Emma De Paz wakened at 2 each morning for 25 years to make soup, roasted rooster and tamales to promote to work crews selecting up their day’s provides on the House Depot.
She joined different immigrant distributors lining the aspect streets beneath tents and over grills in a makeshift group that was one thing of a refuge for Latino immigrants within the Hollywood space. Abelino Perez Alvarez and his spouse bought orange juice, soda and water. Day laborers scrolled via their telephones as they waited outdoors the parking zone in hopes of getting work.
An undated picture of Emma De Paz, a longtime vendor outdoors the House Depot in Hollywood. De Paz was arrested by immigration brokers on the morning of June 19, 2025.
(Carlos Barrera de Paz)
Round 7:30 a.m. Thursday, the refuge was shattered. Dozens of armed brokers, many in masks, converged on the parking zone, blocking gates and surrounding the heaps usually lined by day laborers and avenue distributors.
“Migración! Migración!” folks shouted — and scattered.
They jumped in automobiles, ran down streets. They hid in shops and development websites and behind baggage of soil within the House Depot gardening part. Alvarez’s spouse opened the door of a passing automotive and jumped in.
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“They got here in on all sides,” mentioned Domingo Rueda Hernandez. Fearful, at the same time as a resident with authorized standing, he ran behind baggage of filth within the parking zone with others.
“Agarraron los indios,” he mentioned. He went on to elucidate that they took the dark-skinned folks.
The immigration raids in Los Angeles during the last two weeks have captured the world’s consideration — for the protests, the sporadic violence, the peacetime deployment of the Nationwide Guard and U.S. Marines. However every roundup has inflicted very private trauma to the folks dragged into them, tearing households aside, inciting worry, taking away means to feed youngsters and pay hire.
In a flash, all of this occurred Thursday morning in Hollywood — on the neighborhood House Depot, the lifeblood of financial stability for a lot of working-class immigrants nationwide, which the Trump administration is zeroing in on.
Elias Garcia exhibits a textual content he obtained from his brother, a U.S. citizen, informing him that he had been arrested by immigration brokers in Hollywood on Thursday, June 19, 2025.
(Brittny Mejia / Los Angeles Occasions)
Witnesses and organizers who helped collect data from relations after the sweep mentioned brokers picked up greater than a dozen distributors, day laborers and prospects — together with a U.S. citizen.
In a press release Thursday afternoon, Homeland Safety Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin mentioned Customs and Border Safety “arrested 30 unlawful aliens in Hollywood, California, and 9 unlawful aliens in San Fernando and Pacoima.” She mentioned that through the day’s operations, somebody rammed his car right into a legislation enforcement car.
“CBP Brokers have been additionally assaulted through the operation and verbally harassed,” McLaughlin mentioned.
Witnesses in Hollywood described the brokers fanning out within the lot, apprehending folks rapidly and leaving inside roughly half an hour. There was no clear goal. However there have been unconfirmed experiences of brokers breaking a automotive window to seize somebody.
“Right here, we’re a united group, all the employees that come to this nook,” mentioned Carlos Barrera De Paz, whose sister was taken. “They took us they usually took our group.”
Within the aftermath, tearful relations gathered with damaged glass littering the parking zone. The normally bustling stands the place they promote tamales, juice and low for staff beginning their day have been deserted. Eggshells lay cracked, orange peels strewn, tortillas left on grills.
Understanding House Depots have been prime targets, Silvia Menendez had come to the world early to present out “know your rights” playing cards. When the brokers confirmed up, she started filming as folks ran. She noticed six brokers sort out one particular person to the bottom. Officers with assault rifles and faces lined pulled these arrested into vans and vans. One of many masked brokers started filming her.
A meals stand outdoors the House Depot in Hollywood.
(Brittny Mejia / Los Angeles Occasions)
“It was actually unsettling and scary,” she mentioned.
In a single video, an armed Border Patrol agent screamed at individuals who have been recording to “get again on the sidewalk!” One other agent informed spectators they might document, however to “simply let ‘em work.” An individual shouted at them to “die.”
Job Garcia, a 37-year-old doctoral pupil at Claremont Graduate College, was selecting up an order at House Depot for a buyer. He texted his brother Elias Garcia round 7:59 a.m.: “Hey Elias me agarro ICE,” it learn. ICE received me.
Elias mentioned he has not been capable of discuss to his brother to search out out why he was arrested and booked right into a federal detention facility downtown.
“Is it racial profiling that occurred or was he attempting to assist out a fellow undocumented particular person? I don’t know what it could possibly be,” he mentioned.
Veronica Perez stood sobbing alongside St. Andrews Place, on the sidewalk outdoors the House Depot the place her dad, Abelino Perez Alvarez, 58, has bought orange juice for seven years. Her mom, who’s in her 50s and didn’t wish to be named, additionally labored on this avenue. The household normally has two stands, however with all of the raids they determined to pare it down to 1.
When immigration brokers swarmed the world, Perez’s mom ran towards the road after she heard shouts of “Migracion!” A driver pulled over after they noticed everybody working.
“Ayudanos, ayudanos,” somebody pleaded with the driving force, a stranger. Assist us.
Perez’s mom didn’t wait. She opened the automotive door and received in. One other feminine vendor wasn’t capable of leap in quick sufficient and was grabbed by brokers, Perez mentioned.
After Border Patrol brokers carried out a raid, many distributors fled, leaving empty meals stands outdoors House Depot.
