Para las personas que prefieren escuchar esta junta in spanol wouldn't pass construed interpretes al fondo del Concilio de la Ciudad para receber assistencia.

Okay.

Good afternoon.

The time is now 109 p.m.

on Wednesday, January 22nd, 2026, in the City of San Antonio special session is called to order.

Madam Clerk, please call roll.

Councilmember Corps.

Councilmember Makit Rodriguez.

Present.

Councilmember Villagran.

Councilmember Mungia.

Present.

Councilmember Castillo.

Here.

Councilmember Galvan.

Present.

Councilmember Alnarete Gavito.

Here.

Councilmember Mesa Gonzalez.

Present.

Councilmember Spears.

Here.

Councilmember White.

Mayor Jones.

Here.

Ma'am, we have a quorum.

Okay, thank you.

Madam Clerk.

Before we get started, I'm gonna take the council into an executive session.

I'd ask my colleagues to remain seated while I read those.

Thank you.

The time is now 110 p.m.

on January 22nd.

The City of San Antonio, City Council of the City of San Antonio will now meet in executive session to consult with the City Attorney's Office pursuant to Chapter 551 of the Texas Government Code and to deliberate or discuss the following items.

Economic development negotiations pursuant to Section 551.071.

The time is now 137 p.m.

on Thursday, January 22nd, and the San Antonio City Council will now reconvene in open session.

No official action was taken in executive session.

Again, my goal as mayor is to balance public trust and public safety, trying best to strike that balance while norms around us are quickly changing.

As you will hear since taking office, I've been in touch with ICE and a variety of uh federal agencies to understand their activities and have worked closely with our federal delegation to that effect.

Not surprisingly, we must comply and will comply with state and federal laws, and as you'll hear, that results in frankly very littly way we have as a city when it comes to federal law enforcement related activities.

Today you'll hear about the city's ongoing efforts, uh many dictated by law, and we'll hear and we'll hear directly from you regarding your experiences and and your concerns.

Um, Eric, over to you for a uh for a staff presentation.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, so yes, uh there are three main parts of this presentation.

Um and Andy uh will kick us off at the beginning, laying out the legal obligations under which uh the city and San Antonio Police Department operate related to the cooperation with uh federal agencies generally and uh for uh immigration law enforcement.

The second part of the presentation will uh kind of highlight an overview of the types of interactions that the police department in general has with federal uh agencies, um, and that'll be covered by Chief McManus and uh Deputy City Manager Maria Villa Gomez, and then we'll wrap up with um to the point of the the the the session today.

What are those interactions between uh the city San Antonio Police Department and those federal agencies specifically around immigration enforcement?

So with that, Andy will kick us off uh to uh the presentation.

Thank you, Eric.

Can we get the slide presentation up?

I think the second one.

I think Eric just gave the uh the presentation overview.

Um we'll start with the legal obligations that we have in terms of cooperating with ICE and federal uh agencies.

Uh the primary statute that we need to consider uh is a state law, which is SB4, which was passed by the state legislature in 2017, often referred to as the anti-sanctuary cities bill.

First and foremost, it requires uh the City of San Antonio and SAPD to cooperate with federal agencies in the enforcement of federal immigration laws.

And there's some specific things also that are tied to that.

It prohibits us from adopting any laws or policies that would interfere with federal agencies in the enforcement of federal immigration laws.

It's important to highlight that there's no clear definition of what interfere means uh in the in the interactions we've had with the state.

I would say that's a rather broad definition, at least of what the state has in terms of when it what interfering means.

It also forbids us from having any policy that prohibits our police officers from asking about uh or inquiring about immigration status.

And in fact, uh we changed our policy, our police manual the day SB4 came into effect, uh, because before that uh we did have a policy uh in which SAPD would not ask about immigration status.

Uh next one is an important one.

It requires non-elected officials and city employees to enforce uh SB4.

Uh and enforce SB4 also relates to any comments, opinions, et cetera, uh in your official capacity that could be interpreted to mean that we are not going to comply or not complying with SB4.

Uh consequently, when you hear staff speak today uh and uh answer questions, uh, it's gonna be always overlaid with the statement or with the policy that we are going to comply with SB4.

Uh it does not, though, limit uh elected officials uh from exercising the First Amendment right.

Uh but I'm talking specifically about SB4.

Uh I will caution though, given uh what has happened recently, both in well, particularly in Minnesota, that um that doesn't SB4 doesn't prohibit federal authorities from either starting investigations or frankly arresting people uh who they feel uh are interfering with uh ICE activity.

Um so that there's that caution there as well.

I will remind the council that we are the only city that was sued under SB4 and that we challenged in court SB4 initially successfully, but ultimately when it got to the Fifth Circuit, uh SB4 stands initially uh essentially as was enacted.

Uh one victory we did get was this First Amendment protection for elected officials.

Next thing to keep in mind is SB4 that was passed in 2023.

Uh it prohibits uh illegal entry presence uh in the country.

It essentially establishes uh an immigration prohibition at the state level.

Uh it created some obligations for local government and law enforcement to insist in assist in the transportation or removal uh of individuals.

Uh it was initially enjoined, but the Fifth Circuit uh has upheld that injunction and and uh there's a re-hearing schedule for that uh in January.

Um so again, emphasizing SB4 is the main statute that uh governs our cooperation with ICE officials, and that um right now it's uh it stands as was originally enacted, and uh we were gonna comply with SB4.

Uh last note on here on this slide is that uh even with SB4, the city SAPD has worked with our nonprofits and in fact uh the chief uh and his team uh when they visit neighborhood associations always emphasize that there's no your rights in terms that any individual would have as it comes to interactions with any law enforcement agency, whether it be local, whether it be state, whether it be federal, uh there are still constitutional uh rights out there that individuals should be aware of.

There are still constitutional uh rights out there that individuals should be aware of, and we work with our nonprofits and as I say with the with the SAPD in informing the public as to what those rights are.

So with that, I'll uh turn it over to the chief.

Thank you.

Morning, Mayor, Council.

Um I have a very long history with uh SB4.

If some of you remember that, a long painful history with SB4 dating back to December 23rd of 2017.

So I'm very sensitive to SP4 issues, but I'm also very sensitive to community sentiment and concerns about this.

So let me start with um with slide four.

And SAPD works with federal and state partners through a multi-jurisdictional task force forces, and aren't limited when crimes cross city lines.

Those task forces can operate not only in San Antonio, but they can go New York, Philadelphia, they can even go out of the country if necessary.

And the partnerships let us share resources, intelligence, funding, and funding that SAPD alone wouldn't have otherwise.

These task forces are focused on serious crimes like illegal narcotics, firearms trafficking, human trafficking, smuggling, child exploitation, and they make us more effective and give us a much broader range, as I mentioned, going out of state, going out of the country if need be.

SAPD partners daily with federal agencies and currently participates in 18 multi-agency task forces focused on serious crime, not immigration.

Scale of operations is based on risk and intelligence and largely supported by state and federal grants, with over 7.3 million dollars awarded in FY26.

Task force officers are deputized, as I mentioned earlier, which enables them to go out of uh San Antonio jurisdiction and allows them to, as I mentioned before, operate well beyond San Antonio when needed.

As I mentioned earlier, San Antonio works with federal partner agencies through task forces focused on organized crime and human trafficking.

These partnerships expand our access to resources and intelligence, helping us to target large-scale criminal activity while maintaining strong local enforcement presence.

So these are nine of the 18 task forces that we have.

I'll leave this up on the slide for a minute so you can look at it.

And these are the remaining nine task forces that SAP is involved in.

So you might wonder how officers SAPD officers are governed when they're working with federal agencies.

SAP officers are bound by SAPD policies.

Even when working with state or federal agencies.

Officers on task forces remain under SAPD management the entire time they are assigned to the task force.

I've heard questions asking, and you might wonder why or what is the difference between HSI and ICE.

Homeland Security and ICE.

Immigration and customs enforcement.

ICE and HSI are divisions of Homeland Security or HSI.

HSI handles major transactional crimes like trafficking, cartels, and financial aid.

I'm sorry, financial fraud, while ICE focuses on immigration and enforcement removals as we know.

State law under SD4 requires SAPD under penalty of law to coordinate and cooperate with DA DHS in limited and defined circumstances.

Supporting federal investigations, sharing information on trafficking, smuggling, and coordinating with ICE when legally required.

SAPD's role is cooperative and not enforcement driven.

Thank you, Chief.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council.

The next portion of the presentation is gonna focus on police data as it relates to immigration.

So the police department doesn't actively track data related to immigration, but for this presentation, we did a review of all the calls and all the reports written by the police department for calendar year 2025.

The police department receives roughly about 2.1 million calls per year, and our officers are dispatched to about 1.8 million calls per year.

Of those calls that we received, there were 66 that reference the word immigration, and there were 258 reports that reference the word immigration.

Can you go to the next slide, please?

So what I'm gonna do on the next slides is go over each of the categories in the previous slide of those uh 258 reports that I mentioned.

So there were 161 that there was no federal involvement.

There was no federal immigration enforcement related in this activities.

Individuals that indicated that they were made threats to them to call immigration to report them as being in violation of immigration law.

There was a criminal report where there was a a suspect that was alleged to be in violation of immigration laws, and also reports that SAPD wrote related to demonstrations about immigration where they participate.

There were 43 reports related to ongoing criminal investigations.

The chief uh just mentioned the work that is done with different task forces.

Uh and as a result of some of the work related to narcotics and gag-related activities concurrent with federal criminal investigations, there were 43 reports written for that.

There were 30 reports for state and city charges.

This particular reports involves where the police detain and arrested an individual for a state charge or a city ordinance violation.

And in those cases, those individuals also had an administrative warrant issued by federal agencies.

And finally, there were nine reports related to human smuggling and trafficking.

Those incidents happened in 2025, and as an example, we had a case that happened in Quintana Road in Plum Near in September of 2025.

The next portion of the presentation is about immigration detainers.

So the police department is required by law to comply with immigration detainers.

An immigration uh detainer is a request from MICE that it as the police department or a law enforcement agency to notify ICE before the police department releases an arrested individual.

In 2025, the police department arrested more than 51,000 individuals, and of those ICE issue issue detainers to 11.

Now, in terms of uh immigration administrator warrants, as I mentioned uh in the previous uh slide, the police department does not have the authority to arrest an individual only on the basis of an administrator warrant.

Our police officers are trained to distinguish between an administrative warrant and all the other warrants that they are able to see in the system.

Uh the direction that has been given to the uh police officers again is that they don't have the authority to arrest somebody on the sole basis of an administrative warrant, and that they should contact ICE uh to address or detain that individual at the scene.

So, with that, I'm gonna ask Chief McManus to come back to the podium to talk about how the police department deploys uh resources to different incidents.

Thank you, Maria.

So as I mentioned on slide six, SAPD deploys resources based on scale and scope of each incident, whether they're planned or unplanned.

Responses may involve SAPD alone or multiple agencies as seen in recent large scale incidents.

And some of the examples of those incidents are Maria mentioned one, there was uh on Cantana Road in June of there was another one on June uh in 2022, where we found over 50 deceased persons in the back of a trailer.

Then there was a narcotic and gang investigation that we worked on uh in the 1000 block of Sahara on October 5 of 2024, and then OIS and Stone Oak on January 22nd, 2025, where there were multiple police officers shot.

ICE requests are limited to scene security and uniform presence.

So when they call us, we're not going in through the door with them, we're not putting anybody in handcuffs.

All we're doing is providing scene security uh perimeter security and scene security.

So I think Maria Mentor talked about earlier, there were two requests, only two to assist ICE in 2025, and those requests are rare and they're case specific.

And because of SB4, SAPD is legally required to respond and assist.

And these were limited control deployments, minimal personnel, no routine involvement, and no ongoing operations.

So in conclusion, we understand the concerns and fear in our community, and we're very, very sensitive to them.

To assist federal agencies when requested.

And I want to be very, very clear on this.

I can't over-emphasize it.

SAPD does not enforce immigration laws.

We do not arrest people for immigration violations.

We are not uh by law.

We do not have that jurisdiction.

Uh we will continue to protect San Antonio with compassion, integrity, fairness, and respect.

And again, to our citizens out there, we are sensitive to your concerns, and we are we are very, very aware uh of the fear out there, and we certainly take that into account when we're dealing with our community.

Thank you.

Um Chief McMahonis, thank you for your presentation.

Um before we move on to the uh the public comment um portion of this.

Do any of my colleagues have any clarifying questions for Chief McManus regarding the presentation?

Clarifying questions, longer comments, other things you'd like to discuss, we'll do during the actual council discussion, but any clarifying comment or uh questions regarding the presentation at this point.

Okay.

Um Andy, uh, just bec in case it informs any of the the public comments.

Um recent reporting uh has discuss uh has illuminated the way in which administrative warrants are being um uh handled differently than than was previously understood.

Can can you speak to what that uh may mean for this conversation and and for the community?

Uh thank you, Mayor.

Yet yes, the uh I think your question relates to the use of administrative warrants uh by ICE to either enter uh residential um uh homes or or businesses uh as being reported in uh in some of the national press.

Uh apparently ICE has a internal memo that suggests they are using uh the simply the administrative warrant to do that.

Uh previous constitutional uh law has stated that uh that is not uh within the uh constitutional rights that are are afforded.

Uh we expect that'll be challenged at some point in time, but um uh to clarify, yes, that uh uh that is uh internal memo.

Again, it's being reported.

We don't have independent verification of that, um, but that's what's being reported in the national pressure.

Okay.

Uh Councilman Galvan, you're recognized.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um I had a couple questions for the chief.

Uh for the number, I don't know what slide exactly it's on, uh, but for the number of SAP officers dispatched to assist with immigration-related issues, is that strictly patrol, or is it a multitude of different units or dispatch that's also involved with the kind of assistance that's pro that's required?

So requested.

If I'll give you an example, so uh there was a business uh up off of 281 uh earlier, well, last year, where they were going in to serve some warrants, uh uh um ICE, and they asked for perimeter security from uh SAPD.

We pulled them from uh traffic and other units.

We didn't pull, we don't pull officers from their patrol districts to do that.

So and if there's uh uh investigations that involve the task force officers, then that doesn't involve any patrol officers either.

So very, very little uh imposition on patrol when they ask for assistance.

Primarily, at least so far has been traffic, it's been depending on different task force narcotic units potentially, et cetera.

But not I can't hear you with our tracking.

Sorry, I'm sorry.

No, no, you're good.

Can you hear me better a little bit?

Can you hear you better now?

Yeah.

Okay.

Um so it would be traffic potentially.

Um the other ones.

Yep, narcotics task force.

Yeah, it was also safe.

The the the case that the council that the uh that the mayor that the chief is referring to, it was safe officers and a sergeant that went to that business for that security.

Okay.

So off the slide, council member.

Um of those requests uh for a retailer that I mentioned, uh three SAPD personnel, two safe and one sergeant.

Okay.

So nobody came out of patrol districts to help that help that uh effort.

Um and on 122 25, uh DHS requested SAPD and EMS for a subject who is resisting arrest, so we sent three SAPD officers there as well, uh, plus the MS.

Okay.

Thank you.

Um I know I think on slide 17 there is um a note about supervisors determining uh who gets to go out or how many people go out.

Who's a supervisor within that determination?

Is it is it you is it a sergeant, is it city manager?

Who's what?

For supervisor uh I believe it's on, let me see.

Maybe it's on slide 18.

Yeah.

ICE requests for resources are for the scene security uniform presence, determination is made by supervisors.

So when that call comes in, it may come into dispatch, a dispatch notify supervisor, may come into it from a TFO from a task force officer.

But whatever supervisor receives that call will make that analysis.

And if it's necessary to go up the chain to approve it, then that's what happens as well.

Okay.

Got it.

Do we receive any information from Federal authorities about uh what the request for support is?

Perimeter support, yes, but what the larger action was related to.

I'm sorry, Councilman Right.

The drums are uh my hearing's terrible anyway, and I can't hear with the drums.

No, you're good.

Um I was asking about for do you receive any information related to the action at hand?

Beyond just asking for perimeter support, or is is it just simply that?

I don't understand what you're saying.

I'm sorry.

That's okay.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council, Justice Solomon, assistant chief.

Yeah, we will sometimes receive information because that's gonna determine what it is and how many folks we're gonna send out there.

So uh typically if they're asking for a uniform presence, we will send uh a couple of officers.

If it's uh anything more than that, depending on what it is, uh you know how many folks they're looking for, for example, and we're talking about just in the universe of calls for assistance with a federal agency or the Bear County Sheriff's Department, anybody, uh that determination is made by the uh by the uh uh first line supervisors, or the sergeants.

Uh anything that's gonna have a uh a larger implication in terms of uh gobbling up resources for an unordered amount of time will then go up the chain of command.

Uh anything that would be considered high profile wouldn't would ultimately result in command notification, ultimately all the way up to the chief of police for awareness and uh approval.

Okay.

I think the last two questions I have was um is is any information possible to be shared about how many judicial warrants versus administrative warrants or what kind of warrants are being requested during that request for support?

Is any of that receives and they're able to us to ask for?

That's not something that we would typically track on a day-to-day basis.

I can tell you that there are a number of different task force operations.

Um there are a number of uh SAPD operations that occur daily that um re that are all kinds of different warrants.

So we are focused uh mostly on a rest warrants.

Anything on an administrative type warrant is not something that we have the uh arrest authority for uh criminal warrants, is what we are focused on.

Okay.

Last thing I was gonna ask, Eric, um of course I know this is still new news uh for the police chief.

Um are these same processes gonna be in place with the next chief that we'll have to do.

Yeah, councilman.

I think that you know it uh the what the chief set up here is probably no different than what uh any other major uh city police chief is dealing with right now.

Okay.

Um and so obviously our policies, the adherence to state law, of course, um, the uh internal protocols, the joint investigations, those were all critical things that of any major city police department, and I don't anticipate those changing uh regardless of who the chief is.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Those are my questions.

Councilman Viegeran.

Thank you.

And I don't know if this is a question for uh uh the police or Andy, but uh regarding the incident that happened on 7-3 2025, was the department notified on I know we were just uh three SAPD personnel and two safe officers and one sergeant, but were we notified on what sort of um vehicles were going to be out there, how many personnel the federal employees were going to have out there, and if the vehicles were marked or not.

Did they provide any of that information for you all?

Uh I'll I'll get some more in-depth information, uh, council member, but my understanding is that the um a task force officer uh requested uh uniformed SAPD presence.

And so uh with the specifics of what was said and and what specifically was requested and why, uh I can certainly look into that for you.

Yeah, thank you.

Because uh as we move forward, I think those those are important things.

And then Andy, in regards to SB4, if it is if it is within SB4 for our officers and our task force to ask uh in terms of uh manpower and marked vehicles and employees from the federal government that are gonna be out there, can we do that?

Is that within our our bandwidth if we are going to deploy um our SAPD personnel and we understand it is going to be be dealing with a larger neighborhood.

So if we could get that information, I'd appreciate it.

Thank you.

We can um Andy, going back to the the legal obligations, it it's it's come up a a couple of times.

It's it's it's come up a a couple of times.

Um actually most recently during the last public comment.

Um the point on the slide on the legal obligation slide, uh that SB4 prohibits SAPD from prohibiting their police officers from inquiring into immigration status.

Um the uh there was an idea raised by a community member again at the last public comment about um the possibility of having SAPD officers provide kind of a know your rights um before inquiring uh regarding that uh individuals immigration status.

Do you have a legal uh assessment or opinion on that?

Well, I I I I'll give you the the legal analysis that I can give in public, Mayor, and we can probably talk about more detail in exec, but uh such a practice probably will be problematic in terms of compliance with SB4.

Okay, because a reminder for the community, uh, we are the only city uh that has been challenged under SB4.

Is that correct, Andy?

That's correct, Mayor.

We are the only city that's been sued by the state under SB4.

Okay, and who raised the complaint with the city?

Uh who raised the complaint with the state.

Among among others, it was uh the police union at the time.

Sorry, who?

Among others, it was the police union.

Okay.

Okay.

I was like, all right.

Okay.

All right.

So excuse me.

Excuse me, we'll have we will have a civil discourse.

Okay.

Um we will we are here to listen and I appreciate the uh the patience during this presentation.

Um, but uh we will not tolerate in any way any threatening behavior toward anybody up here, um, certainly in your actions sitting there or in your comments before this body.

Yeah, that's right.

And if you've signed up, we'll call on you and we'll look forward to hearing your comments.

Thank you.

Mayor I have here my question.

Yeah, please go ahead.

Councilman Castillo.

Thank you, Mayor.

I had two clarifying questions with the two instances in which ICE requested uh for SAPD to support in 2025.

Can you help us understand the window of notification?

Uh, for example, on the third and the second, uh was it uh two-week window, one month window.

Uh, how close to the operation is SAPD notified that they're in need of assistance?

Yes, ma'am.

The first one we were called and advised asked to respond to the scene.

Uh the second one that came in, I believe they're dispatched, and we were dispatched to the scene.

So they were um immediate responses.

And my my second question is when ICE is requesting SAPD to support, is the city of San Antonio receiving reimbursement for the support of the officers being pulled off of the field to support with this operation?

No, ma'am, not to my knowledge, no.

Okay.

All right.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chief.

Councilman Corps.

Chief, I just have one quick question for you.

The two requests that um Councilman Castillo just asked about the November uh incident at San Pedro was not included because it was a separate investigation that then became an ICE rate.

Is that correct?

So the yeah, the San Pedro incident was something different.

That was a we'll call that a planned event, and that was a narcotics search warrant.

Um I I know what the reports are saying after, but that was we were not there for any type of immigration enforcement.

I understand, but my question is are there other do we know of other incidences like that in this last year that started off as something else but then turned into an immigration incident?

No, ma'am.

Okay.

Thanks, Mayor.

Councilwoman Alderete Gavito.

Thank you.

I just have one quick question.

Are there ever any times where SAPD overtime hours are you utilized solely to assist with ICE requests?

With what with ICE request?

Uh not to my knowledge, no, ma'am.

Okay, thank you.

Okay.

Hearing no further questions regarding clarification on the staff's presentation, we'll move on to public comment.

I will call individuals um in the order that they signed up to speak.

Um each individual will have two minutes and groups of three or more will have a total of six minutes.

Okay.

The first person to speak is Grant Moody.

Thank you, Mayor.

And uh Paul Jimenez has yielded his time.

This is the new one.

Demonstrates, Commissioner.

Thanks.

Okay.

Good afternoon, Mayor, Counsel.

As you all know, I'm Bear County Commissioner Grant Moody.

I've served in this role for three years now, and from day one, I've been very clear.

Public safety is priority number one.

My comments here are gonna be pretty high level, but related to public safety and respect for law enforcement.

I care deeply about San Antonio.

As elected officials, our words and our actions matter.

When we are not thoughtful, we risk undermining public trust and public safety.

San Antonio is a special place.

While we are one of the largest cities in the country, we still carry the values of a small town.

We look out and show up for one another.

And we have a culture of patriotism as Military City USA.

And a culture of respect that extends to law enforcement.

In today's environment, we must recognize that undermining law enforcement or micromanaging law enforcement ultimately undermines public safety.

And that puts everyone at risk.

ICE is enforcing federal law in coordination with local law enforcement, including our Bear County Sheriff's Office and SAPD.

That coordination or communication between law enforcement is essential to public safety.

And there should be zero tolerance for attacks on those who serve, whether they wear the uniform of SAPD, BCSO, the FBI, ICE, or any other federal agency.

No one's written a lot of murdering people.

Order, order.

Every hey, order.

Everybody will be treated with respect, or you will be escorted out.

Let me let me let me let me just clarify.

Let me just clarify.

Well, we will recess, we'll recess for 15 minutes.

Thank you.

Quiet in the chambers, quiet in the chambers.

Grant Moody, you can before you uh before you start your your comments again.

Let me just reiterate to our neighbors.

We are here to listen.

We are here to listen.

We also want to make sure every speaker, regardless of their viewpoint on the spectrum, is treated with respect and that we actually hear them.

So we will recess as often as we need to make sure that everybody is heard and everybody is treated with respect.

That's why we are all here.

There's no other purpose than that.

So please, I ask for your uh your your help in creating that environment.

Okay, Commissioner Moody, please.

Thank you, Mayor.

As I was saying, there should be zero tolerance for those uh for attacks on those who serve our community.

No one should be threatened, harassed, or harmed for doing their job.

Law enforcement must be able to do their job safely and without interference.

Obstructing law enforcement is a crime, and when officers' lives are put in danger, they have the legal right to defend themselves and their fellow officers.

So let's ensure that that never happens.

By treating those law enforcement officers with the respect and the deference they deserve.

It is important to remember that law enforcement officers are not policymakers.

They are husbands and wives.

Mothers and fathers, sons and daughters.

They are our neighbors and members of this community.

Quiet in the chambers, please.

Quiet in the chambers, please.

Like everyone else, they want to go home safely to their families too, and we owe them that.

Public safety is a core responsibility of government, especially at the local level.

And we must never put politics above public safety.

While we are a nation that values free speech, yes, go for it.

While we are a nation that values free speech, clearly, and the right to protest, we must do so peacefully and lawfully.

Protest is part of our democracy.

Violence and obstruction is not.

Yes.

And anyone who undermines law enforcement, anyone who undermines law enforcement does so at the peril of our city.

Let's remember who we are.

Sir in the chambers, please.

Almost not.

Respect the rule of law.

Sir, the gentleman in the blue shirt, sir.

If you'd please sit down.

Sir.

Let's let's remember who we are.

Respect the rule of law.

Respect those who've taken an oath to serve and protect.

Treat one another with decency.

We are stronger and safer when we do.

Thank you, Mayor and Council.

Mayor Jones.

Mayor Jones.

Order Mayor Jones.

Ma'am, yes.

Mayor Jones.

I am Reverend Lydia Hernandez Tricky, an ordained clergywoman from the Presbyterian Church.

And I wanted to call a point of order.

That's why we're upset.

He is an elected official, ma'am, and he should not have been allowed to speak.

Thank you.

Order, order, order.

There are no uh restrictions on his ability to speak.

Ron Nuremberg, Rod Nuremberg.

Order, order.

We're gonna recess.

We're gonna recess.

All right.

Uh please take your seats.

We'll reconvene after the recess.

Ron Nuremberg.

And then I'm gonna.

Quiet in the chambers, please.

Quiet in the chambers.

I'm gonna ask.

Go ahead.

No, no, no, no.

No, no.

I'm gonna call the um the next several speakers up.

So just so you're on deck.

Frank Zamora, Elijah Payne, Naomi Stewart.

The only individuals that will be able to approach the microphone are those that are called up.

Okay.

Go ahead.

Mayor Jones, uh City Council, thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today.

It is a rare occasion that a council discussion generates this amount of interest.

Um, and so I believe it is because these are moments that define ours ourselves as a community.

I believe that the soul of San Antonio lives in the trust that we've built as a community.

That trust is founded in the compassion we have for our neighbors.

It's maintained by the dignity with which we act, and it's tested by our ability to know right from wrong.

It's trust that makes our community truly safe.

Right now, the president's actions are eroding that trust and replacing it with fear.

A fear of immigrants and a fear of each other.

But immigration isn't a threat to us, it's a strength.

What really threatens our safety is unchecked power.

What we're seeing, what we are seeing play out across the country is abhorrent, and we have an obligation to stand up for our neighbors.

An arm of the government acting as an unconstitutional paramilitary organization being used as a tool for intimidation.

Accountable to only one man.

And when they bypass the courts to hunt our neighbors, it doesn't create safety, it creates chaos.

It is un-American, it is undemocratic, and it is wrong.

We can, we can be a community of laws and a community of compassion.

This is our tradition.

We don't have the authority over immigration law, but we have the human obligation to treat each other with dignity.

This is our collective call as Libra as the leaders and neighbors.

We keep our community safe, and when our local leaders, law enforcement, and neighbors come together, our shared resolve cannot be broken.

Thank you very much for the opportunity.

Frank Zamora.

Frank Zamora, Elijah Payne, Naomi Stewart.

Elijah and Naomi, please line up so you can speak right after Frank.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Council.

If it's possible, Naomi Stewart had to leave and she uh gave her time to me, if that's acceptable.

She has to be she has to be present to give that time to you.

Completely understood.

I'll use my own time then.

Thank you.

Uh my name is Frank Zamora.

I'm a former COSA and former state of Texas employee.

And today I'm here to make the desperate plea that given the extenuating circumstances, we must cease all cooperation between SAPD and ICE in San Antonio.

We all know how we got here.

Last November, this country voted for mass deportation now based on the well-funded lie that migrants commit crime at a dangerous or higher rate than the American people.

Despite countless statistics and journalists debunking it, the migrant crime lie still won at the polls.

Now I recognize the temptation of cooperating with ICE.

It's quiet in red states right now.

But the reality is that red states are calm because our governors have made us weak.

We have adopted the very un-Texan policy of roll over and just let it happen.

And we have given free reign to amateur thugs who have made it clear they have no intention of following the law.

Last May, the Trump administration said it was actively looking into suspending the right of habeas corpus.

Two weeks ago, the vice president informed ICE agents that they have absolute immunity.

And only yesterday, as was previously mentioned, the associated press revealed that ICE agents were sent a memo telling them that they have the power to disregard the Fourth Amendment and enter homes without warrants.

If they have declared, if they have plainly declared that they will not follow the law, we cannot treat them as a law enforcement agency.

Now I am a strong advocate for police reform.

I do not believe there is a PD in this nation that is perfect, but over the years I have seen that SAPD does have a structure in place to ensure that its officers are investigated for breaking either the code or the law.

And while that system is far from perfect, there is a system.

So why are we asking the trained and the accountable to protect the untrained and the negligent?

Thank you for your time.

Elijah Payne.

Elijah Payne.

Araceli Ada Sally Hereda?

Who are Elijah Payne?

Um, after we'll be at a Sally Hereda.

Please line up after the speaker.

Thank you.

Good evening, Council members.

My name is Elijah Payne.

Um I reside in District 6.

I'm also a student at San Antonio, Texas AM.

Uh I would like to ask you all a couple questions.

They're fairly simple.

First question being will local and federal authorities respect the civil rights of immigrants when attempting to detain or after having detained them.

Following that, has ISIS recent conduct been constitutional or unconstitutional.

Following that, does the city of San Antonio recognize ICE as an authority with absolute immunity?

Following that.

Does the city of San Antonio recognize ISIS conduct in other states as unjust?

I just want you to know nobody, not the president, and not any federal agency is above the law.

Followed by Alberto Pena and Maria Fippin.

Please line up.

She did not hear what you said.

Can you repeat, please?

Okay.

Here we are again, the poor, the workers, the uh people who without voice, trying to speak to you because we are the heart, we're the basis of the society we have built this city to.

Speak toward the dais, speak toward the dais.

Once again, we're having to defend ourselves for something that we should not have to defend ourselves.

The poor people, the workers, the ones who prove uh create the riches of the city.

We are still suffering the uh abuses of the immigration and we are still fighting the the same struggle we've had for so long.

We are suffering, we are suffering, and we are receiving the suffering um we are receiving people who are coming to us to our offices to tell us about the suffering.

This is a uh citizenry that uh having been born here and that they are being treated as they are not citizens, and they're being treated worse than in any other country in the world.

They disrespect our rights.

They are it is unfair what they are doing.

We uh are suffering there we're no respect and no and no pity.

We uh are suffering there where no respect and no and no pity we don't want the police to function as immigration we have that right because we pay their salaries because we pay their salaries that tienen this cargo Don't try to fool us saying that you're not going to do something and then you do it as you permitted all these money to be spent on the sports district instead of helping the people that are so poor.

People are starving to death in these neighborhoods of poverty dollars and so we lost the people lost and the people who won are the ones with the billions of dollars.

Don't take us for fools and do not let the police function as an immigration tool.

We're the people who work here, we're the workers, and if we have to if we have to leave the country, if we leave the country, who's gonna do the work for you who's going to build it because you're deporting the workers.

Who's gonna protect the uh older citizen people when their younger caretakers are being deported?

Who's gonna do the work that we who do the most work for the least least amount of money?

Who's gonna do this work?

We're indignant, we're here in large numbers, desesperados, we're desperate our voices.

Because you're not doing not doing anything to defend your people, canos van a defender or canonos van a defender, canus van a darle spalda, canoligana ora, canosan hypocritas, que digan la verdad.

Tell the truth, tell us if you're gonna protect us or not.

Don't say your speak and not say precisely exactly that you will defend us.

We deserve producer tranquillamente.

We we deserve being able to work and live uh calmly.

We don't want to be attacked or murdered for the simple echo de Salina just because we went out to work because we went to clean or we went to produce something we deserve defense for us.

That's why we voted for you.

That's why we put you where you are.

So you can defend for the community.

This is why we're here.

Indignant, raising our voices, screaming yelling, there's no justice for the poor people there's no justice for the people who work there's no justice human for those human human beings who are we, the immigrants, take pity for the immigrants, pity for the workers.

There's no justice for those human human beings who are we, the immigrants.

Thank pity for the immigrants.

Pity for the workers.

Don't turn police into ice.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Your time is up.

Thank you.

Alberto Pena.

Alberto Pena.

I'll make this one.

No, I don't.

Okay.

Alberto Pena is followed by Maria Fiffin and Bonnie Lowry.

Please line up.

Proceduralism done.

Cool.

All right.

Guys.

There's 300 years of history here.

300 years of history that apparently we're fucking up again.

And we need to understand that there is things, support that we need to take away.

Logistics, information.

We can't help ice.

We can't enable them to do this.

Because let's be honest.

There's so many of them that are untrained, walk around with gun, and have not had a mental health screening whatsoever.

Do you know what it means to be a level three security guard, a level two security guard?

Do you know what it means to take a multi phasic inventory test of your mind?

No.

All right.

So I voted for you, Mayorities.

I voted for you.

I know you're extremely sharp.

I know you're extremely wise.

Please use your knowledge to make sure that these barriers of information are put up.

They should not know where we are.

They should not know what we're doing.

They should not know anything.

There must be no cooperation.

Because even though, even though they say that there is no ice activity, even though they say that there's no cooperation, there is.

It's in the form of intelligence.

It's in the form of data.

It's in the form of these points that are being collected over and over and over and over and over again by every single agency.

And half of them don't even know how to write an email properly.

So let's be honest.

Are you going to trust the FBI?

Are you going to trust ICE?

Are you going to trust people who are less qualified than you, than you, than you, than you, than you, than you, than you, than you, you than you.

You will determine the number of people that will minimize those deaths.

Minimize the violence.

There is nothing more and nothing less.

Maria Fippin.

Maria Fithin.

Okay.

Bonnie Lowry, Nadia Gutierrez.

My name is Dear Woman Jaguar Man.

I am a two-spirit medicine person living in the occupied territory of Yanuana Somisec.

My maternal lineage is of the Azteca y Chichimeca peoples.

My ancestral territory runs from southern Juanajuato up through Texas up to Pueblo territory in New Mexico.

I grew up being told by my maternal grandfather we're Indio.

But shh, we don't talk about it.

It's not safe.

My ancestral medicine practices, hundreds and hundreds of years old, passed from mother to mother, were gifted to me and my sisters under the cloak of Catholicism by our mother for our protection.

I don't speak Spanish because my mother was a child in an era where no Mexican signs were everywhere.

And speaking Spanish at school earned you a beating from your teachers.

For those of us with indigenous blood flowing in our veins, in particular those of us who are Southern indigenous, it comes as no surprise that the city of San Antonio government would align itself with the genocidal agenda of the current administration as carried out by our modern-day Confederate Army, American Gestapo, through the targeting and kidnapping of our migrant relatives and anyone who would support the liberation of all peoples.

My daughter currently lives in St.

Paul and works in Minneapolis, lives in the daily reality of having her clients kidnapped at gunpoint from their healing sessions.

I'm not speaking to any of you as politicians.

As politicians, your participants in the upholding of a system that centers and upholds white supremacy.

As politicians, you would of course work with the police to kidnap and imprison black and native people, a job they've been doing with efficiency and zeal since the creation of the 13th Amendment and the police force.

Instead, I speak to you as siblings of this planet, this shared land, and this shared community.

There's a famous quote you've all heard.

Naomi Shellman said it.

Nice people make the best Nazis.

My mom grew up next to them.

They got along, refused to make waves, looked the other way when things got ugly, and focused on happier things in politics.

They were lovely people who turned their heads as their neighbors were dragged away.

You know who weren't nice people, resistance.

You're the leaders of this community.

So lead, not with what is legal, thank you, but with what is right.

Thank you.

Bonnie Lowry.

Bonnie Lowry.

Bonnie Lowry.

Okay.

Nadia Gutierrez.

Meg Loomis and Deborah Shane, you're next.

Please line up.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today on SAPD's cooperation with federal immigration enforcement.

Firstly, programs like the 287 jury agreements were expanded under the Trump administration.

In my viewpoint, not to improve public safety, but to broaden immigration enforcement and consolidate federal power.

Although I'm aware that our counties are the ones who signed 287G agreements and not specifically the SAPD.

Partnering local police with ICE does not make our communities safer.

It erodes community trust and leads to racial profiling and civil rights abuses.

When immigrants and communities of color are afraid that any interaction with police could lead to detention or deportation.

They stop reporting crimes, stop asking for help, and disengage entirely.

If ISIS mission is truly public safety, we must ask why enforcement so often targets people of color and marginalized communities and why detentions are carried out with mass officers, use of excessive force, and intimidation.

In turn, the conditions inside ICE detention facilities are well documented.

Overcrowding unsanitary conditions, denial of proper medical care and restrictions on religious and cultural needs.

The fact that these facilities actively block human rights.

This isn't simply about whether ACBD should cooperate with ICE, whether that cooperation aligns with San Antonio's values and the commitment to public safety.

Is this who we want to be?

And is this the future we are willing to accept?

My answer is a resolute no, and I dearly hope all of yours is too.

You can submit the rest of your comments for the record.

Thank you.

Meg Loomis.

Meg Loomis.

Okay.

Deborah Shane.

Deborah Shane.

Okay.

Mike Everett.

Brandon Waterman will follow.

Deborah Shane, your your go ahead.

Greetings, Mayor Ortiz.

I voted for you, and I'm here to ask you to do more.

We are in for a long haul.

We need to start supplying, start stocking up now.

Um, I would also like to address something specific.

A mayor's office.

I tried, let me clarify.

I tried for three months to get a hold of your office.

I was able to make three contacts, and that was it in three months.

So I'd like to remind you a mayor's office exists to serve the people and is fundamentally unprofessional when that office cannot even be staffed to receive information from constituents.

This is not about politics or personality.

It is about basic governance.

When a resident takes the time to call, write, or show up, they deserve to be heard, documented, and responded to.

An empty or inaccessible office sends a clear message that public input is optional.

It is not.

Listening is not a courtesy.

It is a duty.

Accountability begins with availability, and leadership begins with showing up.

Thank you.

Now I would like to address SB 4 and 8 with the remainder of my time.

It is in direct conflict with federal law.

It conflicts with the U.S.

Constitution.

It suspends habeas corporate corpus in foreign affairs doctrine.

I am a layman.

And I can look up law that contradicts these bills.

And I find it unfathomable.

With all of y'all up here, especially Miss Spears.

Where's Ms.

Spears?

I grew up with your father-in-law.

I learned my love of the law from him, Judge Leonard, and Judge Woods.

Ma'am, your time is up.

You can submit your comments for the record.

Thank you.

Mike Everett.

Mike Everett, Brandon Waterman.

Mike Everett?

No.

Okay.

Brandon Waterman.

Thank you all for working so hard.

You did a really good job of telling us how you have the First Amendment right to speak about things, and it must be really difficult to not use it and sit there silently.

Thank you.

I attempted to see if any of you had spoken about ICE, and all I saw was re-elect me pages.

Redundant reelect reelect me pages.

Still concerned about potholes.

But first of all, uh the hardest working person is whoever Mr.

White is texting.

Thank you.

Thank you for that.

I want to address a few things that were mentioned.

There's been a lot of the word legal, and you're right, we do have a legal system.

We don't have a justice system.

But I want it to be noted that there is not a single regime that has not been built on routine local police work.

I want to repeat that.

Every regime, when they've analyzed how the police interacted with the local population, you didn't even need to remove them before they became compliant.

Nazi Germany, before it took over, utilized local police.

They put a law in place to remove anyone who didn't abide by it.

Unnecessary, didn't need it.

That is what we're facing here.

It's a story time and time again.

And also I just want to mention real quick to the commissioner.

Um, men in suits protect boys in suits.

And as a veteran, you're pathetic and shameful.

So thank you.

Katie Scott.

Katie Scott.

Okay.

Ariana Rodriguez.

She'll be followed by Matilda Miller and Miles Lopez.

Keith Porter, Rene Nicole Good, Miguel Angel Garcia Medina, Jose Castro Rivetta.

These are just some of the names of people who have been killed by ICE this year and last year.

2025 was ICE's deadliest year in two decades.

The city of San Antonio cannot and should not work with ICE because it will only lead to more death and harm.

In the city of Minnesota, a five-year-old named Liam was taken after from school and placed in a detention center in Texas.

There will be people on this council who say, well, legally we have to do this or that.

Legality does not equal mortality.

Enslaving people used to be legal.

In 20 years, when your kids ask you what you did when the Scott Gospato came to town, what will you say?

Will you say that you worked with them, that you helped kidnap our neighbors, that you helped them terrorize our communities?

Matilda Miller.

Miles Lopez, followed by April Jones, please line up.

Hi.

Um Anna Lovell is giving me her time as well to speak.

She's back there.

All right.

Let's be giving one second.

Okay.

Anna Lavoli.

Okay.

You have four minutes, thank you.

Let's be clear about what ICE is.

ICE is not an organization that operates under the law.

They routinely violate the law and are literally encouraged to do so by Trump and his cabinet.

They don't even abide by traffic laws.

If you are someone who thinks an immigration enforcement agency should exist, ICE is not that.

ICE does not abide by any sense of morals or regard for the people of this country.

ICE does not, or ICE is staffed by known white supremacists.

This is not conjecture.

We have names from DHS whistleblowers.

ICE is every single day violating people's rights by demanding papers for simply being in the wrong place and the wrong race at the wrong time.

They are assaulting people who protest or even just observe them.

They are targeting people simply for being in their vicinity.

They are detaining people without warrants, which is called kidnapping, and they are straight up murdering people in the streets on video with impunity.

ICE is not going after criminals.

They are taking people from their schools and from their legal immigration hearings.

Here in San Antonio, the San Pedro incident, they detained 140 people at a food truck park and only charged two of them with any crime.

ICE is the tool that Trump is using to attempt to ethnically cleanse the United States.

There is no low that they will not sink to because ICE is a criminal and terrorist organization.

During the recess, just now, we had a guy in an ice hat that was literally trying to intimidate people.

But who knows if he even was ICE because they apparently don't have to identify themselves like every other organization that calls itself law enforcement.

You cannot pretend that we are discussing cooperation with a lawful federal agency.

There is no executive order or legislation that could be passed that could compel you to cooperate with Al Qaeda and ICE and DHS are not following the law.

And in order for you to follow the law, you must take action against them or be complicit in their crimes.

They should not get one ounce of cooperation.

I am extremely proud of the people of this community for standing together against these thugs, but we shouldn't have to.

It should not be random people putting themselves in danger to protect their neighbors.

It should be all of you.

But you cannot let fear rule you.

Trust me, I know it's terrifying.

I'm terrified right now.

ICE might be taking down the names of speakers here.

But you know who's more scared than any of us are the people who aren't here.

There are neighbors who are worried ICE will knock down their door next.

That they will be the next ones, separated from their families, that their children will be used as bait by ICE agents camped outside their schools, that they or their children will be shipped off to a foreign gulag or even one of our local Texas ICE schulags, like little five-year-old Liam from Minneapolis, where many people have died in their custody, including Geraldo Lunas Campos, who was strangled to death by ICE.

They're building one of those facilities within San Antonio city limits right now, and you could stop that.

In spite of the danger and the fear it in gen that these people engender, I see folks in this community pushing back, putting themselves in harm way, harm's way to protect their community.

And they have less power than you.

You have an obligation to protect the people of this city to follow the law and the constitution.

That remains true, even when the federal and state government break the law and fail in their duty and turn on the people like they are doing now.

So if you don't have the backbone, you shouldn't have taken the job.

SAPD should not cooperate with these people.

They should put them in handcuffs when they break the law like everyone else.

You will never be able to appease them.

They will keep coming back for more.

They do not honor their deals.

They won't simply leave after ripping out the 65% of this city that is Latino and putting them in camps.

They have every racial, ethnic, and gender minority, every dissenter, every poor person, every disabled person who can't be exploited for profit in their crosshairs.

We won't be spared the worst of it just because this is a red state.

Eventually they will work their way up to you.

An ICE agent could shoot you, Mayor Jones, right now.

This city can lead and be the first to put puffs on these terrorists.

Your time, thank you, your time is up.

You can set the example.

Thank you.

April Jones, Cheryl Gonzalez, and Joriel Isabella Perez will follow.

So April, Cheryl Joriel, please line up.

Hello, I'm here today to address the San Antonio Police Department's cooperation with ICE.

I would like to express both my concern for the community and disappointment in city leadership.

ICE has repeatedly demonstrated a pattern of violence, excessive force, and a lack of accountability.

This has meant fear, uncertainty, and trauma for those in our community.

We should not be having a discussion about cooperating with ICE.

Instead, you should all be denouncing ICE and their fear-based tactics, telling them to leave our city and our communities alone.

Speaking out against what is happening is the absolute least you could do.

They're going into private homes and businesses, as well as hospitals, schools, and places of worship.

Places that should be a sanctuary for those in need, places you should be declaring a sanctuary for the citizens of the city to feel safe.

When will it be enough?

We do not need empty platitudes.

We need action.

We need to hold ICE accountable for terrorizing the people of the city and stand in solidarity with residents of San Antonio who are committed to protecting our immigrant neighbors.

To everyone here, if you are an educator or an administrator, you need to protect your students.

All doctors, nurses, and hospital staff need to protect your patients, and all religious leaders should protect your congregations.

Everyone listening needs to continue standing up, keep recording, stay educated, know your rights, check in on your neighbors, do not give up, and do not give in.

Thank you.

April Jones.

You're April, thank you.

Cheryl Gonzalez.

Okay.

Followed by Joriel Isabella Perez.

And then Johnny Rivers.

Thank you.

Can y'all hear me right here?

Okay, awesome.

Today, go ahead and go.

All right.

So this is my first time ever doing something like this, right?

And I saw the importance of having to come out and speak.

I'm one of those community members that go out in my community and not just talk about it, but be about it.

I'm boots on the ground, and I work with immigrants that are hiding.

I used to think that you had to be a criminal to go to prison, but that's what our immigrant families are facing right now.

Barricading themselves, scared, going without eating for two weeks.

How do I know this?

Because I work with other organizations.

And I know I go out there in my community and they speak to me and they tell me I'm scared.

Not only am I speaking for my community, but I'm speaking for my family too.

As a person of color, brown, my children and grandchildren have came to me and said, what are we facing next?

Are we going to be deported as citizens?

And Gina, yes, I'm talking to you too.

All right.

Remember, we put you in these seats, and we're asking for your help.

Just like we put you there, we won't vote you out.

Thank you.

Juriel Isabel Venez.

Johnny Rivers, followed by Sofia Rios.

Good afternoon, Council.

My name is Joriel Isabella, and I'm a student at UTSA, as well as a resident of District 6.

I'm one of many countless young adults in not only the city of San Antonio, but the entirety of the United States of America that feel powerless in this dark, horrifying time.

I've come to speak today to offer my thoughts on the presence of ICE in our beloved city.

I'd first like to begin my comments with an acknowledgement and respect to those whose lives were viciously stolen by ICE in recent times.

Somebody already said that 2025 was ICE's deadliest year in the last 20 years.

San Antonio is a city rich in love and culture.

And I had the privilege to move here at six months old from the Philippines with my strong immigrant mother who fought for her citizenship and to live with an amazing, loving family, native to San Antonio, Texas.

As a young Chicano Filipina woman, I cannot begin to express the horror that I feel when I read these headlines every single morning.

My black and brown sisters and brothers, my immigrant siblings, and the allies that believe in our right to exist in peace are in fear.

Children in school arrive every day with the possibility lingering in their developing minds that today could be the day that they are kidnapped from school premises by the government for simply being from elsewhere.

Teens go to school haunted by the thought by their parents potentially being in the wrong sp in the wrong place at the wrong time by the wrong people in the wrong uniforms.

Then reality council is that the ever growing list of names of individuals who have died or disappeared by the hands of these domestic terrorists hiding behind masks and ice patched vests has the potential to read our names, my name, my parents, my friends and family, your names, other people and pillars in our community.

I understand that as officials, you and your colleagues must abide by certain laws, but if they want us to do things the right way, I suggest that they begin to do that as well.

Thank you.

Johnny Rivers, Sophia Rios, Ryan Wurse, please line up.

Good afternoon, Council.

I am a proud constituent of District One, and I'm here to talk about the involvement of ICE and the collaboration between police.

For context, San Antonio is the largest city in the US where Hispanics make up the majority of the population.

Minnesota, 7%.

San Antonio, 64.

If we use that as a barometer, what does that say about the expectation of ICE here in our city?

Immigration enforcement policies that disproportionately affect Hispanic communities will be felt here tenfold.

The narrative that we cannot that we cannot feed is to perpetuate the narrative that ICE is only apprehending the worst criminals.

We know that to be untrue.

To add to that, just going off of the presentation that we saw from our police department.

ICE, the police department is not verifying these documents or who they are going to be apprehending.

How are we supposed to know if they're going to stand to defend our civil rights or to just apprehend us and hand us over to ICE?

It is their job to take a stand and yours to let them know that they can take a stand against ICE.

I'm proud to say that San Antonio was one of the cities that stood up against uh SB4.

And what was the um what was what happened as a result?

We got fined.

$300,000.

Take that money again.

Use it again.

It's justifying.

None of you were apprehended, none of you were arrested, none of you had to go to an ice detention camp.

I saw a lot of energy and excitement when some of you were asking us to support a new arena for the Spurs.

I don't see that enthusiasm now when we need it most.

I've seen posts, social media posts asking constituents to vote to support a new arena, but none to defend us against ice.

Thank you.

Sophia Rios.

Ryan Worse, Noah Collins, Rob Sakal.

Hi, my name is Sophia Rios, and I reside in District 1.

I'm here to voice concern of increased ICE presence in the city.

We are urging the city council to speak against ICE in our home and take stance on disallowing them to act upon their terror.

Our neighbors are unlawfully getting dragged out of their homes and kidnapped by federal agents you allowed to run rampant in our neighborhoods.

San Antonio Tourism welcomed 37.65 million visitors, boosting the economy with 21.5 billion dollars impact in 2023.

And I'm only saying that because I know how money runs things.

It is vital now to that all council members work up a plan to adopt a policy similar to Austin's Freedom City policies that offer some sort of protection to our targeted community members.

And to our community, please show up for your neighbors and take action upon yourselves to offer support during this time.

Thank you.

Ryan Worse.

Ryan.

Ryan Worse.

Followed by Noah Collins and Rob Sakal.

Who are you?

No, I'm Noah.

You're Noah.

Okay.

Yeah.

Noah, Rab Sakal, and then James Jameson.

Order, order.

We're gonna recess.

We're gonna recess.

Order!

All right.

Brian.

No.

You're Noah.

Noah.

Okay.

Okay.

Order.

Order.

Please take your seats.

Order.

Noah, go ahead, please.

Noah, followed by Rob Sakall.

James, Jameson, please line up.

Go ahead.

I don't have like a speech prepared or anything.

Um, my first time doing something like this, so I'm definitely a little bit nervous.

But I think we've all seen, you know, the murders on television, the kidnappings of innocent people who have done completely nothing.

And a lot of them are getting shipped here to Texas.

And in fact, they're dying here in Texas.

Um it's unjust, it's completely wrong, it's morally corrupt, and ICE is definitely more corrupt.

And I think I also speak for probably a lot of the people who are against ICE as well, that the police are also morally corrupt.

