The Trump administration says it’s sending 700 Marines and 2,000 more National Guard troops to Los Angeles. Protests against ICE arrests have been ongoing for a few days now.
Some of the images of the current protests in LA are evocative of those in Phoenix more than a decade ago, when protestors took to the streets to voice their opposition to the immigration law known as SB 1070.
Luis Ávila, a community organizer and president of ICONICO Campaigns, which helps organizations build up their abilities to advocate, helped organize those protests and joined The Show to discuss.
Full conversation
MARK BRODIE: So I'm curious, like when you watch or hear about what's going on in LA, like what comes to mind for you, especially given your experience here in Phoenix?
LUIS ÁVILA: Well, you know, it's a, it's a mix of, sadness, you know, anger and pride, to be honest, just to know that. Our government is mobilizing, these needed resources in other places to oppress and go after people, including, you know, everyone from children to journalists. It's a, it's a very sad day. It's a very, it's a very hard thing to see.
At the same time, I'm, I'm really proud of the fact that people are standing up for their rights and that they are calling these injustices and ensuring that people know that this is something that will happen in LA.
I think that the sentiment was shared here in Arizona in 2010 when people mobilized in big numbers against SB 1070, the show me your papers laws, but also something that happened, you know, before that in 2006, 2007 against the oppression of people like Joe Arpaio as well. So this is, this is something familiar to us in Arizona, and it's something that, that we are aware could happen anywhere as well.
BRODIE: I wonder about some of the both similarities and differences between 2010 in Phoenix and now in LA. And I wonder, sort of like from an organizing standpoint, like with SB 1070, like you kind of saw that one coming, right? Like the bill was moving through the Legislature.
You kind of had a sense of what was going to happen, whereas in LA right now, I mean, it seems as though it is maybe a bit more spontaneous. Is that a fair assessment?
ÁVILA: Absolutely. I mean, 2010 and SB 1070 was a result of years of anti-immigrant legislation, draconian leadership from people like Russell Pearce of the Senate, you know, you know, movements like the Minutemen in the southern part of Arizona. So in some ways, 2010 was, you know, a culmination of that anti-immigrant sentiment and, and policies.
So we had a lot of time to build coalitions and institutions and connect with each other, sometimes across difference, you know, with people who were working on the impacts and economic impacts or the social impacts, the human impacts of anti-immigrant legislation. So in some ways, in 2010, we had the infrastructure to respond, we had the, the messages, the connections, but also we were, you know, mobilizing and defending ourselves, in some ways against the, the loss of the people from the state of Arizona.
In this case, the people from LA are seeing something unprecedented, and that is federal forces used against citizens, which is not just something scary but extremely dangerous for us to consider, that if there is dissent in the United States now, you know, the military could be mobilized against us.
BRODIE: Do you see a straight line between the SB 1070 protests and what we're seeing now in LA?
ÁVILA: I see a straight line between Arizona and what's happening in the anti-immigrant movement nationally. In some ways, Arizona is a microcosm and hopefully a lesson to the rest of the country. When Arizona was the, what we, we, we were called the epicenter of hate, right, like around the country, so people saw us as a backward state that we're going against people who were, you know, some of the most vulnerable populations in our state.
Our economy was affected by the billions, you know, our reputation in the state got really tarnished for years, as you remember, people refused to come in conferences and concerts and, and really the view of the state of Arizona was, was really impacted. And, and I think in some ways, you know, the microcosm of what Arizona is to the rest of the country is exactly that.
The United States is now seeing international law as a place that maybe you don't want to go study in one of the best universities in the world because you might …. be picked up by a masked person. Really, the United States is shooting its body, itself in the foot by actually creating this image of anti-immigrant sentiment and you know, that they're against the people who want to make a better life in this place.
BRODIE: Why do you think it is that we haven't seen the kinds of protests in Phoenix or other parts of Arizona that we have seen in LA recently? I mean, there are certainly some protesters at the state Capitol. There are folks by the, you know, the federal courthouse protesting ICE activities there, but we're certainly not seeing anything like the images coming out of LA.
ÁVILA: Yeah, I think that, you know, social movements and protests are, are shown and, and reacted in different ways. There is a vast infrastructure in the state of Arizona of immigrant advocates and immigrant defenders and as as we speak today, they are, you know, all across the city, doing, accompaniment and witnessing and recording and observing bad behavior from ICE agents and from some of these folks who we don't even know if they are ICE agent. They're just showing up with masked faces, like some of them are not identifying themselves.
And Arizona right now, it's in a very strong effort to protect our communities, to ensure that they know their rights, that we're sharing information with people as we know these efforts are not only impacting undocumented people, but also residents and citizens. So the, the effort in Arizona has been very much on the ground. Tons of organizations and people are out there today, talking to people and ensuring that they are documenting what's happening.
I think what happened in LA though, it was a very different story. It's one of those things that happened in the perfect storm, right? The conditions were right, for people to come out on the streets and actually fight back. It started in Paramount with a really big raid in Paramount, in one of the areas of Los Angeles, but it spread out to the whole city, as we have seen it thanks to social media. We have to remember, too, that back in 2010, 2006 when we were mobilizing people, social media wasn't as strong as we have it now, so we see other ways of communicating as well.
BRODIE: As an organizer, how do you try to keep things from devolving into violence? Like, I would imagine when you see pictures of cars on fire, that that's probably not what you want to see, right?
ÁVILA: Absolutely. I mean, in my personal opinion, violence is not something that I condone. It's not something that I support. The efforts in Arizona and, and many of the protesters in, in Los Angeles as well, as we have seen are peaceful protests.
I mean, the people who are reporting from the ground are showing that people are showing up peacefully and that they're being agitated and they are being, also in some ways harassed by police forces.
And I think that the president mobilizing the military is just, you know, throwing gas to the, to the fire. He is not acting in good faith, and I think that his efforts are actually causing more harm than a real solution to the conversation that we're having, which is separating families and picking up people just because of the way they look or they sound. It's not an American value. It's not something that we should be supporting.
