As the protests of anti -immigrant raids continue during the sixth day in Los Angeles, a group of 30 regional mayors in southern California joined to support and solidarity with those who protest peacefully.
During a press conference led by the mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, on Wednesday, the mayor of Huntington Park, Arturo Flores, who is a veteran sailor, spoke directly with the members of the service deployed in the protests of the administration of President Donald Trump.
Their comments occur since more than 4,000 national guards and 700 Marines will be parked in Los Angeles, despite the fervent objections of some local leaders.
A woman agitates an American flag, while the staff of the California National Guard is outside the Federal Building during the protests in response to federal immigration operations in Los Angeles, on June 10, 2025.
Apu Gomes/AFP through Getty Images
Trump said the deployment is necessary to “address anarchy” and said that angels would be “burning to the ground” if he had not sent to the members of the service.
“I have a message for those marines,” Flores began, talking about the oath that he and all members of the service take to “defend the Constitution and defend this country.”
“That oath was for the American people. It was not for a dictator, it was not for a tyrant, it was not for a president, it was for the American people,” Flores said.
The mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, speaks at a press conference on June 11, 2025.
Pool through ABC News
“The people who are here in these communities, in the city of Los Angeles and the cities they will hear, are Americans, whether they have a document or do not,” Flores added.
The protests, which began on Friday in Paramount, California, and have spread to the nearby center of Los Angeles, were partly caused by a Customs Immigration and Control Retail (ICE) of the United States made in front of a local home in Huntington Park and elsewhere in the area.
Since Friday, there have been more than 300 people arrested for ICE in Los Angeles, according to the coalition for the human immigrants of Los Angeles, a local organization of immigrants.
American Marines with the 2nd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division in Test The crowd control tactics on a base in the Great Los Angeles, June 10, 2025.
CPL. Jaye Towsend/US Marines through Reuters
On Tuesday, the official ICE account in X shared a photo of the national guards at the scene of an arrest made by an ICE agent with the legend: “Photos of the ICE immigration application operation of ICE today.”
Speaking of the “militarization of the application of immigration,” Flores said that “it does not take place in our neighborhoods, and the deployment of marines on American soil is an alarming escalation that undermines the values of democracy.”
“We rely on these tactics based on the fear that are directed to the communities of immigrants and erode public confidence,” he said, qualifying the actions of the Trump administration to display more than 4,000 members of the service “political theater that is based on fear.”
