ICE raids on Thursday at a weed farm in Camarillo, California, pulled out the crazies both online and on-site. I, like most people, watched local TV stations film the standoff and the tear gas deployed, and then I watched as ICE vehicles were pelted with stones – with a fair amount of them contacting glass windows, breaking the glass.
It wasn’t long ago that we saw one man throwing rocks at ICE vehicles speeding past his location on a corner. That person was later arrested on felony charges. I am hopeful that in the Camarillo crowd, there were undercover agents who noted who was committing felonies, and the same fate befalls the masked criminals there. Time will tell.
There’s been plenty of reporting from RedState on what happened on Thursday. I wanted to add what I found because this was so close to “home.” I live not very far from that area of Southern California. When I drive through that part of Ventura and toward Santa Barbara County, the freeway runs through what used to be nothing but farm fields. On both sides of the freeway, there are still fields of crops. What has changed in that area is weed farms taking over parts of Camarillo. Why Camarillo is a “good” location isn’t a mystery. With much of Camarillo still “rural” with most of the residential areas miles on the east side of the freeway (most of the fields are on the west side), weed farms have plenty of land to grow their “state legal” crops. California allows weed to be grown and sold in the state.
Once you descend the Conejo Grade heading “north” on the 101 freeway, you have a view of the Camarillo farmlands. A few minutes later, if it's harvesting season, you can see farmhands picking crops in the open air. Sometimes you can smell the crop being harvested.
If I hopped in my car and drove that route, I'd see, to the west, about a mile away, covered farmland. That, apparently, is the pot-growing location of Green House Farms; however, its website has its corporate location in Carpinteria (about 20 miles north of Camarillo).
Karen Bass Goes Eyes Wide Open With Latest Moves After ICE Saves Trafficked Children
Doing some research for this article was enlightening.
For instance, I didn’t think about the smell of growing massive amounts of weed. Growing an enormous amount of marijuana results in a concomitant amount of weed odor. Locals objected to the constant smell of weed in the community. Although growers can use air scrubbers, the best way to avoid bugging people who don’t want to breathe weed being grown is to move operations to farmland that isn’t close to homes. Glass House Farms, the self-proclaimed biggest weed grower in California, set up operations in the farmlands of Camarillo. Glass House Farms is pretty proud of their operation – and California is pretty proud of it as well.
Below is a 39-minute video that is professional and slick. It talks about "family-owned" values, that growing pot is an "art form." All happy people who work for Glass House Farms. One of its "first employees" talks about being the jack of all trades when it started. She was the chief "money counter" in the early days. Pot growing and pot selling are still federal offenses; thus, it is a "cash only" business. Who counts all the cash now isn't explained. She said that Glass House now employs 400 to 500 people. The chief scientist working for Glass House discusses the smell, and he calls it "smell management."
According to the "age restricted" video, the effects its weed will have are:
Euphoria, Focus, Creativity, and Relaxation.
Those attributes seem at odds, but that's just me. In any event, one of the owners is pretty slick in his presentation, and when he's not marketing his weed, he's marketing the California "dude" lifestyle.
Then the hammer came down. Is Glass House just a local weed grower and seller? According to the Feds, maybe not. The Feds executed a warrant yesterday, and that means they weren't trolling Home Depot looking to arrest gardeners.
Joe Cunningham reported on this yesterday:
Videos captured agents chasing workers through fields, with reports of at least one individual held at gunpoint and several U.S. citizens detained. An estimated 12 to 15 workers were detained at the Camarillo facility, though some sources suggest up to 100 detentions across both sites.
What initially appeared to be a peaceful demonstration turned chaotic when ICE agents deployed tear gas, smoke canisters, and rubber bullets to disperse the increasingly agitated crowd. Video taken at the scene shows anything but a peaceful protest, despite the declarations of some on social media.
This morning, I noted X was overloaded with fact-free agitators claiming that there were "no weed" farms in Camarillo and that ICE was just grabbing "brown people" and tear-gassing children. And that was just California's Governor, Gavin Newsom
Why is Gov HairGel so emotionally invested in this business? Makes you wonder
The reality is that ICE was executing a warrant. The warrants are signed by a judge. That judge looks at evidence and determined that probable cause existed to raid the facility. What really happened on Thursday?
What will CNN and MSNBC and dopes like this report? Lies and half-lies and nonsense because plenty of people from Congress to the West Coast will believe their nonsense.
I guarantee that a warranted raid that apparently rescued children and arrested criminals will be further spun as farmhands being arrested and sent to a concentration camp. And incurious people will believe this nonsense. I have friends, smart people, who believe idiots like "Dr John." ICE officers are under attack, not the "rule of law." Unfortunately, and inevitably, bullets will be substituted for rocks and bricks. Firecrackers will be sticks of dynamite. The escalation has already started.
Law enforcement is under attack, and leftists like "Dr John" and Gavin Newsom will have blood on their hands.
Editor’s Note: Democrat politicians and their radical supporters will do everything they can to interfere with and threaten ICE agents enforcing our immigration laws.
Help us hold these leftists accountable and expose their obstruction. Join RedState and use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your membership.