- 3 months ago
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass holds a press briefing.
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00:00Thank you everyone.
00:28Thank you, thank you everyone for being here.
00:31We put a call out about an hour ago.
00:35And with this call, and I'm so glad that you are here as children.
00:39Yes.
00:40You came on a moment's notice because every single person standing here understands the gravity of this situation.
00:49That's right.
00:50And what we want to show to the world, you want to know Los Angeles, this is Los Angeles.
00:56Last Thursday, Los Angeles was peaceful.
01:08There was nothing happening here that warranted what began to take place on Friday.
01:15So today, I wanted to present a visual, one that Angelenos know, but I just want to make sure that the state, the country, and the world knows that this is Los Angeles.
01:29We are a city of labor.
01:31We are a city of businesses.
01:32We are a city of faith.
01:34We are a city of believers.
01:36And we are a city of dreamers.
01:38So let's just remember why we are here today.
01:50Last Thursday, ICE entered our city and provoked the city by chasing people through Home Depots and car washes and showing up at schools and today showing up at emergency rooms and homeless shelters.
02:07ICE intervened as a pretext to federalize the National Guard and then in the White House, the National Guard was complimented for the work that they did to keep peace in the city Saturday night.
02:27But I will tell you, the Guard didn't even arrive here until Sunday.
02:32They used this as a pretext to send the U.S. Marines into an American city, which will target our own citizens.
02:42They've been threatening elected officials with arrests, and they just shoved and cuffed a sitting U.S. Senator.
02:52How could you say that you did not know who he was?
02:56We see the videotape.
02:57We see him saying who he was.
03:00But how do you not recognize one of two senators in our state?
03:06And he is not just any senator.
03:08He is the first Latino citizen senator to ever represent our state.
03:20The images we have seen of our city over the past week, the raids, the vandalism, the looting, none of that is L.A.
03:29Los Angeles is who you see behind me, representatives of the faith community, the business community, community organizations.
03:36Yesterday, I stood at this podium with over 30 mayors from Los Angeles County who are all concerned about what is going on.
03:45Los Angeles is a Jewish community, a Muslim community, a Christian community, and many other faiths.
03:51Los Angeles is Chinatown, Little Tokyo, Filipino town, Koreatown, Thai town, the South L.A. African American community, the Chamber of Congress, the Central City Association.
04:03This is L.A., and we are united.
04:06And I just want to say that I was listening to the words of the secretary at the press conference describing L.A. as a war zone.
04:15It is my understanding that she arrived here late last night, was here for a few hours today, and came to that conclusion.
04:24There's no one up here that sees Los Angeles like that, and I know as the press, you know this is not all of Los Angeles.
04:34This is isolated to a few blocks in a city that is over 500 square miles.
04:43And out of those 500 square miles, the protests, and especially the protests that devolved into vandalism, represents about half a square mile.
05:00So the notion that this is happening all over our city, the notion that this city is not governable,
05:06the notion that we need the military to intervene, we have the capacity to address these problems,
05:13and I know there's not a person up here that supports vandalism, that supports violence,
05:18and that understands if you support the immigrant community, you know how to do it in a peaceful manner.
05:24We are proud to say that we have a well-established, a well-respected immigrant rights organization
05:30that have been holding protests for years and years that have never devolved into violence.
05:36And so to characterize what is going on as our city as a city of mayhem is just an outright lie.
05:44I'm not going to call it an untruth. I'm not going to sugarcoat it.
05:47I'm going to call it for what it is, which is a lie.
05:50And I just have to say, I served with the secretary.
05:53I served with the secretary for probably about 10 years in Congress.
05:57And Madam Secretary, I do not recognize you anymore.
06:01I do not know Christy Noem that I served with for 10 years.
06:07So no matter what happens out of the White House, we will always uphold and reflect
06:15what Los Angeles and the United States of America are truly about.
06:20Freedom, tolerance, and for God's sake, our Constitution.
