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In Los Angeles, Mayor Karen Bass signed an ‘executive declaration’ ordering every municipal department to be in compliance with the “sanctuary city ordinance” and to create a “preparedness plan” to block federal immigration enforcement.
She could have just called it a declaration of insurrection.
California was already infamous for its sanctuary city status, but Gov. Newsom and local officials like Mayor Bass are doubling down on ordering government employees, including local law enforcement, to protect illegal alien criminals and to confront federal law enforcement.
That can’t end well.
“I will never accept these unlawful and chaotic raids,” the Long Angeles mayor vowed and promised to “deploy every resource and tool available within the city” to protect illegal aliens and stop federal law enforcement from enforcing immigration law. Her ‘executive declaration’ also requests the “Police Commission, in collaboration with the Chief of Police, to incorporate, where appropriate, the community feedback and provide additional guidance to police officers on how to respond to situations involving federal immigration enforcement. “
Over a dozen local mayors had joined Bass at an event calling for an end to immigration enforcement. The attendees included Mayor Arturo Flores who had berated Marines deployed in Los Angeles and who had urged local police to stop ICE from arresting illegal aliens.
Mayor Flores of Huntington Park put out a statement targeting ICE and “urging law enforcement to investigate and intervene in any unauthorized operations that place public safety or civil liberties at risk.”
Flores and the rest of the city government passed a resolution ‘ordering’ ICE personnel to reveal their names. Huntington Park rolled out a HP With You program to aid illegal aliens and obstruct immigration enforcement.
Ventura Mayor Jeannette Sanchez-Palacios, another attendee at the Bass anti-immigration enforcement event, put out a letter urging residents to “report and document” ICE activities and referred them to the Mixteco/Indigena Community Organizing Project (MICOP). MICOP is a member of the ‘ICE Out of VC’ coalition alongside the local SEIU chapter, the Latinx Bar Association and pro-Hamas group CAIR. A key ‘ICE Out of VC’ activist urged local police to “stand up to protect our communities if ICE violates the law.”
When California politicians aren’t pressuring police officers to fight ICE, they’re turning to criminals to aid them in ending federal immigration enforcement.
Vice Mayor Cynthia Gonzalez of Cudahy, who was also at the Bass event, went even further by appearing to rally violent street gangs to fight ICE. “You guys are all about territory, you tag everything up, and this is 18th Street and this is Florencia and now that your hood’s being invaded by the biggest gang there is, there ain’t a peep out of you.”
“I want to know where all the cholos are at in Los Angeles – 18th Street, Florencia. Where’s the leadership at?” she demanded of the two street gangs. The 18th Street gang has an estimated 30,000 members and is responsible for trafficking meth and cocaine, and numerous murders. The Florencia 13 gang is nearly as deadly and has been known to traffic in fentanyl.
“So don’t be trying to claim no block, no nothing if you’re not showing up right now trying to, like, help out and organize. I don’t want to hear a peep out of you once they’re gone, trying to claim that this is my block. This was not your block. You weren’t even here helping out. So whoever is the leadership over there just f***ing get your members in order,” the vice mayor demanded of two gangs that had already carried out the murders of police officers.
California elected officials have also taken to alerting illegal aliens of ICE operations.
“The City of Perris has received reports of ongoing ICE operations within the area. We urge all residents to remain calm, stay indoors when possible, and know your rights,” Mayor Michael Vargas posted on Facebook.
Other Southern California mayors remain committed to rejecting federal law enforcement.
“We made the determination as a city that we cannot have armed masked men who are not identifying themselves — who the federal government is refusing to confirm are federal agents — running around and conducting this type of activity that is dangerous and volatile,” Pasadena Mayor Victor M. Gordo complained.
“ICE has no place in Long Beach,” Mayor Rex Richardson declared and then wondered. “How do you defend your residents from your government?”
He blasted Long Beach Transit for a memo telling employees not to interfere with ICE operations. “That’s unacceptable,” he claimed. “Fear has no place on our transit system.”
Federal funds of course do.
What actually has no place in the Long Beach Transit system or anywhere in the country is the rejection of the law and the obstruction of federal law enforcement by local elected officials.
California Democrat politicians are moving toward the same kind of illegal conduct, aiding and abetting crimes, and obstructing law enforcement, that already led to the arrests of judges. Worse still, mayors like Bass and Flores, appear to be pushing city employees, including law enforcement, into confrontations with ICE, while others, like Sanchez-Palacios, are even recruiting criminals to fight ICE. This is not a difference of opinion, it’s an insurrection.
When signing her insurrection declaration, Mayor Karen Bass of Los Angeles said, “I just want to repeat the irony that I am going to sign an executive directive to help the city family understand how to protect the workforce and Angelenos from our federal government.”
Bass doesn’t seem to understand the definition of irony or of the United States of America.
Signing a declaration ordering all branches of the city government to block federal law enforcement isn’t irony: it’s insurrection.