So I think it comes as no surprise that two morally corrupt agencies probably want to work together.

In fact, the Texas government wants to give cops more money if they work with ICE.

They're already overfunded.

I'm speaking about the police here.

Um, they're already overfunded.

Um, our schools are closing, people are being murdered on the streets, and people are dying in concentration camps.

I really, really hope, God willing, that uh you city council members can maybe I don't know, come together and make something of this.

Um, but I'm also not hopeful of that.

And I look out to all the people who are here, and that's where my hope is.

It's in the community.

So I really ask everyone here to be in touch with your community members because a lot of them are scared.

You know, even people who aren't immigrants are scared.

I I delivered groceries to a family.

Who's terrified to go outside?

That's that's not right.

People should be okay to go outside and buy their really expensive groceries.

God willing that can also get fixed.

Um but we're scared, and I'm sorry to say this, but sometimes these elected officials aren't gonna be the people who are gonna do something, so go out to local organizations, go out to your community members and find solidarity there.

Rob Sakal.

James Jameson, Chelsea Sanchez, please line up.

Mayor, city council, leaders of the city, and I'm glad that the city attorney is here because we're gonna need them in the years to come.

Uh I was just told by our city manager to be quiet when I asked them to please pay attention to the person speaking.

I was told by someone sitting behind uh Officer McManus that you people are always violent, putting me in some category.

The gentleman with an ice hat told all of us he was gonna call ice to our houses, asking for our name and address outside of this building.

As leaders of the city, Misty, I'm in your district, I voted for you.

Please take a leadership position.

My speech today.

I attended Eisenhower Middle School, Churchill High School, and the University of Texas at San Antonio.

I live here today.

I'm a business owner, I'm an investor in this city.

My stake in San Antonio is local, long-term, and personal.

I, like many many Texans, take the Constitution seriously.

Not as a slogan, but as limits on governmental power.

This is as Texan as it can be, y'all.

I'm here about agenda one, as most people are.

In Texas, we are taught to distrust unaccountable government power.

The First Amendment violations occur when people are intimidated for speaking.

Fourth Amendment, when they're detained without warrants and individualized cause.

Fifth, when people lose their freedom without a judge and an order.

And the 14th will apply to local governments, which are beyond pardon of this president.

If you cooperate in breaking these other constitutional articles, thank you.

James Jameson.

James Jameson.

Chelsea Sanchez, followed by Courtney Head and Ian Lewis.

Please line up.

Hi, my name's Chelsea Sanchez.

The people who support ICE are afraid of criminals threatening their way of life, but only a pitiful fraction of those detained have any any criminal record, let alone a violent one.

But under the Trump administration, people in this country have been denied their first, fourth, fifth, and sixth amendment rights at the hands of ICE, among others.

All people in this country, regardless of how they got here and what languages they speak, have the right to protection from search and seizure without a warrant, a signed judicial warrant.

State law has required that our that the uh participation of our law enforcement and ICE operations.

Okay.

Will SAPD accompany ICE to check their warrants and uphold our rights?

Will they protect legal observers and nonviolent protesters?

Will they hold ICE accountable to the law?

Entering the U.S.

illegally is a misdemeanor.

The penalty is a fine.

Yet those detained by ICE face lawless barbarity, starvation, rape, and murder in centers where lawmakers are consistently refused access to verify humane conditions.

So I want to ask ICE supporters to think about this.

Anne Frank was a citizen before Nazi Germany decided she wasn't.

Venezuelans here had protected status before the Trump administration decided they didn't.

And they already welcomed the idea of revoking the citizenship of people who disagree with them.

Fascists demonize and dehumanize a specific group of people until they think they can get away with disposing of them.

And then they move on to the next group.

So regardless of the city's decision, regardless of state law, we know that the only individuals who collaborate with ICE are a danger to our safety and not here to serve and protect us.

If the police union can defend officers that feed our homeless turd sandwiches, they can defend officers who uphold our constitutional rights.

Courtney Head.

Courtney Head.

Courtney.

Okay, Courtney Head.

Ian Lewis and McKinsey Winters, please line up.

All right.

I'm here.

I'm here because there is no factual justification for the level of ICE cooperation in our city.

San Antonio has a population of roughly 1.5 million people with an estimated undocumented population of 100,000.

That is roughly seven in a hundred people.

This is not an emergency.

It is not a surge.

It is a long-standing, stable population that is already a part of the city's workforce economy.

There are neighbors and friends.

Texas law.

Texas law does require a certain level of cooperation.

However, the Texas law does not require cities to exceed what is necessary.

It requires cities to proactively decide.

It does not require cities to proactively assist, coordinate, or volunteer local resources beyond minimum compliance.

We need to be honest about what is actually happening here.

Modern immigration enforcement in this country did not evolve as a neutral public safety system.

It expanded historically to control who is allowed to belong and to maintain a European white population proportion.

That context, that context matters because overenforcement today still desp disproportionately targets the same minority communities.

Given the actual numbers in San Antonio, the question is not whether the city can comply with Texas law.

The question is why the city continues to overcomply.

San Antonio is not legally required to initiate contact with ICE.

It is not required to notify beyond mandated circumstances.

All those choices have predictable outcomes.

When people are afraid of ICE, they avoid local law enforcement, they avoid city services, they avoid civic life.

It makes everyone less safe.

Thank you.

Ian Lewis.

Ian Ian Lewis, followed by McKenzie Winters and Warren Koons.

Hello, my name is Ian Lewis.

I'm from District 7.

Uh San Antonio Police Department cannot cooperate with ICE.

We've already seen videos from across America where ICE targets people indiscriminately.

Black, white, Hispanic, but especially accosting people with accents who speak Spanish who don't look like me.

Sorry, I'm nervous.

They have attacked bystanders and protesters, causing one to lose their eye permanently.

Some have been found guilty of sexual assault.

Have maced and gassed children, they have dragged pregnant women, they've gone after the sick and the disabled, and they're responsible for dozens of deaths already with at least two homicides.

I can't fathom her being kidnapped by these people.

And if anything were to happen to her, there would be hell to pay.

This administration has been lawless and unethical, and they have communicated ultranationalist white supremacist ideas.

American supremacy, defend the homeland, we'll have our home again.

If you didn't know, we'll have her home again is a song used by white supremacist groups in America.

Cooperation means supporting these actions and ideals.

And we don't want to communicate that to our city, to our Latino community.

I'm not an idiot.

I understand that the law compels us to cooperate, but we have to minimize it.

We have to protect the people here.

Thank you.

Um, clarify that all of the support that the city has provided when it comes to immigration enforcement has been at the request of federal authorities.

That's probably more a question for Eric to answer, Mayor.

Yes, ma'am.

Okay.

Thank you.

Mayor.

Like you, I am a member of the LGBTQ community.

As is my Hispanic wife.

We've seen them pull people out of cars, heard on their cameras recording when people told them, hey, I have identification.

I am a citizen and be told I don't care.

Up until last year, I hadn't owned a weapon for 30 years.

But now because of this fear, because of the fear of who's next, especially those of us that we know that they've been called terrorists just because of what we believe, and because of who we love.

So when they start violating our Fourth Amendment rights, I sincerely hope y'all are actually, you know, in addition to just being present that that's cataloged.

I would hope that y'all would actually enforce our Fourth Amendment rights.

And if you don't, then I hope you'll also stand aside when we exercise our second amendment rights.

Warren Coons, followed by Vox Rose.

So Warren Coons followed by Vox Rose and then Aubrey Reichman.

Please line up.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Warren Robert Coons.

I live here in San Antonio, and thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight.

I'd like to talk about ICE operations in our facility and what San Antonio should and shouldn't be able to absorb, enable, normalize, and easily excuse.

One of the huge issues that we have here is our SAPD officers are trained to the golden standard.

1,300 hours as advertised.

ICE, meanwhile, there is no clarification on what their training is and what it is on, and we are seeing massive.

Excuse me.

Mass is usual violence against members.

Destroying their constitutional rights.

Would citizens become prey for the government?

We have issues with people coming forth seeking help.

Everyone gets more tense and becomes violent.

They become angry.

That's why San Antonio needs boundaries.

We need transparency.

We need to thank you all.

All right, here we go.

We need transparency.

We need to say exactly what ICE is doing, what they are doing with our SAPD officers to make sure our citizens aren't being violated in any way, shape, and or form, killed or manned.

Thank you for your time.

Vox Rose, followed by Audrey Reichman and Sherilyn Ochoa.

Please line up.

Okay, so there's a slight rhetoric problem with my speech, but I think my message still stands.

So I'm gonna read it as I wrote it.

But I broke 287G agreement.

What I really meant was SAPD working with ICE.

Okay.

I strongly oppose the proposed 287G agreement between San Antonio Police Department and the United States immigration and customs enforcement enforcement ICE because DPS and Balconus Heights PD and the other agencies with 287Gs already have enough resources available.

Between state troopers, flock cameras, balconispd, and surveillance tech preying on the people of color, it's making the streets of San Antonio feel like the inside of a real life panopticonic prison facility.

With all these tools available at ICE's disposal and more, what benefits does working with SAPD truly provide?

Accept more militarization and money.

If SAPD is allowed to work with ICE, what pieces of Texas policy will be geared towards keeping marginalized and oppressed people safe?

Because as it stands, Texas policy is intent on ensuring the marginalized community continues to be the marginalized community continues to be oppressed and persistent in instilling fear and distrust.

If I SAPD work together, it will only perpetuate systemic injustices faced by the marginalized communities.

Uh yes, my name's Aubrey Reichman.

Um I would just like to say that um I do hope that this city and the SAPD, I hope that we really reconsider and cease immediately all interaction and cooperation with ICE.

Um I'll leave the rest of my time for other people, but I'd like to remind you what is across the street in front of City Hall, a monument stands, and it says, in recognition of the Hispanic in Texas, who through their pride and struggle have kept alive the heartbeat of Mexico Texas motherland, and in doing so have become an integral part of the culture and character of this proud state.

So please remember that.

Thank you.

Sherilyn Ochoa.

Followed by Jonathan Gonzalez and Josh Marsh Lowitz.

Hello, Council members, and hello, fellow mayor.

My name is Shirlene Ochoa.

I'm Miss Teen, South Texas.

I'm a student at St.

Mary's University, studying political science and history.

I live in District 6, and although I'm not originally from San Antonio, I moved here for school, but I stayed because I love this city and I love our community.

I rise today in firm opposition to an expansion of collaboration between local police and La ICE.

Let us name this honestly.

Policies like this are not neutral.

They are born from fear.

And fear when written into policy becomes hatred towards our communities.

They tell immigrants that their presence is a threat, that their lives are disposable, and that the safety is not meant for them.

San Antonio is an immigrant city, and it's always has been.

We repeat, never forget the Alamo as a slogan of pride, but memory without truth is empty.

We remember the wars, yet forget the hands that raised them.

We remember the battle, yet we erase the people.

Mexican, indigenous, and immigrant whose labor, blood, and survival, built this city long before it was governed such as chambers such as this one.

You cannot celebrate San Antonio's history while criminalizing the people who created it.

From local police collaborating with ICE.

Communities do not become safer.

They become silent.

Victims stop calling 911.

Witnesses stop coming forward.

Parents fear a traffic stop more than the crime itself.

That is not public safety.

That is enforced fear.

Local law enforcement exists to promote to protect communities, not a police identity or immigration status.

Blurring that line destroys trust.

And without trust, there is no safety, only suspicion.

You can submit the rest of your comments for the record.

Thank you.

May I just say this one thing?

Although I'm not originally from San Antonio, I chose this city.

And to all of you guys who swore an oath to do what's best for San Antonio, I ask you to choose it today.

Choose its people, choose its history, choose its future.

Thank you.

Jonathan Gonzalez.

Jonathan Gonzalez, followed by Josh Marsh Lowitz and then Laura Marshall.

Good afternoon, City Council.

My name is Jonathan Gonzalez, and I'm here because, like many, I aim to remind the council that the cooperation between SAPD and ICE is not in the best interest of this city and does nothing short of endangering the lives of its citizens.

ICE is not targeting criminals.

ICE agents wait outside of schools, raid housing developments off Poltenko in 211, and rip families apart outside of immigration court, regardless of status ruling.

We also know ICE is illegally kidnapping individuals.

I still has not returned a plane of deep polite that left to El Salvador, even though a judge declared the plane to seize operations before him.

ICE is in contempt of the law and its inquiry in SAPD and this council must not be further complicit.

We have seen partnerships between PDs and ICE in many cities and municipalities, some here.

Balconese Heights, a stretch along 410, has a 287G agreement with its police department acting as ICE agents.

I went to several businesses in that area, reminding folks of the quickly diminishing rights and the situation.

Many are scaled to enter the target parking lot to go to walk out Wonderland's Mall.

Some have avoided the area entirely and reminded their loved ones to do the same.

The area will continue to lose business, but more importantly, the PD will continue to lose valuable 911 calls as individuals feel prosecution.

ICE is attempting to use administration warrants to circumvent many individual liberties.

In a leaked memo, it was revealed that ICE wants to use these wants to enter houses, something which has always relied on a judicial warrant.

So tell me, will you have Chief Chief McManus help kick all dolls down?

The issue with fading liberties is that historically they are always meant with resistance.

Regardless of this decision, it is clear family and communities in this city must organize and resist the fact that this even requires a special session and not an immediate stance by our commissioner in Mail shows complicity.

Nobody, including the boys in blue, with all their knowledge of the law are coming to save us.

Sir, your time is up, thank you.

You can submit the rest of your comments for the record.

Josh Marshlowitz, followed by Laura Marshall and then Catherine Jones.

How many people need to get shot before you decide where you stand?

How many children need to be pepper sprayed and taken away from their families before you decide where you stand?

How many people need to be beaten and detained illegally before you decide?

Do you only decide when they come for your family?

Do you only decide when they come for you or your fellow officials?

There is no oversight in ICE detention centers.

Do you even truly know what goes on in there?

How many need to die at the hands of ICE before we stand up and say it's enough?

Today is that day.

As officials of the law, we the people trust you to serve and protect us.

We trust you to do the right thing and keep the people of our city safe.

Terrible things are happening outside.

At any time, night and day.

Poor helpless people are being dragged out of their homes.

Families are torn apart, men, women, and children separated.

Does that sound familiar?

That is a direct quote from Anne Frank's diary.

Do you want to side with the people enacting this type of behavior?

Their actions are illegal, immoral, and unethical.

There is no oversight from the federal government.

The people of San Antonio are alone in this fight.

We do not have to be.

Laura Marshall, followed by Catherine Jones, and then Laura Rios Ramos.

Good afternoon.

My name is Laura, and I'm a resident of District 7.

For the past six months, I've been involved in community outreach and mutual aid efforts, working to inform neighbors of their rights as ICE enforcement, suspicion, and fear escalate in our city.

In the one year since Trump took office, we've been asked to accept masked federal agents who will not identify themselves, ripping people out of cars, forcing people to prove their citizenship, disregarding their answer.

We have been asked to accept that ICE agents will show up at an elementary school, take parents.

We've been asked to accept the violence that people like Trump and Stephen Miller encourage.

Multiple people dead in the detention centers, concluding recently in El Paso.

In one year, the needle has moved so dramatically that I would not have believed you if you told me this two years ago.

That's what we'd be dealing with now.

This is not business as usual.

ICE is not operating transparently, lawfully, or respecting our constitutional rights.

This is how authoritarianism takes hold even in America.

The people in charge will vilify a group of people, violate their rights, and the public accepts it.

Then they expand it to people with a little bit stronger rights like birthright citizenship or people who've sought asylum.

The goal is to strip away the rights from the most vulnerable people and work your way up until the constitution no longer applies.

The American public and the city of San Antonio can stop this from happening.

What are y'all going to do about the rise of authoritarianism in this country?

Do not collaborate with ICE.

Thank you.

Catherine Jones.

Catherine Jones, followed by Laura Rios Ramos, and then Maria Solis Kennedy.

Hi, I'm Catherine.

I'm a D2 resident, used to be a D7 resident.

Um five of the people on council took endorsements from the same police union that sued the city over SB4.

That's awkward, right?

That's kind of a bad look for y'all.

I'm here to talk about the same things that many of the people before me have raised as concerns about the city's collaboration with ICE and SAPD's collaboration with ICE.

Y'all should not escalate collaboration with ICE, and you should be ready to defend the community.

That looks like when your constituents are detained by ICE, when they're placed in immigrant detention, following up with them, finding where they're held, offering them legal resources, not letting them disappear in the system.

I suspect that the federal and state fascist governments are going to try and escalate y'all's ability.

Oh my god, sorry, I'm nervous.

Um the state and federal governments are probably going to target local governments that do not preemptively collaborate with ICE.

They may try and withhold funding from you.

They may try and sue y'all, they may take you against legal action, and you need to be ready to face those consequences and come up with a plan that does not look like selling out our community members just to satisfy the fascists in the state of Texas and in the US government.

Thank you for your time.

Laura Rios Rama Ramirez.

Laura Rios Ramirez.

Okay.

Maria Solis Kennedy.

Maria Solis Kennedy.

Anthony Lucio.

Anthony Lucio.

Okay.

Claire Lewis.

Claire Lewis.

Amador Salazar.

Amador Salazar.

Okay.

Followed by Alejandra Lopez and Angel Hinajosa.

Hey everyone.

Uh, my name is Amalud.

I'm a district one resident.

Um, I am the co-chair of the San Antonio Democratic Socialists of America, and I vote.

Uh I'll just start by uh saying uh I think it's nice that City Council finally plugged in their controller and decided to have a briefing.

I feel like that could have maybe happened a year ago.

Uh so my hat does not go out to you.

Um but our organization has taken on court watching where families going through the immigration process are taken away anyway, uh doing it the right way.

Um we have also engaged in know your rights business canvases to, you know, supply small businesses with some documentation, letting them know what rights they have if I decides to enter the premises.

Uh we've also done know your rights uh community walks, so neighbors are in the SAISD area know what their rights are.

And to know that, you know, an ICE warrant does not mean open your door.

Um, but if you look at Minneapolis, it doesn't seem like any of your rights actually matter.

And so uh you all are in the uncomfortable position of trying to think of creative ways to hold the line.

Uh so please do that.

Um I feel like that's the bare minimum at this point.

Um, you know, while we're on the topic of SAISD, I know that there was some concern about you know, public education budgets, stuff like that.

Uh the budget uh for public education is already uh you know being taken down, and it's because families are afraid to go to school.

If you don't attend your school, then the school loses money, and it's a compounding effect.

So let's keep that in mind also.

Um go.

Uh line up.

Thank you.

Um and Theresa Gutierrez is yielding her time.

She's right here.

Theresa Gutierrez.

Yeah.

Thank you, Teresa.

You have four minutes.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Mayor and members of City Council.

My name is Alejandra Lopez.

I'm a teacher, resident of District 3, and currently serve as the proud president of the San Antonio Alliance of Teachers and Support Personnel.

We are the union that represents teachers and support staff in San Antonio ISD, and we are affiliated with both the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, the two largest education unions in the country.

And it is union educators that have been on the front lines of the Trump administration's attacks on our immigrant communities across the country.

What we have collectively witnessed over the last few years in Minneapolis and Minnesota more broadly is a clear escalation of the violence that ICE has been perpetuating on black and brown communities.

I say black and brown communities because it's clear that they are racially profiling and detaining US citizens.

Someone mentioned Liam earlier, the beautiful five-year-old child who was detained by ICE in Minnesota and has now been transported to Texas.

It's also been reported that he was used as bait to lure his try to lure his family members outside of their house.

This speaks to the violent and dehumanizing tactics ICE is employing.

I'm sure you can understand the level of fear we're experiencing in a district like mine, where 96% of our students are students of color.

We've had the parents of our students and members taken by ICE.

SAISD is down 1,600 students, and we believe many of them are members of families who are scared to send their children to school for fear of ICE or have made the devastating decision to leave their community and self-deport.

Throughout the fall, we moved an issue survey through our campuses and asked educators to prioritize the community issues they wanted to organize around.

Protecting our immigrant students, staff, and families was number one.

And so that's what we've been working to do.

We're doing community walks with our coalition partners, distributing distributing know your rights door hangers around our school communities, providing know your rights information for the front offices of our schools, and we've made sure our district protocols are as tight as possible if ICE shows up on one of our campuses.

Our union is also proud to be a founding member of SA Stands, our city's immigrant rights coalition, because we know that the lifeblood of our labor movement is solidarity.

And so today we're here, yes, to hear you ask the hard questions and hopefully get some important answers, but we're also here to say clearly and unequivocally that we need more.

We need more from you, our elected local leaders, more creative ways to work together to protect our communities.

Thank you.

Angel Hinehosa.

Followed by Sadia Mitchell Morales and then Myra Carrier.

Hello, I am Miss Hinojosa, and I live on the west side of San Antonio, and I'm here to speak out against the terror and abuse inflicted by ICE and heavy police force on our community and across the nation.

I am a mother and an art teacher, and I've seen firsthand the effects that this has had on our youth.

Kids are having panic attacks in our classrooms, and all I can do is console them through art and remind them that in my classroom there is a safe space.

Look at what the youth are doing.

They're walking out of class, interrupting their education and time of innocence to speak up against the injustices.

I'm so proud of them, and if they can do it, so can we, and I urge the people to continue to show up and speak up because our voices matter and we are stronger in numbers.

Stay villigent, mi gente.

To my students at SACA, I love you.

I have one more message.

Umgel is actually my husband, and these are his words.

If the blood of the innocent is spilled on the streets because of this fascist regime, then that will be the stain on your hands, and the people will never forgive you.

Sadia, Sadia Mitchell Morales, Myra Carrier, Kyla, Kayla Miranda.

I'm Saida Michel Morales.

I'm the communications director at Futuro San Antonio.

I'm also the proud daughter of hardworking immigrants, a former public school teacher of eight years and the Latina mother to two beautiful boys.

Every morning, I, like so many other parents and caregivers in our city, drive my children to school.

These days, while I may be smiling on the outside for my kids, on the inside, I am terrified.

As you can see, I have brown skin, speak both English and Spanish, and often proudly wear clothes representing my Mexican and Honduran heritages.

Every day we are seeing reports of ICE agents targeting people based on their physical appearance.

They are grabbing people first and asking questions later, and nowhere is safe, not even churches or schools.

At Futuro, we have been working tirelessly to ensure that all children in this city are able to attend school regularly so that they can learn.

Sadly, I have seen firsthand from the families, teachers, and school superintendents we work with how immigration enforcement actions near homes, schools, and school routes undermine student learning, destabilize families, and create a culture of fear that harms entire communities.

When families are plagued by fear of ICE actions on the way to and from school, many families may choose to keep their kids safe at home or withdraw them from school completely, not only negatively impacting their learning, but harming their school environment as well.

In short, increased ICE activity will only worsen chronic absenteeism and decrease learning opportunities for our already most vulnerable students.

I urge you to prioritize student and family safety by ensuring ICE activity does not disrupt morning or evening school commutes.

I also ask that you coordinate with all public school, uh public schools and families, both ISD and charter, to share timely information about immigration enforcement so staff can respond uh staff can respond accordingly.

I call on you, please make sure ICE upholds federal law, safeguarding every student's right to a free public education regardless of immigration status.

Thank you.

So Myra Carrier, and then we'll go to Anthony Anthony Lucio and then Kayla Miranda.

Good afternoon, Mayor Jones, Council members.

My name is Mayra Alejandra Carrier, and I'm here today representing my immigrant communities.

My students and my San Antonio community members who wanted to be here but could not.

I'm a proud first generation Mexican American and the daughter of a single Mexican mother who raced her life in search of the American dream for her daughters.

As a child, I carried responsibilities, no child should have to carry.

I translated for my mother at medical appointments, advocated for her and myself and police matters, and navigated systems that were never built for families like mine, while also helping race my little sister.

Our children are already carrying enough.

And now many of them sit in classrooms terrified, wondering if their parents will still be here when they get home.

I'm also a United States Army veteran.

For 10 years I wore a uniform.

I serve this country.

And like many veterans, I've lost friends, not only during wartime, but also coming home.

Friends lost to mental health, struggles to suicide after fighting for the freedoms that we are discussing today.

So when I see women and men, people who fought for who look like my family being abducted in the streets of San Antonio, or worse, like what we witnessed in Minnesota, I have to ask.

Are we next here in San Antonio?

Mayor Jones, I speak to you directly because you are also a veteran.

You know what you know and understand what service is.

You understand sacrifice.

You understand what it means to protect people.

And not just with words like others, but by action.

Please protect our families, protect our children, protect your districts, and lean on each other to take care of us as a whole.

And to the community listening today, if you grew up like me, you know this fear.

You know what it feels like to be a child translating adult pain.

You know the anxiety of systems that see you as a problem instead of a person.

So I'm here today because many families in San Antonio don't have this privilege of feeling safe.

They are already being targeted, watched, questioned, and feared.

Their children carry anxiety into classrooms.

Their parents leave home unsure of their return, and no amount of doing everything right will protect them from that fear.

Thank you.

Anthony Lucio, followed by Kayla Miranda and then Alicia Perez.

Good afternoon, City Council.

Thanks for your time.

My name is Anthony Lucio, uh, been a resident for about six years here, and I understand that the department, the police department working along immigration enforcement is not a new thing.

They do, especially when it called becomes in criminal investigations.

But what is new are the tactics being put in place and the oppression that's being put across the members of our community.

Instead of instead of uh going after these criminals, they've opted to go into hospitals, restaurants, construction sites, grocery stores, doctor's office looking for kidnappings of opportunity, and they deem they they target and detain anybody they seem suspect with no probable cause.

And the only determining factor is that anyone they that did they do not deem that is deserves to be here.

Uh and this is why, you know, it's such an important thing.

And and if it really was about immigration, if it really was about, you know, it decreasing the criminals, then why are they going to these immigration courthouses where people who seek asylum who are fleeing war-torn countries who are fleeing for better opportunities in this country or have ICE cuffs in hand waiting outside these courthouses?

Why are why why are they why are they not regarded the same rights that every US citizen should have?