06:25With that, I would like to introduce Angelica Salas, the executive director of CHIRLA, one of the most respected and established immigrant rights organization that has been in our city for over four decades.
06:53And is known throughout the nation.
06:55And I want to ask you, Angelica, to talk about what the letter that you received this morning.
07:02Yeah!
07:03Thank you, brothers and sisters.
07:10See, the Los Angeles that I love is made of beautiful people who are behind me and who are all over this city.
07:17This is a city that cares for one another.
07:33This is a city of caretakers.
07:36The people that I'm standing next to are people who work with our students and our children.
07:42They're people who work in our faith institutions, caring for entire congregations.
07:48They're the people who are fighting for worker rights.
07:51They're our union brothers and sisters.
07:54These are the people who are running to the detention centers in order to offer legal services to those who are currently detained.
08:02They're the same people talking to the families that are calling us on our hotline.
08:07This is the Los Angeles that I love deeply.
08:12This is also the Los Angeles that the immigrant community has helped built from its very, very first days as a city.
08:22And what I want you to know is the city that I love, loves our people back.
08:29What I have seen come to our city is cruelty, is chaos, is violations of human, civil and constitutional rights.
08:46What has been brought to our city has been racial profiling in a way that I have never experienced it in my career.
08:55What I see now, and based on all our reports, is over 45 enforcement actions, not just in the city of Los Angeles, but in our entire region, all of Southern California.
09:12I have never seen this.
09:15It's unprecedented, and that is an understatement.
09:19The pain that we are witnessing when we talk to the family members is unbearable, of children being left behind.
09:31And I want this president to know that this city is tough, it is organized, it is disciplined, and will not tolerate what is happening at this moment.
09:44What was very clear to me this year was, at the beginning of the year, is that they were not just going after the immigrant community.
10:02But they were going to go after all the immigrant rights organizations that supported them.
10:08And they did.
10:09They began by defunding us, by making sure that organizations here next to me wouldn't have the resources to be able to go represent children and vulnerable adults, disabled individuals in detention.
10:25That took away legal services from those who are still trying to find their parents and their children from the first Trump administration.
10:37And now, what I see very clearly is they're coming to the organizations by then, I would say, to saying the most vicious of lies of who we are and what we do and what we're about.
10:50But the truth is the truth, and it's based on our actions.
10:55Not actions of this day, but actions of decades.
10:58And yes, we have received a letter from Senator Josh Hawley.
11:03But what I want you to know is that's not going to deter us, it's not going to intimidate us from standing with our immigrant community,
11:17by standing with our families, by demanding due process, by demanding that there be accountability for the violations of human and civil rights that have occurred in our city.
11:28But I know I'm not alone.
11:30These are all the people who are here with me, and there's so many good people in L.A.
11:36And we're going to stand together.
11:43We're going to show this country that we do believe in liberty and justice for all,
11:49and that our Constitution and our Bill of Rights are our guiding principles,
11:53and that is what has brought so many immigrants to this country because they believe deeply in these values,
12:00and we're going to fight to make sure that those values are upheld.
12:03Thank you very much.
12:12Can I just say thank you, Mary?
12:13Let me just say that one thing I think that is not thought about, we certainly understand it in our city.
12:27The immigrant community is vital to the economy of our city.
12:33That's right.
12:34There are entire sectors of our economy that will not function if the immigrant community is too afraid to go to work and too afraid to go to school.
12:44You could talk about the construction industry, and I think there's a lot of building that needs to take place here.
12:49You can talk about hospitality, and I think that we are concerned about our tourism industry.
12:55And I could go on and on about the economic impact.
12:59That is why we have the Chamber of Commerce and the Central City Association,
13:04Central City Association led by Nell McOsker and Maria Salinas, the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce.
13:12Thank you, Mayor, for your work.
13:21Angelica, thank you for your work and what you are doing in the front lines.
13:25On behalf of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, I can tell you that we are deeply, deeply disturbed by all the activity that we have seen.
13:33And Mayor, you are right.
13:35We have a local economy here that is vibrant.
13:38But it's vibrant because of all our workforce.
13:41That includes our immigrant workforce that is here.
13:45And we at the Chamber of Commerce, we understand and we know that they play a role in just about every sector that you can think of.
13:53We understand that together, that we power one of the largest economies in this country.
14:01And it is important for us to recognize that if we have employees that do not show up to work, that's a problem.
14:09If they do not show up to their health appointment, that's a problem.
14:13They do not show up to their school and their education, that's a problem for our broader community.
14:20We want to see this community thrive.
14:22This is the Los Angeles that we all know.
14:25And I'm so proud to stand with all the civic leaders that are here, the business leaders that are here, to say enough.
14:33We need to de-escalate this.
14:36We cannot have what happened to Senator Padilla today.
14:40That cannot be the norm.
14:42And Los Angeles will rise above this because we've done it before.
14:54And we're going to do it again.
14:56And we're going to do it with everyone in our community, including our immigrant population.
15:01I was with our chamber board this morning, affirming the work that we are doing to ensure that this community feels safe, feels supported,
15:11and that we are all working together just like we're here with the mayor and with this entire group here today.
15:18Thank you, Mayor, for having us and for lifting up how important it is to sustain an economy that works for all.
15:34I started off my day meeting with representatives of the business community and the labor community, which plays a vital role in our city.
15:42And there are already reports of people not showing up to work, of empty store shelves, of people feeling that they cannot leave,
15:52leave kids and families afraid to go to graduations.
15:57The attendance at graduations being down by 25 and 50 percent because parents are afraid that on one of the most important days of their lives,
16:07that they cannot attend the graduation because they might be detained by ICE.
16:14This is not the America, this is not the city that we live in, and we will not accept this.
16:21That's right.
16:22We are also...
16:23We are also a city of faith, a city of many faiths, many cultures.
16:38There's not too many countries on Earth that are not represented in Los Angeles.
16:44I'd like to bring up Father Brendan Bowes from the Dolores Mission Church.
16:49Thank you, Mary Bass.
16:58My name is Father Brendan Bussey.
17:00It's okay, Polish immigrants do strange things to their last names.
17:04As you said, I'm the pastor of the Dolores Mission Church, and it was great to have you stand with the interfaith community.
17:09I hope you felt the interfaith community standing with you on Tuesday when we came into Grand Park to pray in peace,
17:16to pray for peace, to bring a presence of peace.
17:19And I know, as you mentioned, the children that are here and our families are feeling that this is a moment that is quite scary for many of us.
17:26But I stand here today to remind us that this is also not just a scary moment, but a sacred moment.
17:32This is a sacred moment where we as a city of Los Angeles stand up and recognize that there's two ways we can live.
17:38As if everything is sacred, or as if nothing is.
17:42And we stand here today because we know that everything and everyone and every place is sacred.
17:49There are some in our government, as you know, as we have seen, that act as if nothing is sacred.
17:55Not our churches, not our schools, not our hospitals, not our shelters, not our homes, not our streets, not our parks, not every place.
18:03No place is sacred, and nobody is treated as if they were in this city by this government.
18:09And so I'm here to remind you that this is a moment where we have a choice to make.
18:13If everything is sacred, then we need to respect the dignity of all people, respect the rights of all people.
18:19We need to do everything we can to advocate and stand for that.
18:22And everybody in this room, I think, stands with us as we say that.
18:26I go to my school every day and I hear things now that I don't ever want to hear.
18:31Children looking at me saying, Father Brendan, I saw you on the news.
18:34That's something I never wanted to hear.
18:37But I asked one of those children, I said, how did that make you feel?
18:40And he said, thought for a minute, and he said, strong.
18:45I felt strong when I saw you up there.
