Good morning, and welcome to L.A. on the File — our Metropolis Corridor publication. It’s Tony Barboza, with assist from my colleagues David Zahniser and Julia Wick, providing you with the most recent on metropolis and county authorities.
For many of this week, downtown Los Angeles has been buzzing with protesters, together with highschool college students , who’re decrying President Trump’s mass deportation plans. The demonstrators with Mexican, Guatemalan and Salvadoran flags, who gathered outdoors Metropolis Corridor, marched by way of the streets and have been a reminder that L.A. is a metropolis of immigrants and a spot the place, for a few years now, assist for immigrant communities has been politically well-liked.
That actuality was evident inside Metropolis Corridor too, the place Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez and several other colleagues on Tuesday to ramp up the town’s response to the Trump immigration crackdown. The proposals, that are comparatively restricted in scope, might require companies to report federal immigration raids and audits to the town, put aside area at LAX for authorized help, fund authorized service teams and launch a complete “know your rights” marketing campaign for immigrants, amongst different steps.
Nonetheless, the laws, which got here after Mayor Karen Bass signed a sanctuary metropolis ordinance into regulation in December, exhibits metropolis leaders’ willingness to hold the mantle of resistance to Trump’s anti-immigration agenda. That’s important, given the chance of antagonizing a president who has already threatened to punish “sanctuary cities” by — cash that L.A. must get better from the current wildfires.
Soto-Martínez mentioned in an interview Friday that “that is only the start of a really lengthy 4 years. That is our opening salvo, however there will probably be many extra.”
He mentioned his workplace selected the proposals to introduce this week after bringing collectively a group of individuals engaged on the entrance strains in immigrant communities.
“We had different concepts as nicely, however we felt that these have been those that we would have liked to place ahead the quickest,” Soto-Martínez mentioned, with out detailing what different measures have been into consideration.
As a result of most immigration coverage occurs on the federal stage, he added, the town’s means to reply “goes to be completely depending on our means to be inventive” and likewise on how outraged and activated communities get in response to Trump’s actions.
The Los Angeles County Republican Get together, which has little affect at Metropolis Corridor and has beforehand , responded to the council’s new immigration proposals by suggesting that it as an alternative “crack down on follow-home robberies, or looting, or homeless encampment fires.”
“Possibly the nice individuals of Los Angeles might attend absolutely funded ‘know your rights’ seminars about the way to rebuild after incompetent metropolis management allowed their houses to burn to a crisp on account of gross mismanagement,” Roxanne Hoge, who chairs the L.A. County Republican Get together, mentioned Friday. “It’s embarrassing that individuals who have been elected to fill potholes and run public transit however who can do neither have something to say about federal immigration enforcement.”
Councilmember John Lee — a former Republican who modified his registration to “no get together choice” on an overwhelmingly Democratic Metropolis Council — mentioned he wish to see amendments to this week’s proposals to exclude participation for individuals convicted of violent crimes, his workplace mentioned this week.
In the meantime, immigrant rights teams have been pushing the town to transcend its sanctuary regulation and take extra proactive steps. Organized labor is a strong ally and has stood beside these teams in calling for extra motion.
“Immigrant rights are employees’ rights,” Yvonne Wheeler, president of the L.A. County Federation of Labor, mentioned at a rally outdoors Metropolis Corridor this week. “Completely nobody ought to reside in concern of deportation. Nobody ought to reside in concern that their family members will probably be focused in colleges, church buildings and locations of worship.”
Angélica Salas, government director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, one of many teams championing the sanctuary metropolis ordinance and different native actions to guard immigrants, mentioned the motions launched this week are solely a primary step in a response that should evolve and adapt over the subsequent 4 years.
“I do know that this Metropolis Council, nearly all of them, are with us. They’re with us, and so they wish to assist our households,” she mentioned.
Whereas there’s a number of assist for educating individuals about their constitutional rights, she mentioned, “these actions aren’t sufficient to cease the ferocious assault on immigrants by the administration that it appears like comes up with one thing new by which to assault us each single day. It’s going to require extra motion that’s each proactive and responsive.”
Salas wish to see extra metropolis funding in community-led fast response , to report and doc immigration raids and different enforcement exercise and join individuals to authorized companies and assist. She thinks the town also needs to assist applications to supply free authorized companies in colleges.
Seeing crowds of younger individuals protesting within the streets this week gave hope to Salas, who received her begin within the immigrant rights motion through the Nineties in opposition to Proposition 187, the poll measure that sought to disclaim companies to immigrants with out authorized standing and sparked a brand new technology of activists to battle for immigrant rights.
“At the moment, I simply thought ‘Oh, my God, they’re attacking my household,’ and that’s how I received into this motion,” she mentioned. “So it fills me with simply a lot admiration for these younger people who find themselves standing up for his or her mother and father. Lots of them are additionally undocumented.”
One official who is essential to the town’s response is Claudia Aragon, director of the Workplace of Immigrant Affairs for Bass. She began the job in 2023, at a time when Texas Gov. Greg Abbott was placing migrants in search of asylum onto buses and and different Democratic-run cities. Aragon helped handle the migrants’ arrival and join them with organizations to search out housing and companies.
