There are moments in history when people are forced to choose a side, when the stakes are too high, the violence too severe, and the truth too urgent for anyone to stand in the middle. Today, as immigrants across the Inland Empire face unprecedented attacks, we have reached one of those moments. And let me be absolutely clear: when it comes to growing authoritarianism and the humanity of immigrants, there is no middle ground.
For decades, immigrants in Riverside and San Bernardino counties have endured abuse, harassment, and violence at the hands of government agencies and local law enforcement. Our region has been a testing ground for some of the most aggressive and dehumanizing tactics used anywhere in California. But what we are witnessing now, the escalation and normalization of violence, demands a new level of political courage.
Families have been shot at by federal agents in broad daylight. Workers have been chased into medical clinics. Children have watched their parents detained in parking lots and grocery store aisles. Cars have been rammed, homes surveilled, and entire neighborhoods terrorized by federal agencies acting with impunity. These are not isolated incidents. This is a pattern. A system. A growing authoritarian impulse that sees immigrants not as people, but as targets…