(Silvia Menendez)
The couple had run in reverse instructions. Perez’s mom received away, however her father was arrested.
For a lot of, their hearts nonetheless pounded as they tried to kind out what occurred and the place their relations have been.
Maegan Ortiz, the chief director of the nonprofit group Instituto de Educación Common del Sur de California, referred to as IDEPSCA, hugged Perez tight as she cried.
She had gathered Perez’s father’s identify and date of delivery and wrote it right into a pocket book through which she was compiling the names of all these taken.
“Lo siento. We’re going to do our greatest to search out him,” Ortiz reassured Perez.
Perez pulled up her telephone log, which confirmed that her first name to her mom — listed as “madresita” — went out at 7:35 a.m. Perez mentioned she doesn’t have siblings, solely a daughter and her dad and mom.
“They’re all I’ve. It’s the three of us,” Perez mentioned. The household had been making use of for a U visa — a kind granted to sure crime victims — after her mother grew to become the sufferer of a violent assault.
“Now we have that hope,” Perez mentioned.
Most of the staff have been registered with IDEPSCA’s day laborer program. Their households trickled in after the sweep in search of them, selecting up automobiles and speaking to others who already felt a void.
“Lourdes additionally received taken,” one particular person informed one other.
Emma De Paz, 58, was nowhere to be discovered when her brother arrived at her stand. Barrera De Paz, who wore paint-splattered blue denims, works as a handyman and had rushed over from Lengthy Seaside after seeing a dwell video on TikTok of arrests unfolding.
“If something occurs to her, it will likely be the duty of the authorities that took my sister,” he mentioned.
Emma, who misplaced her husband after his coronary heart transplant final 12 months, has suffered from despair ever since and faces a number of medical points.
There have been unconfirmed experiences of immigration brokers breaking a truck window to seize somebody inside. That car was nonetheless within the House Depot parking zone hours after the raid.
(Brittny Mejia / Los Angeles Occasions)
“My sister wants her medication. She has diabetes. She wants medication for her blood stress and her coronary heart,” he mentioned. By Thursday afternoon, they have been capable of drop off her medicine.
“I consider Germany, Hitler and the persecutions there, I believed that was simply historical past,” he mentioned. Now, it felt like historical past repeating.
With the stands empty, many have been enraged.
“Despicable doesn’t even start to explain what that is,” mentioned Hugo Soto-Martinez, a Los Angeles Metropolis Council member who represents the world. “You hear about this taking place in army dictatorships and totalitarian governments. To occur right here within the second-largest metropolis in America is — I don’t have phrases, simply outrage. “
Organizers are working to search out authorized illustration for some, however Soto-Martinez mentioned the response must be nonviolent protest.
“Nonviolent, direct motion broke Jim Crow. It introduced down apartheid. We’re experiencing that at a nationwide stage. We all know what works, we’ve to commit ourselves to that sort of motion,” he mentioned.
Federal officers insist they’re focusing primarily on criminals. Border Patrol Sector Chief Greg Bovino posted a video this week on his Instagram web page that includes Assistant Chief Patrol Agent David Kim.
“Roving patrols in an city setting like Los Angeles County presents a whole lot of challenges for us. It’s not as simple as folks suppose it’s,” Kim mentioned. “However there’s that narrative on the market the place folks suppose that simply since you’re at a House Depot that you simply’re a tough employee and that’s all you’ve ever completed.”
He identified that they’d picked up a Mexican nationwide at a Cerritos House Depot on Tuesday who’d been convicted of intercourse with a minor youthful than 16. “Now we have lots of people hiding within the nation that shouldn’t be right here. It takes us getting out on the bottom, in search of these people and it’s simply a whole lot of arduous work that goes into it. We’ll proceed doing it.”
In Might, White Home Deputy Chief of Workers Stephen Miller reportedly directed high Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers to transcend goal lists and have brokers make arrests at House Depot or 7-Eleven comfort shops as they sought to crank up their day by day arrest numbers to three,000.
Federal brokers raided one other House Depot on Thursday in San Fernando. The town’s vice mayor, Maria Elena Solorio, mentioned on an Instagram put up that she was in search of solutions and had solely the primary names of these taken. She pleaded for assist, alongside Los Angeles Metropolis Councilwoman Monica Rodriguez.
An immigration agent walks outdoors the House Depot.
(Silvia Menendez)
“We have to defend each other in these very scary instances,” Rodriguez mentioned. She urged folks to report immigration agent sightings to a speedy response line and cautioned these to stay peaceable and never intrude.
“It is a systematic assault towards essentially the most weak members of the migrant group,” mentioned Pablo Alvarado, co-executive director of the Nationwide Day Laborer Organizing Community. “It’s the working poor. That’s who they’re going after. These are the areas the place they really feel they will do that. They don’t even have authorized parameters.”
Edwin Guevara says the folks taken are these constructing Los Angeles. He runs a development crew and received a name from one among his staff round 7:20 a.m. The person was shopping for lumber for a lodge job when immigration arrived. He informed the person to cover inside House Depot.
“Us right here on the House Depot, we construct this group, we construct society to what it’s. We’re those who construct the financial system to the place it’s at,” Guevara mentioned. “With out us constructing buildings, with out us constructing houses, with out us constructing eating places for folks to go eat, retailers to buy at, Goal, there can be no cash in these locations. “