Just in fact, just this week, an immigration judge was fired because she refused to comply and bend the law to the to this administration, and she wanted to follow the law and was replaced with somebody who will bend that law.

In fact, when Senator Murphy was there just this week, uh he was he spoke to one of the ICE officers.

I thought you were going for after criminals.

Well, all they say is that they are prioritizing everyone.

It doesn't matter.

And all I have to say, if what is the reason for all this?

Why is ICE going after everybody?

Well, it comes to find out as reported by the Wall Street Journal that they are they have a quota of 3,000 arrests, and these don't mean detainees.

This are just people that they they can release.

And couple that with a for-profit prison systems that are core civic and GEO group that are currently profiting off of tech the federal dollars of all of our tax dollars.

Thank you for your time.

Kayla Miranda followed by Alicia Perez and then Tariq Almugi.

Yes, ma'am, it's just uh a question about uh I wonder if you have a contingency since we are so close to Mexico for these when unarmed agents are taking people, but what about when the criminals start taking our kids?

I have 16-year-old daughter who walks home from school.

What is the contingency when unmasked people start taking our kids across the border?

We don't know.

We we don't know who's taking people, and we are totally against people being masked, taking our people, and we are concerned.

We are close to Mexico.

We are concerned that our children are going to be taken and not to a concentration camp in the US once they're taken across the border, just to get across the border, you don't need anything.

You don't you don't need anything, you don't need ID, you just take a car and go.

So we are all concerned citizens, and for sure, we're not okay with it.

Alicia Perez, followed by Tariq Elmugi, and then Father Richard Aguilar.

Good afternoon.

Thank you for having this hearing.

My name's Alicia or Ali Perez.

I'm a mother, I'm a San Antonian, I'm raising my four kids here.

I'm also an immigration attorney.

I've had the people taken from my arms outside of their lawful court proceedings and detained by ICE and then forced into deportation.

Um I also helped co-found SA stands because we all know that when we work together, these organizations of organizations we are stronger.

There's a lot of pain here today, and thank you for receiving that, but I think there's also a lot of love and a lot of hope.

And I think that's going to be the answer here.

I want to recognize the hard work of our um law enforcement.

I hear SAPD in the city when they say that you're not enforcing federal laws.

But the concern here is not your intent or the practical thing that you're doing, it's the effect.

Every arrest is the first step of federal ice enforcement change chain.

Arrest leads to ice contact at the jail, ice contact leads to detention, detention leads to the deportation, and as the community has stated over and over today, these deportations are not being lawfully done.

And I know that because they've tried to take people from me who've already won their cases.

I've had to go to federal court and we get them back.

So let's not get lost in semantics.

Arrests and the local policies that predictably feed that system, they do carry federal immigration consequences.

We are part of the chain.

So right now, people in San Antonio, as my community said, are more afraid than ever to call for help.

This is especially scary for domestic violence victims who are already fed to call.

Fear suppresses reporting, fear makes victims and witnesses disappear.

Fear makes our community less safe.

But I believe we can comply with a law and still be thoughtful about how our local practices affect safety.

We can use discretion.

We can emphasize in our policies about this, best practices.

You can submit the rest of your comments for the record.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Tariq.

Tariq El Mugi.

Tariq El Mugi.

Okay.

Father Aguilar.

And then Tori Salas and Virginia Quinn.

Good afternoon.

My family has lived in these lands, which we call Atlan for 12,000 years.

So we did not cross the border.

The border crossed us.

When I was a young child, my elders told me of a story that I now learned is called Mexican rape repatriate repatriation.

It happened in the 1930s when anyone who looked Mexican were deported back to Mexico, whether it were their citizens or not.

And I think we're there now, in many respects.

It was all legal, all ordered by the government.

A parishioner who was with me at the time said maybe we're living in that time again.

And even though it was almost 40 years ago, we need to ask ourselves the question.

Whose side do you choose?

Do you choose the fear or freedom?

A dictator or dignity?

Partisan politics or democracy of a nation?

Ice raids or community safety.

Government terrorism or the truth of the people.

Capricious law, chaotic disorder, or life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

My hope is that you choose for the people of San Antonio.

How can you trust a distrustful marauding militia?

I hope you don't choose that that direction.

Thank you.

Torre Salas.

Tori Salas.

Okay.

Virginia Quinn.

Virginia Quinn.

Followed by Alejandro Herrera.

No.

Okay.

Virginia Quinn.

No.

Alejandro Hereda.

Followed by Quinn Nook and Alastor Myth.

Please line up.

You are.

You've got two minutes.

Thank you.

My name is Israel Alejandro Herrera.

I'm a brother, a son, and an uncle.

I'm a UTSA graduate and an engineer.

But most importantly, I'm your neighbor.

And like it or not, you are mine.

This message is not only to City Council, it's to anyone who can frankly pull their head out of their ass.

American citizens are being shot and assaulted in our streets.

And so many of you, so many of you are stuck in a fallacy, a cognitive dissonance, the mental conflict that occurs when beliefs or assumptions are contradicted by new information, tending this unease by rejecting, explaining away, or just avoiding new information.

Our community is scared, and you are scared.

It's visible.

It's visible in everyone's faces.

But it's time to face reality.

Daily I see my neighbors grasping onto any semblance of a rules-based order, but it's gone.

This administration and at the hands of Donald, Vaught, Miller, Peter Thiel, and the Heritage Foundation are fulfilling a plan of fascism, whether we like it or not.

Good news is that we can work with our fear, not against it.

This administration is not following court orders.

They have acted with impunity, forging wars on sovereign states and its own citizens.

Their intent is to agitate citizens and oppress them into fighting back for a pretext to a de facto martial law.

And it's here.

Thank you for your time.

Quinn Nook.

Quinn Nook, followed by Alastor Myth and then Terry Kerr.

Oh, hello?

Oh, wait.

Yes.

So I want to start us off by something that really bugged me whenever I first started in coming in here.

Was it two inter in recesses that you guys took?

It just felt so disrespectful to be in the house, our house, and y'all get offended by what we say and what we do.

That is not how this works.

Right?

Oh, yeah.

Gosh, it must be so hard to get paid to listen to people and not do it.

And speaking of jobs, y'all job is to represent us.

It doesn't matter what y'all think, no matter what y'all think is best for us or what y'all think would work.

It matters what we think will work and what we want, and we do not want ice.

ICE is not professional.

ICE does not deserve respect.

ICE is just filled with racist dogs.

Lots of lots of individual journalists has applied to ice, and all it took was like six minutes to get a job.

And on their first day, some of them have got a gun.

Does that sound professional to y'all?

Does that sound like somebody who deserves respect?

We do not, we should not respect people who shoot people.

We should not respect people who kidnap people.

We should not respect people who threaten our neighbors and our friends.

That is not a professional organization that does not deserve to be anywhere in the city.

Thank you.

And then Priscilla Olivades.

Hello, everyone.

I wanted to uh take a moment to uh thank everyone, oh all but one person who has spoken before me.

Uh we all represent um the best quality of our humanity, our love, our community, and our uh a sense of growth and wanting to better ourselves.

ICE represents all of the worst.

In short, ICE does not belong in San Antonio and it should not be owed the cooperation or assistance of this community.

Uh I don't need to go into the definition of fascism and all the ways that ICE is mimicking the German SS, because it is self-evident to any person with eyes who values truth above hate.

ICE has proven time and again, they will exit they exist for malice alone and operate outside of the law without warrants, due process, evidence, accountability, or transparency.

If they insist to work without due diligence in the process of the judicial system, then to stay consistent, they should learn to work without the support or protection of the local law enforcement.

The only cooperation that we should be talking about today is our officials and SAPD working with the community, not modern day Nazis.

To continue, ICE is a nationally funded poison for our diverse community.

They represent only rotten decay of our society.

This is not for law and order.

This is not to catch criminals.

They have attempted to deport uh citizens without due process or legal representation to foreign gulags.

They have shot and harassed unarmed citizens.

They used legal immigration documents to track it and trap legal immigrants.

The point is to oppress and erase members of our community, a clear sign of fascism, which we know for certain is an absolute evil, which cannot and should not be compromised with in any way, shape, or form.

We should not be speaking about compromising with or improving ICE operations.

We should be re-strengthening our efforts to make this a sanctuary city, protecting our community members, whether they were born here or moved here, and we should be encouraging public and private entities to turn ICE away at the door.

To reiterate, there is no space for ICE in this or any other community, and they must be rebuked.

Thank you for your time.

Terry Kerr.

Terry Kerr, followed by Priscilla Olivares and Inolharas Ruiz.

Good afternoon, Mayor, uh Council, and neighbors.

Um I immigrated to the United States over 50 years ago.

I've been a resident of San Antonio for 43 years.

I'm also a person of color.

I'm white.

Okay.

I came from Ireland, and in Ireland, they used to say people are full of the Blarney.

I had to write that down because after listening to many of my neighbors, I don't think I've heard that much BLARNI since I left Ireland.

Here's what I heard today.

And some of the people made a lot of excellent points.

But Nazis, fascists, genocide, domestic terrorists.

I think there was a lot of hyperbole today.

And I think people should go back and consider this.

On a serious note, they got here, didn't you?

Quiet, quiet in the chamber, please.

On a serious note, the tragedy that happened in Minneapolis.

I believe if the authorities there had taken the same position that the San Antonio police department has with the federal authorities and controlled the traffic, perhaps that tragedy would have been avoided.

I want to also point out that in the last year, according to some of the news reports that I've read, uh, there were uh people from the uh Venezuelan gang, Tran Diorgua, that were arrested.

And then last week, uh Sheriff Salazar mentioned that they'd arrested three um illegal immigrants that were in a that were in a uh car um theft ring that stole SUVs that were being used for human trafficking.

They had law.

They had been linked to the cartel and were involved in human trafficking and had been deported previous times.

My time upon the same.

Your sir, your time is up.

You can you can submit the rest of your comments for the record.

Priscilla Olivares, followed by Enjolras Ruiz.

Followed by Ray Voyean.

My name is Priscilla Olivares.

I'm a senior policy attorney with the immigrant legal resource center and a member of SA Stands.

I'm also an immigration attorney, and I have witnessed how ICE has torn families apart, detaining and deporting families.

I'm here to ask for transparency and accountability for SAPD's role in the November raid and for transparency any time SAPD collaborates with ICE.

The November raid occurred three months ago, and there were still so many unanswered questions.

I stand alongside community calling for transparency.

We want to know why nearly 50 SAPD officers provided, quote, perimeter security for the raid.

How and who determined 50 officers should be dedicated to the raid, which violated the rights of so many.

How much did providing 50 SAPD officers cost taxpayers?

The federal government has plenty of money.

The administration passed HR 1 last summer, giving them 170 billion dollars more to harm our communities.

SBA deputized many law enforcement, including Texas DPS, to act as ICE agents.

Why then is SAPD dedicating so many resources in these operations?

SAPD says it only provided perimeter support, but any support in violating our rights is wrong.

And the ICE memo lead yesterday states ICE now believes they have the right to enter homes without a warrant.

This is shocking and unconstitutional.

Will SAPD provide unprovides logistical support or perimeter support when ICE enters our homes without warrants in clear violation of the Fourth Amendment.

I was also shocked to hear SAPD chiefs state they are calling ICE if they see an administrative warrant and their database.

Let's be clear an administrative warrant is not a real warrant, and nothing in SB4 2017 requires compliance with an administrative warrant.

The Fourth Amendment, SAP the Fourth Amendment prohibits SAPD or any law enforcement from prolonging detention, even briefly of an individual after the legal authority has stopped.

So I really encourage City Council to really understand what SAPD is saying when they're saying they're going to violate the law by calling ICE for those administrative warrants.

And I'm happy to talk more about this uh after the meeting.

Thank you.

Enjolas.

In Holas, Ruiz Ray.

Excuse me?

You had it right the first time.

Oh, thank you.

In yours.

And then Ray Voyeyan and then Regina Guevada.

Oh shoot, that's all I saw the time ticking out.

I got worried.

Go ahead.

Good evening, Council members.

Mayor Jones and City of San Antonio.

Over the past few weeks, we have had a uh it's called a unique situation arise.

Make no mistake, ICE is coming to San Antonio.

The question today is not whether to bar ICE from entry to San Antonio, it is whether we allow SAPD to assist ICE and DHS agents in deporting the residents of San Antonio.

My answer, simply put, is no.

ICE training is insufficient compared to SAPD training.

SAPD Academy requires 1,300 hours to complete the academy and obtain your peace officer license.

This high standard allows San Antonians to trust in the officers' ability to make rational decisions, uphold the law, and put the needs of the community before any personal beliefs.

According to Homeland Security, 10,000 new ICE officers have been sworn in under new guidelines, guidelines that allowed them to complete their training in six to eight weeks.

Over the past few weeks, we've seen the result of this training.

The violence and blatant carelessness with which ICE has operated in cities like Chicago, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, and so many others has now come to our city.

Untrained officers claiming that they alone have unlimited authority to terrorize people in their homes, in public, at their work, in their cars.

SAPD should supervise ICE with the goal of ensuring the safety of citizens and protecting constitutional rights.

Just this year alone, ICE deaths, not casualties, deaths have jumped up 232, the highest in 20 years.

Submit the rest of your comments for the for the record.

Thank you.

