Hundreds of Long Beach residents gathered for a rally on Sunday, June 8 opposing the ongoing Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids sweeping Southern California.
As the national guard, called in by President Donald Trump, began to arrive in Los Angeles on Sunday morning, Long Beach residents marched down Broadway and Ocean Boulevard chanting and holding signs opposing the immigration raids.
The raids began in Los Angeles on Friday morning, resulting in the arrest of 118 people, as reported by the LAist, followed by protests throughout the city. As of Tuesday morning, the detainees are still being held in the Los Angeles Detention Center and there have been daily protests against the raids.
Since Friday, ICE has moved into the surrounding cities of Whittier, Paramount, Santa Ana, Culver City and more.
The rally was organized late Saturday night by Long Beach resident Tanya Kapila, who said “It’s been really devastating. I know a lot of undocumented folks, I know we all do especially in Long Beach. I know a lot of them want to mobilize and organize themselves and they don’t have the ability to.”
Kapila organized a rally in November 2024 for the liberation of Palestinian people, and spoke about how these struggles are connected.
“Look at the human aspect of it. It’s less about borders and it’s against that mindset that we were taught, this individualistic mindset that colonization has brought us,” Kapila said. “It’s more about the human race and the world’s people rather than Palestinian people, Muslim people, Mexican people … When one person is oppressed we are all oppressed.”
Gallery:
