On May 2, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents raided 11 El Balazo taquería restaurants in the San Francisco Bay Area. Agents illegally arrested over 60 workers. Community members and organizers held a protest three days later in San Francisco.
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The raid took place a day after immigrant rights protests were held all over the country on May 1, International Workers Day. A mass immigrant rights movement in 2006 re-established May 1 as a day of working-class struggle in the United States. Since then, the number of raids against immigrant workers has increased.
The Balazo raids were part of a massive round-up designed to intimidate immigrant workers. On May 9, Berkeley High School was on lock down because ICE agents were preparing to raid the school. The raid was prevented when the ICE agents were caught illegally dressed in Berkeley police uniforms. Other ICE actions have taken place nationwide.
ICE agents entered the Balazo restaurants with an IRS search warrant. The agents had no arrest warrants. The arrests were illegal and any evidence collected from the arrests is inadmissible in court.
Many workers were interrogated without legal representation. ICE claims that it targets those involved in criminal activity and does not do random enforcement. But most of the Balazo employees had no criminal records.
Most of the workers were imprisoned for five to seven days. Among those detained, five were juveniles.
Workers have been placed in one of two monitoring programs, ISAP or G4S, while they await deportation hearings. ISAP is the most restrictive.
Workers in the ISAP program have been forced to wear electronic ankle bracelets, having their every move tracked upon their release. They must remain in their homes at least 12 hours a day and visit the San Francisco ICE office three times a week. This is particularly difficult since the workers live all over the Bay Area, some as far away as Tracy in the Central Valley. ICE agents may also come to the workers’ homes unannounced.
In the wake of the raid, El Balazo has been inconsistent with its rehiring policy. Many workers may have no choice but to leave the country because they cannot afford to stay without a job.
In reaction to the ICE assault, several hundred people protested in front of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s San Francisco office on May 5.
Immigrant rights activists, faith leaders, labor union members, workers, students and several community organizations joined the action, which called for an immediate end to the raids. The protest pointed out that the callous and systematic raids are tearing families apart and unjustly criminalizing workers.
The attacks on immigrant workers are an attack on the entire working class. Homeland Security is targeting vulnerable immigrant workers in the hopes of stifling them as political force and using racism to divide workers. The real criminals are not immigrant workers but ICE agents and the capitalist class for whom they work.
