Data from well-known immigration rights groups show that the neighborhoods targeted by federal agents for the immigration attack were overwhelmingly Latinos.
A heatmap created by The Coalition for Human Migmigrant Rights (Chirla) documented 471 immigration enforcement action reported in LA County to the LA Rapid Response Network (LARRN) between June 6th and July 20th.
“It’s just a report we were able to verify through our responders,” said Jorge Mario Cabrera, Communications Director at Chairah. “That doesn’t mean they are the only incidents in the area.”
Cabrera suspects Chaira has caught a third of enforcement activities that took place across the county.
During the same period, Chirla allegedly received 1,677 enforcement calls across the region, with 1,500 of these reports noting that armed agents were present, and 389 reports witnessed random arrests of community members.
Areas with the highest number of enforcement actions reported to Chirla:
San Fernando Valley (Panorama City) – 22 Action
Pico Rivera – 18 Actions
Silver Lake Echo Park – 15 Actions
Bell Garden – 14 Action
Hollywood – 9 Action
Vernon – South Los Angeles – 8 Action
Pico/Union-DownTown Los Angeles – 8 Action
Los Angeles Little Tokio Downtown – 7 Action
Glassell Park – 7 Action
Southgate – 7 Action
Of the five ZIP codes with the highest number of immigrant enforcements, 76% of the population totaled Latino, Chirla’s analysis shows.
22 enforcement actions were reported from Panorama City, the highest of all ZIP codes analyzed. Their population is 42% Latinos and 38.2% immigrants.
“This map clearly shows the blatant racial profiling of the Trump administration,” Chaila executive director Angelica Salas said in a press release. “The area where people of color, including the main Latino hubs, are racially profiled and targeted people and jobs, and this military federal immigration enforcement project was a surgical attack intended to cause panic and confusion and unleash the fears of the neighbourhood.”
ICE and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) did not respond to requests for comment from the Times. The agency has opposed racial profiling claims in the past.
A DHS spokesperson wrote in a statement that such allegations were “aversive and decisively false” and that “these types of smears are designed to demonize and exacerbate our brave ice law enforcement.”
The Chirla analysis is not the complete accounting of the raids that took place in Los Angeles. DHS has not released any number of enforcement actions or locations. Since operations began in June and early July, ice and border patrols have reported arrested 2,792 illegal aliens in the LA area.
“The maps show that they didn’t go to the wealthy white neighborhood,” Cabrera said. “They went to a place where people of color could be randomly picked up.”
The report comes amid widespread concerns about Trump administration’s racial profiling in immigration policy.
According to a report from the Times, LA residents, particularly dark-skinned Latinos, have expressed fear of being targeted by ice agents, and even American citizens have been caught up in the attack.
Chirla was one of the groups that sued DHS on July 2, claiming that arrests and detention in LA and surrounding counties were illegal and racially targeted.
“The overwhelming individuals who have been arrested for halts in the attack are not targeted in any meaningful sense of the word based on their skin color and occupation,” the plaintiff wrote in the lawsuit.
US District Judge Mame Eusi Mensa Frimon wrote that DHS and ICE may not use their apparent race or ethnicity, or human occupation, to justify their arrest or detention.
The Trump administration is trying to lift these restrictions.
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