California Immigration Protests: 3 San Francisco Police Officers Hurt; 60 Arrested

By David Hernandez and J.D. Morris

Source San Francisco Chronicle

Sixty people were arrested Sunday night in downtown San Francisco after a protest against President Donald Trump's immigration raids became chaotic amid his extraordinary deployment of federal troops hundreds of miles away in Southern California.

The protest started peacefully around 6 p.m. near a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office on Sansome Street, but within an hour it had grown into a tense standoff between demonstrators and police. While many in the crowd of hundreds departed after officers declared an unlawful assembly, some continued marching through streets before officers began making arrests several hours later on Montgomery Street.

Some protesters shattered windows and vandalized buildings, Muni vehicles and an SFPD patrol car, according to police and Mayor Daniel Lurie. Three police officers were injured, one of whom went to a hospital for treatment, the SFPD said.

"Everyone in this country has a right to make their voice heard peacefully, and local law enforcement will always protect that right and the rights of everyone in our city to be safe," Lurie said in a statement late Sunday night. "But we will never tolerate violent and destructive behavior. ... Violence directed at law enforcement or public servants is never acceptable."

Protesters sought to express solidarity with those in Los Angeles County who have rallied against immigration agents targeting people for deportation at businesses and court hearings. In response to the protests, Trump announced Saturday that he would send 2,000 National Guard soldiers to Los Angeles.

After troops arrived in Los Angeles on Sunday, protesters blocked traffic on Highway 101 and set autonomous vehicles on fire as authorities fired tear gas and declared an unlawful assembly. Dozens of people were arrested over the weekend.

In San Francisco, organizers said before their show of solidarity that they didn't want to wait for federal agents to "descend and tear apart our communities."

The demonstration came days after advocates reported that at least 15 people, including children as young as 3, were detained during scheduled check-ins at the San Francisco ICE office.

Toward the beginning of the San Francisco protest Sunday, labor and community activist Gloria La Riva said immigrants are the backbone of many industries, including Trump's hotel empire. She called the deployment of the Coast Guard in Los Angeles "a mistake," describing the region a city built on immigrants.

La Riva and other speakers said the moment called for demonstrations to defend immigrant rights.

"We've got to march, we've got to stay together," La Riva said.

At the start of the demonstration, about 500 protesters assembled outside the ICE office on the corner of Washington and Sansome streets, shutting down the intersection. Police officers who later confronted the group held batons; others were armed what looked like guns with rubber bullets.

"Stand up, fight back," the group of demonstrators chanted as they walked up to the line of officers at one point. "Trump must go down."

At about 7:30 p.m., two demonstrators smashed sledgehammers into doors and windows on the Sansome Street building where the ICE office is located. The exterior of the building was defaced with graffiti that read "F— ICE," "ACAB" (for "All Cops Are Bastards") and other messages.

San Francisco police later ordered hundreds of demonstrators gathered near Sansome and Jackson streets to disperse, and officers then advanced in a line toward the crowd, which held its ground. Eventually the two sides pushed each other as they tussled over a metal barricade they held between their bodies. Officers pushed the group back about half a block. The crowd, which had dwindled to about 200 people, chanted "abolish ICE."

As officers held the line, a demonstrator threw an object at them. An officer pointed what looked like a less-lethal gun at the crowd, but didn't fire.

The protesters began to march away from the office building just after 8 p.m. "Whose streets?" the demonstrators chanted as they walked down Sansome Street. "Our streets."

The group walked down Market Street to the Embarcadero BART Station, where the demonstrators were met by police officers — some on foot, others on motorcycles and in sport utility vehicles. The group then headed back down Market Street, as officers followed. BART said shortly before 9 p.m. that Embarcadero Station was closed "due to a civil disturbance" but service was restored less than an hour later.

Around 9 p.m., the group was blocked in on Montgomery Street near Bush Street, with officers forming a circle around the demonstrators. "Let us go!" the crowd chanted. California Highway Patrol officers arrived as backup and formed a line at Montgomery and Bush streets.

By 9:40 p.m., an officer told the remaining crowd of at least 50 demonstrators that they were under arrest and instructed them to sit down. A protester in the group was detained around 10 p.m., and others followed shortly after.

SFPD said it made the 60 arrests, which included some juveniles, after protesters refused to comply with a dispersal order on the 200 block of Montgomery Street. Officers also recovered one gun, police said.

The National Guard deployment by Trump intensified a feud with California that has simmered throughout the early months of his second term in the White House. It's the first time in 60 years that a president has deployed the National Guard without the request of a state governor, but the circumstances are far different. When President Lyndon Johnson sent troops to Alabama to protect a 1965 civil rights march led by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., he did so because the state's segregationist governor had declined to send in the Guard.

In this instance, Trump overrode the wishes of Gov. Gavin Newsom, who said there was "no unmet need" for additional law enforcement in Los Angeles. Newsom on Sunday urged Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to rescind what the governor called an "unlawful deployment of troops."

"We didn't have a problem until Trump got involved," Newsom said in a social media post. "This is a serious breach of state sovereignty — inflaming tensions while pulling resources from where they're actually needed."

Hegseth and Trump, however, have shown no indication that they will back down anytime soon.

Hegseth threatened Saturday to send Marines stationed at Camp Pendleton in San Diego County to help crack down on Southern California protests — an idea that Newsom called "deranged." Trump, for his part, wrote on his social media website Sunday that Los Angeles had been "invaded and occupied" by undocumented immigrants and criminals and that "lawless riots" in the city would "only strengthen our resolve."

Trump said he had directed his administration to "to take all such action necessary to liberate Los Angeles."

"Order will be restored, the Illegals will be expelled, and Los Angeles will be set free," he said.

One of the San Francisco protesters, Holly Pablo, said she came to the demonstration with her 15-year-old daughter to show her "the reality of what we live in" because "we have to prepare."

"So many people ... are being pulled over that aren't supposed to be," Pablo said. "We're not criminals. They want to criminalize everyone, but what they're doing is bringing down our economy, and everyone's going to get f—ed after that."

Another San Francisco protest against Trump's immigration raids and his recent ban on travel from 12 countries is set for 4 p.m. Monday in front of City Hall.

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