18:47And that's what I want everybody to hear in the faith community, the civic community, the business community, the whole of Los Angeles.
18:53When we stand together, our children do not feel scared.
18:56They do not feel threatened.
18:58They do not feel worried about who's going to be home when they get back from school.
19:02They feel strong when they see us standing together.
19:05They feel brave when they see us acting in their name.
19:08They feel proud when they see people standing up for what is right.
19:12And that's what we do here today.
19:14And always, as we said in the park on Tuesday, we will continue to be brave with our love because that's what Los Angeles is.
19:22Someone at that action was there crying in tears asking, where is my family?
19:27And as I heard them say that, I said, I don't know where they are, but I know exactly who they are.
19:33They are our brothers and sisters.
19:35And we need to start acting as if that were true.
19:38We will be brave with our love.
19:41We will be brave with our love.
19:43We will be brave with our love.
19:57So let me just say, as I said earlier, that there's no one up here that supports vandalism, that supports violence.
20:05We have had to have a curfew in the city because we want to make sure that the downtown neighborhood and all the other neighborhoods are safe.
20:14But let me be very clear.
20:16We want peace to come to our city.
20:19The peace that we need to have happen needs to begin in Washington, and we need to stop the race.
20:27Stop the race! Stop the race! Stop the race! Stop the race!
20:46Having the military, soldiers who are trained to fight wars on foreign soil here in our city is not going to bring peace because, first and foremost, they are not needed.
21:03Second of all, federalizing the National Guard will not bring peace to our city.
21:10That is not all that is going to do is provoke people and create and add to the sense of fear in this city.
21:19We know how to bring about peace, and peace begins with ICE leaving Los Angeles.
21:35Okay, we're going to take a few questions, Zach.
21:38We're going first to Anna and then to Robert.
21:41Mr. Bass, have you been able to get on the phone with President Trump?
21:44No, I have made a formal request.
21:47I have talked to members that are close to the administration.
21:50We will see if my formal request is granted.
21:53Did he deny your request?
21:54There has just not been a response just yet.
21:57We're going to Robert and then Josh.
21:59Hi, Mayor.
22:00Hi.
22:01Let's talk about the curfew.
22:03Is it going to continue?
22:04How long is it going to continue?
22:06Does the zone need to be expanded after we saw it last night included?
22:09Well, I don't think the zone needs to be expanded.
22:12Unfortunately, we will continue the curfew.
22:14And my hope is, is after continuing it a few more days that people will get the message that we are serious.
22:20The arrest that took place last night was not for looting, was not for violence.
22:25It was for unlawful assembly and curfew violation.
22:28What I noticed when I was traveling the streets late last night is that the people that were out on the streets were young people waving flags and they were not violent.
22:39That was not the group that is committing, that has committed the vandalism.
22:44We're going to Josh and then Laura.
22:46Mayor Bassett, in her remarks earlier, Christine Noam said that you would not respond to calls from the White House.
22:53They tried to get caught.
22:54Well, like I said, I do not recognize the secretary anymore.
22:58I don't know who she is.
23:00Yeah.
23:01That is a complete lie.
23:04I have spoken to Senator Berdia and I just, you know, want to express my concern about his health, about his safety.
23:13And, you know, all I can say is that, I mean, in some instances, there's no words.
23:18This is a sitting U.S. senator, not somebody.
23:22And frankly, if you're going to come into town and say you have diagnosed what is happening in our city and you don't even know who the U.S. senator is.
23:31Yeah.
23:32Mayor Bassett, what is happening in the country, everybody is outrageous, the majority of the Americans.
23:43What do you think that democracy is going to?
23:47Bassett, an authoritarian president, what do you think?
23:52Let me just say that I think that unfortunately our city is being used as a test case.
23:57I feel like we are a citywide laboratory to see what happens if Washington comes in and literally usurps the authority of the governor, usurps the authority of the mayor.
