To those on the right, Los Angeles was a war zone. Trump declared that without his intervention the city would have been obliterated. It would have been overrun by insurrectionists (not people who storm Capitol buildings, real insurrectionists with brown skin). Military intervention was required to restore order.

To those on the left, a dictator declared war on his own people and used the military to subdue peaceful protests. There were no issues and those burning cars you saw were nothing to worry about and all part of the fun of LA life or something.

To someone who lives in Los Angeles, the truth is a small group, in a small area, acted like assholes, set some cars on fire, looted some stores, and gave Trump ammo for him to rile up his base and initiate a propaganda campaign. The LA police had it under control and the protests were not spreading. We had a curfew which came too late because the democrats handled the protests while worrying about Trump rather than managing their own damned city, but overall it was a lot of fuss over a small blip.

Not to mention the fact that the protests were there to protest one of the most shameful episodes in our recent history - something we should be protesting. Perhaps not by setting fire to cars and looting store like a bunch of morons, but it did and does warrant protest.

The city was and is as it always is - peaceful, sunny, and incident-free except in a few square blocks downtown. That statement is true of LA at any point in time. Certain areas of downtown have been a dystopian nightmare for the poor and addicted for the last 25 years as late-stage capitalism continues to turn its most needy out onto the streets. The fact that some of those blocks were on fire a few days ago isn’t that surprising.

Other than that, the city has been business as usual. This isn’t ‘92 folks. The city isn’t a disaster zone. I live here. I would go downtown and show you, but I don’t want to get depressed looking at all the homeless people both MAGA, and non-MAGA voters seem happy to ignore.

What is different in LA is the fear running like venom through our community; and Los Angeles is a community. Don’t let anyone tell you different. You will hear people from out-of-town bemoan that LA is a city of strangers and phonies - but these are often New Yorkers, or Chicagoans, or middle Americans who are either used to a different type of community or, more often, haven’t yet been invited to the real community in Los Angeles.

The community in Los Angeles is Latino, and it is everywhere. It is in our language, in our food, in our art, our music, our street names, our clothes, our colors, our sports, our history. It is in everything we do. You cannot live here and be happy without embracing it, and if you want to love Californian life, you have to love Latino culture. You don’t have to love all of it, just as you don’t have to love all of American culture - but that California Dream definitely includes a burrito from Campos at some point. It absolutely includes singing Feliz Navidad at least once every Christmas regardless of your religious heritage, and you better know how to pronounce Sepulveda or you ain’t getting where you want to go.

So, when ICE come to town and start rounding up people and treating them without humanity, it sends fear through the entire system. It’s a toxic shock to the whole network. If you live in Los Angeles, you know someone who is here illegally. You probably know someone who could just never be bothered to go for citizenship, but you also know someone who has been trying to turn that illegal status into legal status for years but has been unable to do so because this country makes it damned near impossible to do so unless you are white, European, or have a lot of money.

I know many illegal Californians that work hard, pay taxes, raise families, live healthy, positive, upstanding lives that up until about 8 years ago most republicans would have labeled as good Americans other than their immigration status. They lead virtuous lives and would be deemed an asset to this country.

Today, those people are being hunted. They are being rounded up and herded into camps for deportation. Families are being destroyed and treated without humanity. My friends, people I have known for 25 years, are having their lives wrecked as the President and his supporters mock their pain.

They have been sacrificed to ease a resentment brewed in the poison chalice of Trickle-Down Economics. They have been crucified by those who still drink that poison but have been waiting a long time and were just about ready to blow… until Trump came along and told them they were still smart to believe the plan, but the immigrants and the lefties had been rigging the game.

This modus operandi is recognizable in the worst leaders in history. We are not there yet, and Trump is too old to take us there - but his actions are breeding acolytes. Power corrupts.

They have given more to this country than any of their critics, yet they receive no benefit in this moment, no due process, and are given no quarter.

I have a friend who told me if he is deported then he thinks it is just supposed to be that way, because that’s how this country is now. He doesn’t like it “so much”. He shrugged and shook his head, unable to express what was in his heart - but it was clear enough. I’ve known him a long time. I know what he felt. He’s paid taxes, worked hard, lived the American dream, never (and I mean NEVER) put a foot wrong, and never been able to get citizenship. He’s not educated enough. He’s at a point now where if he keeps trying they’ll know too much and kick him out, so he has to stay under the radar (even though the IRS has no problem taking his taxes). He’s a wonderful man, a great father. Kind, loving, generous. The man you want in your lifeboat.

My heart is broken today. I have never felt such shame over my country; over the people I know that voted for this. I can’t reconcile how people I know who voted for Trump are able to deal with knowing that their choice has ruined the lives of people that I know they care about.

“Well, they should have got their citizenship” is just a statement of fact, it does not heal the wound. How are they dealing with the wound? Are they just closing their eyes until it goes away?

I feel like I betrayed my friends.

I'm An Immigrant