Now that the Trump administration is launching a flurry of anti-immigration government orders and different actions, Aragon mentioned the town is working to tell immigrant Angelenos by way of “know your rights” and household preparedness workshops, and by directing them to suppliers of professional bono immigration authorized companies.
Aragon mentioned that L.A.’s immigrant communities are in “concern of what they’ll anticipate once they depart their door each day.” She needs them to know that “throughout this time, the mayor’s workplace is right here working each day for them, and we’ll stand with them, and we’ll proceed to work each single day for them, like we did when the buses arrived.”
Bass’ workplace didn’t instantly reply questions from The Occasions concerning the mayor’s place on the council’s immigration proposals and whether or not any extra actions are wanted to guard immigrants from the Trump administration.
In an announcement, Bass pointed to her workplace’s work with nonprofits to supply “know your rights” coaching and to teach immigrants about accessible sources. “Nobody ought to reside in concern on account of their immigration standing,” she mentioned.
Requested concerning the council’s immigration proposals, Solomon Rivera, Bass’ deputy chief of employees, mentioned that “a number of them make sense.”
The mayor “has to see the place the council finally ends up on these, however is actually supportive of defending all Angelenos, and the council’s finished job on main on that,” he mentioned.
The following listening to on the proposals is scheduled for Feb. 21 on the council’s committee on civil rights and immigration.
State of play
— REOPENING REVERSAL: Bass late final week that the fire-ravaged Pacific Palisades would reopen to most of the people, sparking criticism from residents and opposition from Councilmember Traci Park, who represents the realm, in addition to the mayor’s restoration czar, Steve Soboroff. A day later, hours earlier than the neighborhood was set to reopen, Bass , saying the checkpoints blocking the realm would stay in place.
— MASTERS OF DISASTER: The mayor has a agency that makes a speciality of catastrophe preparedness and response, to assist the town get better from the Palisades hearth. It’s nonetheless not clear how a lot the agency will probably be paid or for the way lengthy.
— COLLATERAL DAMAGE: The plan to increase and modernize the Los Angeles Conference Heart by the 2028 Olympic Video games is not possible, metropolis officers mentioned. Excessive-level metropolis analysts that the brand new give attention to wildfire restoration will make it inconceivable to marshal the sources to complete the $1.4-billion challenge by that date. The council will resolve in coming weeks whether or not to remodel the challenge or abandon it.
— CARUSO COMMITTEE: Talking of wildfire restoration, actual property developer and unsuccessful mayoral candidate Rick Caruso has , bringing in numerous enterprise leaders to have a look at methods for rapidly rebuilding from final month’s fires. Caruso introduced his picks days after Gov. Gavin Newsom introduced his personal , which is populated by a special set of enterprise leaders.
— ROGAN’S HERO: In the meantime, Caruso spent practically two hours hanging out with podcaster Joe Rogan, to name for the firing of Janisse Quiñones, chief government on the Division of Water and Energy, over her company’s preparation for and response to the current Palisades hearth. Bass has, in current weeks, promised a full accounting of the town’s dealing with of the emergency.
— HEADED TO COURT: A.F. Gilmore Co., which owns the Authentic Farmers Market, filed a lawsuit this week in search of to overturn the Metropolis Council’s approval of the , which might increase and modernize the Tv Metropolis property at Beverly Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue. The lawsuit claims that the town didn’t adjust to state environmental regulation whereas reviewing the challenge, amongst different issues.
— MYSTERY MAN (OR WOMAN): The Metropolis Council awarded a to Bienart Katzman Littrell Williams, a regulation agency that can characterize metropolis officers in a “federal legal investigation associated to a metropolis worker.” Metropolis Atty. Hydee Feldstein Soto didn’t reply to inquiries from The Occasions asking whether or not the contract is linked to the FBI’s investigation into Deputy Mayor Brian Williams, who was placed on depart in December amid allegations that he known as in a pretend bomb menace. (Williams, by way of his lawyer, has denied the allegations.) A Bass aide referred inquiries to Feldstein Soto.
— COUNTY CRACKDOWN: Los Angeles County supervisors want to by handing out fines of as much as $50,000 to landlords who dramatically hike rents. “There are nonetheless dangerous actors who’re profiting from this disaster,” mentioned Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, whose district consists of the blackened Pacific Palisades.
— EASTSIDE HIRE: Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, who represents elements of the Eastside, has introduced on a brand new press deputy: Lisa Marroquin, who was till not too long ago public affairs director for the Central Metropolis Assn., a downtown enterprise group. Earlier than that, Marroquin spent just a few years with which has lobbied Metropolis Corridor on behalf of purchasers together with Waymo, Airbnb and engineering large AECOM.
QUICK HITS
- The place is Inside Protected? The mayor’s signature homelessness program went to the realm round Clovis Avenue and 111th Place, an space represented by Councilmembers Tim McOsker and Marqueece Harris-Dawson. Outreach employees additionally revisited a piece of Harbor Metropolis, a McOsker aide mentioned.
- On the docket for subsequent week: The council’s transportation and public works committees to debate methods for implementing Measure HLA, which requires the set up of bus and bike lanes on designated streets once they obtain repairs.