24:08And so I think as part of this test case, it's a warning for other cities.
24:12But clearly other cities are very concerned, which is why you have seen protests spread.
24:17But I also know that there's a new mayor in Omaha, Nebraska.
24:21I don't know how many hours he's been mayor and he's already experiencing raids.
24:26So I think this sense of fear and terror goes whenever you have ICE that's out there.
24:32ICE could be raiding folks right now.
24:34I was in a meeting with Angelica and some of the other immigrant rights leaders the other morning and everybody's cell phones started going off.
24:41Why? Because they were being notified of raids that were taking place in front of schools.
24:45You might have heard me mention that my grandson's elementary school.
24:49There were ICE agents right out in front of that.
24:51We believe that it's because they thought it was a graduation that was taking place.
24:55And the violent criminals that they detained were two street vendors selling food.
25:00So we're going across the territory. If you could say your name and your album.
25:04A.C. Johnson, ProPublica, and PBS Frontline.
25:07At 5.52 a.m. this morning, the National Guard was used to effect what seemed to be a low-level criminal arrest.
25:14Were you aware of that? Do you expect that to continue?
25:17No, but thank you for raising that because I think what that could indicate is an expansion of their mission.
25:22Their mission here is supposed to be solely protecting the federal buildings.
25:27A hundred National Guard or Federalized National Guard are in the Downtown Federal Building.
25:33And a hundred are in the Westwood Federal Building.
25:35Westwood always has protests. None of them have been about this issue.
25:39I don't even know why they're there. And frankly, I don't know why the Federalized National Guard is needing.
25:45But I will tell you, when I saw the Federalized National Guard there this morning,
25:51it indicated to me that there might be an expansion of their mission.
25:55And I believe that is extremely dangerous.
25:57Again, all that does is provoke the community.
26:00Well, for me, the last time he was president, I was in Washington, D.C., and a lot of these ideas were lifted then.
26:20They talked about them, but they didn't implement them.
26:23So in part, and I think that's true for most of us, we heard this rhetoric before.
26:28Now we're watching it play out.
26:30And it's extremely terrifying.
26:33Molly and then across.
26:35Mayor, two things.
26:37First, you mentioned.
26:39Oh, I'm sorry. I'm Molly with the Washington Post.
26:41Two questions.
26:43One, do we know whether Marines have actually entered the city of Los Angeles or been actually deployed out in Los Angeles?
26:49And then second, we've got this court ruling we're expecting to come down in San Francisco today.
26:54What is the significance of that for Los Angeles in terms of the National Guard?
26:57Well, hopefully the significance of that is the Federalized National Guard will leave.
27:02Again, we have a very good relationship with our governor.
27:06If the National Guard was needed, I could have picked up the phone, called the police chief, called the sheriff, and said,
27:12please make the request, and it would not have been denied.
27:15Once again, there was no reason for that.
27:18You asked, what was the other question?
27:20About whether the Marines got to do it.
27:21Oh, so my understanding, and you might know different, they're in Seal Beach.
27:25And by the way, the Marines who cannot arrest people, who do not do civil, you know, in the streets, crowd control, are now being trained for that.
27:35And I think we've probably all seen the pictures of the Marines being trained.
27:39And by the way, we really need to understand, it's so important to understand our history.
27:45It's not normal for the military to be deployed on the streets of cities in the United States.
27:52The military is for foreign wars.
27:54Right.
27:55Not civil unrest that's not even happening.
27:58We're going across, and then down in front.
28:00Hi.
28:01Jacob Marks, the Associated Press, just to follow my colleagues.
28:04Have you had any communication with anyone in the U.S. military about the possible deployment?
28:09No, you know, you see, this is the thing about the military, about the Federalized National Guard, about ICE.
28:15There's no communication.
28:17None of us here know how long the raids are going to go on.
28:20We all function off of rumors, and I think the latest rumor is that it's going to go on for 30 days.
