, she said. Medina worried immigration officials were now targeting him and their house. At one point, she told her husband she didnât want him attending his 10-year-old daughterâs graduation.
She said the argument ended with her husband storming out of the house.
âHe was upset,â she said. âHe wanted to go to the graduation but I told him no and that I was going to take my sister.â
Medinaâs husband, Saldana, was wanted for being in the country following his deportation. Eight years ago, Saldana was arrested for a violent crime, but the criminal charges were dropped and he was subsequently deported, Medina said.
Early Thursday morning, Medina was rattled by several loud knocks on the front door. When she looked through the window she saw men in fatigues carrying assault rifles. One of them was pointing his weapon at her and ordered her to come out of the house, she said.
She explained she had just finished showering and needed to get dressed, as well as wake up her kids. Medina asked the soldiers to put down their guns and they did, she said.
Eventually, the family walked out and stood in the driveway as the men in fatigues searched the house for her husband, Medina said. He was not home at the time.
As she, her brother-in-law and her kids waited in the driveway, Medina said she spotted Noem watching the operation. She said she also spotted a video crew and someone she believed to be Dr. Phil McGraw â the TV personality â sitting in an SUV.
The site of Noem in a baseball hat and ballistic vest was startling, and Medina said she began to record her with her phone.
âI got scared. I did recognize her. I was like, âWhat is she doing in my house?â So I started recording her,â Medina said.
The pregnant mother said Noem was laughing and appeared as if she was âwaiting for something to happen.â
Cameras inside and outside the home captured the men in fatigues walking around and searching the house. The men left shortly after, Medina said. There were at least a dozen men in fatigues, according to Medina and videos reviewed by The Times.
She hasnât spoken to her husband since the raid on their home and is now worried how she will be able to pay this monthâs $3,000 rent. Her husband was the main breadwinner.
The incident has traumatized her four kids whose ages range from 2 to 10, according to Medina. She said she is four months pregnant with twin boys.
âMy daughter is very sad, she wanted to go to her graduation,â she said. â My 7-year-old has been asking where her father is, theyâre very close to one another.â
âThis is no way of living,â she added.
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