Participants in the Terminal Island press conference included (from right) Los Angeles City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, Councilmember Tim McOsker, Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn, Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi, Assemblymember Mike Gipson, Elise Swanson and Anthony Luna of the San Pedro Chamber of Commerce, and Maya Suzuki Daniels of Harbor Peace Patrols.
Rafu Wire Service and Staff Reports
Gathering near the Japanese Fishing Village Memorial in San Pedro on July 11, local elected officials called on the federal government to end its use of Terminal Island as a staging area for immigration enforcement.
Speakers at the morning press conference included Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi (D-Torrance), Assemblymember Mike Gipson (D-Gardena), Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn, Los Angeles City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson, and Los Angeles City Concilmember Tim McOsker. and representatives of the San Pedro Chamber of Commerce and Harbor Peace Patrols.
“ICE is going after hard-working immigrants and their families, not criminals,” said Muratsuchi. “They are being rounded up and incarcerated like the Japanese Americans who once lived on Terminal Island more than 80 years ago — hard-working immigrants who were scapegoated and wrongfully accused of being a threat to national security.
“As chair of the Assembly Education Committee, I am fighting to keep ICE out of California public schools, and today, I join the fight to get ICE out of Terminal Island. Terminal Island should never again become a symbol of injustice.
“Terminal Island was once home to a thriving fishing village where 3,000 individuals of Japanese descent were forcibly removed by the federal government in 1942 following the signing of Executive Order 9066.”
The village was demolished while the former residents were incarcerated. After the war, those that returned to Southern California had to settle elsewhere. The memorial on Seaside Avenue, which includes a torii and a statue of two Terminal Island fishermen, was dedicated in 2002.
A portion of federally owned land on the former site of Terminal Island has been used for ICE activity. The land houses a federal prison and a U.S. Coast Guard base.
“Today we assembled community groups, business leaders, and elected officials on Terminal Island, a location with a tragic history of the unlawful removal of Japanese immigrants and their American children, to denounce the repeated unconstitutional actions of ICE and CBP (U.S. Customs and Border Protection) that are being staged here and now from the Terminal Island Coast Guard base,” McOsker, whose district includes San Pedro, said after the event. “We are demanding that ICE get off Terminal Island and out of our community.”
Hahn insisted that ICE raids over the last weeks have been conducted by groups of agents who are “masked, always armed, (and) pull up to everyday places in everyday neighborhoods.”
These agents target and detain “everyday working people,” contrary to the administration’s claims that only dangerous criminals are being rounded up, she added.
“It is a sad, tragic irony that ICE and CBP have chosen this spot as a launching pad for those illegal raids and sweeps that have terrorized communities across L.A. County,” Hahn said.
Maya Suzuki Daniels, whose family was incarcerated during World War II, spoke on behalf of San Pedro Neighbors for Peace and Justice. She said she felt compelled to speak on the issue.
“My grandfather taught me the values of peace, justice, equality and compassion,” she said. “These are the values that guide me today, and that I see reflected in my neighbors here in San Pedro.”
Her group, with support from Union del Barrio, launched the Harbor Area Peace Patrols in June, which inform residents of their rights and monitor ICE activity.
“We’ve documented license plate swapping, faces being covered with balaclavas in the heat of the summer and other efforts to avoid accountability,” Daniels said. “If residents must follow traffic laws, why are these armed agents allowed to break them with impunity?”
Daniels also spoke at a press conference held by community activists last month at the same location.
Federal immigration enforcement operations began in Los Angeles on June 6 and have spread across the county and beyond.
In response to ongoing raids, several cities in the region have announced they would join a proposed class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union against the federal government on behalf of people who allege they were unlawfully stopped or detained by federal agents. Detainees have included U.S. citizens and immigrants who are in the country legally.
The lawsuit alleges that federal agencies, including ICE and CBP, have engaged in unconstitutional and unlawful immigration enforcement raids by targeting Angelenos based on their perceived race and ethnicity and also denying detainees constitutionally mandated due process.
White House officials have previously defended ICE activity in Southern California.
“The brave men and women of ICE are under siege by deranged Democrats — but undeterred in their mission,” the White House said in a statement. “Every day, these heroes put their own lives on the line to get the worst of the worst — criminal illegal immigrant killers, rapists, gangbangers, and other violent criminals — off our streets and out of our neighborhoods.”
The Department of Homeland Security has also denied allegations that such enforcement has been discriminatory.