28:25The rumor is the military might be here for 60 days.
28:28The bottom line is they're not needed for 30, for 20, or for 60 days.
28:33I'll just have a question real quick.
28:35You mentioned raids at a homeless shelter.
28:37Can you share any more about that?
28:40Well, what I know is that, and I don't know.
28:42Do you know?
28:43Yes.
28:44Okay.
28:45So, especially, every day that passes, our reports and the numbers of raids increase.
28:52They also increase in front of schools.
28:55We received reports of hospitals and churches.
29:01And so, what I need you to understand is that each day there are multiple actions, and they're not just in the city of Los Angeles.
29:10So, they'll be in Whittier.
29:12They'll be in Downey.
29:13They'll be in all adjoining cities, regional cities.
29:17Yesterday, our raids rapid response network did not stop receiving calls until after 7 p.m.
29:26And so, there's two kinds of reports.
29:28It's the community is also very scared.
29:30So, even if they are not at an enforcement site, what's happening is they're witnessing everything.
29:36Right.
29:37So, a lot of our volunteers.
29:40Mayor, can I say something in Spanish?
29:42Because I think it's really important for...
29:44Um, no, mas un mensaje a nuestra comunidad, inmigrante, a toda nuestra comunidad aquà en Los Angeles.
29:51Lo único que sà les quiero decir es que toda esta gente que está aquÃ, todos son lÃderes cÃvicos de Los Angeles, con nuestra alcaldesa, todos diciéndoles a ustedes que no están solos.
30:00Que vamos a luchar con ustedes por sus familias porque son las familias de Los Angeles y que estamos dispuestos a seguir luchando con todo, con todas nuestras capacidades para que la inmigración, para que estas redadas paren.
30:13Muchas gracias.
30:14Claro!
30:15Yeah!
30:16Yeah!
30:17Yeah!
30:18Yeah!
30:19Yeah!
30:23Can I say something to these for the priest?
30:24Oh, sure.
30:25Sure, sure.
30:26Okay.
30:27Father, many parishioners from all the Catholic churches are asking their pastors if they can
30:37go to Mass on Sunday, and there are some groups, Catholic groups in different dioceses, Diocese
30:44of Orange, for example, they already canceled their community events.
30:48What is the message for the Catholics to take action or to stay inside of this?
30:55Yeah, thank you.
30:55It's a good question, because there is a lot of fear.
30:57A lot of people aren't showing up for work.
30:59They're not showing up for school.
31:00They're not showing up at church.
31:02And what I would say is I don't know of any specific decision, at least in the Diocese of
31:07Los Angeles, to advise around that.
31:09But one thing, I've responded to many of these raid incidences in East L.A., and one thing
31:14that sometimes I get the response is, well, did it happen at the parish?
31:17And what they mean is the church building.
31:19And I'd just like to remind everybody that a parish community is actually the whole neighborhood.
31:23And so I would call on religious leaders and parish communities to surround their churches
31:29and to surround their communities with the same kind of support.
31:32So in any place, you can ask for extra presents that might help people feel safe, or you might
31:38make a decision to cancel the events that you have if it seems like people aren't safe or
31:41there's an active threat to them.
31:43So that's what I would say.
31:44I think it's a call on all of us to make sure that those places are safe, whether we are
31:48members of that congregation or not, that the congregation is really mixed in like all
31:53of our brothers and sisters within the whole community.
31:55And my question is, because they already went to churches in the South Downing, they arrested
32:00an old man who was seated on the parking lot.
32:04That's right.
32:04If they already touch one single church, even if it's not Catholic, nobody's safe.
32:10That's right.
32:10Yeah.
32:11I mean, what our community has said again and again is that they just feel hunted and
32:16they feel kidnapped.
32:17They feel sequestered, right?
32:19And they're hunting people and that might end up in a church parking lot.
32:22They might end up in another parking lot.
32:24But we also know that organizations are receiving specific letters that seem to threaten them.
