Border Patrol agents clad in tactical gear jumped out of a Penske moving truck in the parking lot of a Los Angeles Home Depot before arresting more than a dozen immigrants early on Wednesday morning.
The raid, dubbed “Operation Trojan Horse” by U.S. Border Patrol El Centro Sector Chief Gregory Bovino, came weeks after a federal judge temporarily blocked agents from using race, spoken language or place of work to target people in indiscriminate immigration arrests. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals later affirmed the federal judge’s ruling.
The Wednesday raid, as well as others in the Los Angeles area in recent weeks, suggest that the Trump administration is not complying with court orders, immigrant rights advocates told HuffPost.
“We are deeply troubled by reports of raids in Southern California since Saturday, including at a Home Depot in Westlake this morning,” Mohammad Tajsar, an attorney at ACLU Foundation of Southern California and one of the lawyers representing the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, told HuffPost in a statement. “While we continue to investigate these incidents, the evidence available so far raises serious concerns that the federal government may be in violation of the federal judge’s July temporary restraining order.”
“What we saw today is disturbing. It creates chaos. And it sends waves of terror in the community that is already reeling with the impact of more than 45 days of military siege,” said Jorge-Mario Cabrera, communications director for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, one of the plaintiffs in the suit.
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