32:29At our church, we haven't received one of those letters yet, but you never know what's
32:32going to happen.
32:33I think that that's what we need to be prepared for.
32:35We're going to go down in front and then end with Jay's answer.
32:38Let me just say before we do that, a couple of the other impacts.
32:44Thank you for mentioning the church because that was a grandfather that was dropping off
32:49his granddaughter.
32:50But some of the other impacts, when people are detained, and Angelica, you will correct
32:56me if I'm wrong, you've been doing this for years and years.
32:59In the past, people have had access to legal counsel.
33:02People have had access to families.
33:04So when the priest says that people feel kidnapped, you do feel kidnapped if you don't know where
33:11your relative is.
33:13If you showed up to work because a raid was happening and you watched your mother, your
33:17father, your sister, your brother being carted off and you don't know where they went, that
33:23creates a sense of panic.
33:24So one of the consequences of this is people being afraid to leave their homes and then
33:30they don't want to go to the grocery store to get food.
33:33So we were talking this morning about, in solidarity, finding out who those people are and delivering
33:39food to them.
33:40That is a shame that we are even having this conversation.
33:45Go ahead, Zed.
33:46There's been a lot of talk about protests and violence and all that, but there is an issue
33:57with the LAPD who has been firing on peaceful protesters and they've also been deliberately
34:08firing bullets at rubber bullets or other types of so-called less lethal munitions at reporters.
34:18There's the Australian reporter who's sitting on the leg on camera.
34:22I know people who have concussions and moves in their heads.
34:27And the New York Post was sort of a shock in the head.
34:30It, you know, I think that something is not right here and there's violence from the federal
34:41source, but all of this violence is not, it cannot be put on the protesters.
34:47Protesters are out there to protect anybody.
34:51Well, I'm sorry, and I might feel differently than other people here.
34:55I would draw a distinction between the people who are vandalizing buildings and who are,
35:01you know, breaking in and looting.
35:03But let me just say that I have heard a number of accusations about the LAPD and you can be
35:09sure that we will do an evaluation of all of it.
35:13Because one thing about our city, like a lot of other cities, just about everything is videotaped,
35:19including law enforcement and including people who are protesting.
35:23So I would draw a distinction between people who are peacefully protesting.
35:28So there will be an evaluation and an investigation into everything that happened, including the
35:35conduct of the police department.
35:36Well, last question.
35:40This is David Zahnizer at the Los Angeles Times.
35:43This is a very iconic question I posed earlier this week.
35:46The city has many, many facilities where the public goes, interact, or provide services,
35:52libraries, or recreation centers.
35:54I'm wondering, is there any kind of training?
35:57Is there any kind of preparation that you or the department heads are overseeing to address
36:04the issue of warrantless visits or ICE visits?
36:08What is the city doing right now, or what has it done up until this point at these locations?
36:14Sure.
36:14Well, let me just tell you, prior to Friday, many city departments that interface with the public
36:21have been given the information, know your rights, the typical information that is passed out
36:27by immigrant rights organizations and the city.
36:30Now, having said that, we need to really ramp up.
36:33I will tell you, though, that this has been happening so fast that we absolutely need to
36:39do that, because I can also imagine people fleeing into these buildings for protection.
36:45But I also don't want to misrepresent the power of the city as well.
36:51It's important that people understand that the federal government is more powerful than
36:56the city or the state.
36:57And a lot of questions have come up about why can't you just stop this?
37:01Trust me, if I could, I would.
37:05But we have to be careful, because we also don't want to invite the federal government
37:09in to press charges against a lot of people unnecessarily.
37:14So let me just say thank you all for showing up.
37:17And I just can't thank all of you enough, because you are showing who our city is.
37:23You are showing that our city is going to be united.
37:26And you are showing that we are not going to allow this administration or any other administration
37:32to divide us and to have us in conflict with each other, because we are L.A.
37:50Yeah.
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