Thank you for your time.

Ray Ray Voyaian, followed by Regina Guevara.

And then Angela Pardo.

In 2012, two of my children were killed in South Bear County in a police chase gone wrong.

And still today I respect Chief McManus, SAPD, Sheriff Salazar, and our entire Bear County Sheriffs.

I want to tell you about one of my clients, a Honduran boy who at the age of 11 walked most of the way with his father from their home in Honduras to the Laredo border.

He became my client in August of 2020.

At that time, he was not attending school because his father was afraid of the system.

As is assigned CHW, I was trusted to step in.

Franklin came into my care so I could enroll him in school and advocate for him.

I watched him learn English, make friends, become a standout soccer player, Great Hearts Monte Vista, MVP two years in a row.

And he began to believe in his future.

In June of 2023, I received the greatest promotion of my life.

I became his mom.

By this time of 2024 school year, Franklin was thriving and preparing to enter the Bear County Sheriff's Explorer Academy.

His dream today is still to be a police officer and join our military.

On August 12, 2024, Franklin was asked to leave our country.

Because we did not want to break the law, we did everything we were asked to do.

Franklin and my family returned to Honduras September 19, 2024.

Today my reality looks very different than what many imagine.

I continue to serve my clients as a community health worker while traveling between Honduras and San Antonio.

Three of my U.S.

born children who are citizens by birth are living outside the country with Franklin and our extended family.

This is only possible because of my resources and support of a loving community.

And that is not the reality for most of my families.

There's a misconception that people can simply return legally.

Often they cannot.

Timelines are long, legal costs are overwhelming.

Families are forced to choose between compliance and survival.

I understand we're a nation of laws and laws must be followed.

Compliance, however, should not mean families are torn apart, but that people must live in fear.

I ask my city to take an active role ensuring the safety and dignity of every person who calls San Antonio home.

Ice cannot come into our city with no regard for sanctity life.

The future of our families is in your hands.

Thank you.

Ray, Ray Voyaian, Angela Pardo, Stephanie Esparza.

Members of the county of the City Council of San Antonio.

Today is not a day we meet lightly on.

While one of our esteemed state representatives flees for warm weather, we meet to discuss the bone-chilling topic of ice.

Not the ice that spreads along our city streets that causes vehicles and pedestrians to slip and fall.

But the kind that enters suddenly and violently into our neighborhoods, stealing women and children, they deem a threat to us.

Despite this time of uncertainty, our voice has been strong to call for justice to be met.

That is what I hope to ask of you today.

That the SAPD do not assist ICE.

Let the SAPD be a warning light in this trying storm.

The members of the SAPD are members of our community who experienced the previous winter storm in 2021.

With their help, we can respond more effectively when the cold creeps in and the power grid falters once more.

Full of passion, joy, and love.

These are things in short supply these days.

But they don't have to be.

So much for having a little bit of notice.

Good afternoon.

I forgot my speech at home, so I'm writing some notes and please bear with me.

Good afternoon, Mayor Jones, City Council, and fellow citizens.

I am Kathy Stein.

I am speaking for myself.

I know that we have all seen what's going on in Minneapolis and the property damage, the to the businesses, to homes, to vehicles, and to people, not the least of which.

And I know you have two, so I won't waste your time talking about that.

But I do have a possible solution, sort of, that I would like you to consider.

Not now, but when we get the surge that we know we're going to get, that's similar to what Minneapolis is experiencing with 3,000 ICE agents descending upon the city.

What if we closed it?

What if we simply close the businesses, close the schools, and let them serve the warrants that they have without any interference, without any threats, without any delays.

Could we do that for a day or two and let them do whatever legitimate business they have so that none of those things happen here?

Um if we close down, please for a second.

If we closed down, we would have to put uh plan in place so people were prepared, and also possibly have some makeup days like we do with schools when schools close early, uh, or when schools are closed, so that businesses would be open, maybe that would not normally be open on a Saturday to make up that time.

And I would be willing to talk to anybody who thinks it to me.

Thank you, ma'am.

Emily Morales, Nicholas Baker, Chris Weldy, Emily Morales, okay, Nicholas Baker, Chris Weldy and Hernando Arce.

Good afternoon.

Nico Baker, District One.

Uh across the plaza here on this building on Dolorosa Street on the north wall, there's a plaque.

It says, here stood the early courthouse, city council room, et cetera, and where occurred the Indian massacre in 1840.

On March 19th of that year, 35 unarmed men and women, Comanches were murdered in the city council meeting room.

The Plaza, all the way down Dolorosa Street, here.

In this place.

Racial violence is central to Texas history.

You could say it's the whole point.

Why did we need Texas Rangers to make room for white Anglo settlers?

Let the city council take note.

It is the Anglo who is the immigrant to Texas.

It is important I say this because the truth is that the activities of ICE and SAPD with regards to immigration are not unprecedented.

The unprecedented thing to do would be to hold these lawful thugs accountable and bring them to justice.

When we ask this city council to adopt positions, policies, and ordinances that are hostile to ICE and beneficial to our community, we are asking this city council to break the cycle of racial violence in Texas.

When we talk about ICE, we are talking about an organization younger than me, denying access to attorneys to their clients.

Where new hires are not required to sign affidavits swearing they have not been convicted of a domestic violence or sex crime, as reported by Laura Jadid, who has allowed the death of over 30 people in holding sales.

We were talking about an organization who issues unlawful internal memos and warrantless entry of private property.

We were talking about a group who the Supreme Court has rule can stop people based on the color of their skin, the language that they speak, the accent they speak with.

The last thing I'm gonna say, my wife cannot be here.

Her student in Natalia High School was detained.

San Antonio Express News has an article.

It's called Trapped by ICE.

The name of the journalist Nancy Prayer Johnson, Javier Linares.

He never missed a day of school until he was kidnapped by ICE.

He loved bikes and always wanted to try Dave's hot chicken.

He's the kind of student leaders always hope they get to teach.

Thank you for your time.

Chris Chris Welding.

Followed by Hernando Arset and Laura Molinar.

Good afternoon, Mayor Jones and members of the San Antonio City Council.

My name is Dr.

Christine Weldy.

I'm a resident of District 9.

I came from a three-generation military family and recently retired after 41 years as a Department of Army civil servant dedicated to supporting military families and military children.

After living three decades in Europe, I chose to make San Antonio my home.

I chose this city because San Antonio is Military City USA, a city that understands service, sacrifice, and duty.

It's also a rich, vibrant, culturally diverse city, and that diversity is our strength.

Immigrants have helped build San Antonio, our culture, our neighborhoods, and our economy.

Because of my background, I believe deeply in law and order.

I respect the rule of law.

I strongly support the men and women who dedicate their lives as law enforcement officers to keep our neighborhoods and our city safe.

In normal times, we trust our law enforcement institutions to act lawfully and protect the public.

But these are not normal times.

Across this country, we are seeing ICE engage in actions that raise serious constitutional concerns, including rawful wrongful detentions, excessive force, and tactics that spreads fear across our communities, including incidents involving excessive force against community members engaged in lawful neighborhood watch or observation.

These concerns are not partisan.

They are concerns for all residents of San Antonio because constitutional rights belong to everyone.

San Antonio must not be complicit in unlawful federal actions.

SB4 does not require the San Antonio Police Department to enter into voluntary cooperation agreements with ICE, nor does it require the city to go beyond what the law demands.

I'm asking this council to refuse cooperation with ICE beyond what is legally required to man transparency and interactions with ICE and to use every legal avenue available to protect the constitutional rights and community trust.

Thank you.

Hernando Hernando Arce.

Followed by Laura Molinar and Christine Nickel.

Order.

Thank you, Mayor.

Council members.

Quiet in the chambers, please.

Quiet, quiet in the chambers.

We're gonna take a recess.

We're gonna take a recess.

Please take your seats.

We'll reconvene.

Hernando Arce, followed by Laura Molinad and then Christine Nickel.

Thank you, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Hernando Arce.

I'm an independent reporter here in San Antonio, Texas.

Now I wouldn't have to be here if the Biden administration did not lend millions and millions of illegal aliens into our country.

But in order to understand what we're facing today, we have to go back only about four years during the Ron Nuremberg administration here.

When he opened up the migrant resource center, I as I finally call it the American Replacement Center on San Pedro Avenue, where over a million illegal aliens came into our country, into our state, into our city of San Antonio, including the Gotta Ways.

Ironically, that that immigration uh migrant center was sold right before the invasion.

It was sold uh from San Antonio to one of uh one of uh the mayor's biggest donor, Gray Street Partners, who owns a lot of the property around the Pearl Brewery.

They bought that building, rehabed for these migrants, and they turned around and rented it to the city of San Antonio for 113,000 a month.

And over a million of these illegals came in through that center.

I was there every day documenting.

I got over a thousand videos.

So I was able to expose the the hit the secret hangar that was behind the airport where 300 illegal aliens were staying as an overflow.

I filmed that, and from filming it in public property, I was I was uh given a uh trespassing warning, and then two weeks later I was arrested at the San Antonio Airport at three o'clock in the morning for filming illegal aliens coming off three coach buses.

And uh actually, I was arrested that night by SAPD airport police.

The case uh was dismissed for lack of evidence, and I sue the city, and we settled out of court.

But I'm painting the picture here just to show you now that we're come back full circle.

Now that we have all these millions of people that came in here on unvetted, and I know the system very well.

I know what an NTA is, I know what a TPS is, I know what temporary protection status is.

So when you see all these people getting detained and arrested, is because quiet in the chambers quiet in the chambers.

How many minutes do I have?

You have five seconds.

And I can't talk with these people over talking me.

You don't know how much to say, so your your time is complete.

Um, if you have additional Laura Molinad, followed by Christine Nickel, Peter Bella.

Laura Molinar.

Okay, Christine Nickel.

Quiet in the chambers, please.

Christine Nickel.

Okay.

Peter Bella.

Followed by Shannon Locke and Izzy Bowza.

Good afternoon.

My name is Peter Bella.

10,000 local residents took to the streets and protested entirely peacefully during the June 14th, 2025 No Kings Rally and March in San Antonio.

SAPD Chief McManus saluted our nonviolent protest writing on Twitter.

Thank you to the thousands of demonstrators and organizers for showing everyone how it should be done today.

Between the hard rock, which is SB4, and I understand from the brief description we've had so far that it puts you all in a between a rock and a hard place.

I get that.

But on the other end is how we carry ourselves in San Antonio, how we respect each other, and how we work out our differences together, and we find the common ground we need.

But the deployment of ice in Los Angeles, Chicago, and now Minneapolis has promoted confrontation and has escalated violence, no notably in the shooting death by an ICE agent of Renee Good, followed by the dismissal of the murderer at the highest levels of the federal government immediately after Ms.

Good's death.

But we need to recognize the success of our peaceful protest.

We look at the sit to the city of San Antonio to return the favor of that peaceful protest.

We look to you to keep us protected, as you always try to do, and even given the constraints of SB4, keep ice out of San Antonio.

Thank you.

Shannon Locke, followed by Izzy Bowser and Mata Leosha Devari.

Good afternoon, Mayor Jones.

Counsel.

My name is Shennon Locke.

I'm running to be the next Bear County District Attorney on the Democratic ticket.

I'm the only candidate who is board certified in criminal law.

And I'm here to explain to you how we should hold ICE accountable.

I'm not only a criminal defense attorney who practices criminal law in federal and state court.

I'm also a father, a husband, a neighbor who's seen their family and friends terrorized by ICE.

Any perception of investigative cooperation with ICE damages community trust.

It causes victims to hesitate and to pause before calling the police.

That increases community danger.

Let me be clear.

Indiscriminate arrests are illegal in the state of Texas.

Detention requires reasonable suspicion.

Arrests require probable cause.

Raids that detain innocent people are unlawful.

When these occur, those agents must be investigated and referred for prosecution.

What SAPD can do is they can observe and investigate these unlawful raids and refer those unlawful raids to the DA's office for prosecution.

As the only board certified candidate for district attorney, I will have my prosecutors, once I'm elected, review these cases and submit them to the grand jury.

If the grand jury finds that criminal acts have occurred, and detaining somebody illegally is a kidnapping.

Pointing a gun at somebody without justification or lawful authority is an aggravated assault.

The federal government will then try to remove it to federal court, but we can litigate that in front of our federal judiciary, who is saying things that they have never said before about our federal agents because those agents are doing things they've never done before.

Thank you very much for your time and thank you very much for having me.

Izzy Izzy Bowser.

Izzy Bowser.

She's not here anymore.

Okay.

Mata liso de Vera.

Okay.

Gilberto Avila.

Followed by Kate Sanchez and Deanne Cuyar.

Please line up.

Hello.

Uh I first would just like to pause for a moment and just to kind of reflect on all of the compassion and care that unites us all here today.

I just want everyone to kind of look around and see all of these amazing people who have come today and give up some time out of our afternoon to stand up for those who couldn't be here today.

I also like to acknowledge all the caregivers that have allowed us to be here today.

And just uh hello to Ez M and L who are watching.

Um I'm a father, a public educator, and um what has compelled me to come today is to express um the need to minimize our cooperation with SAPD and to reflect on what strategies the city is going to do to address the needs of our students.

Um, our students are already under threat.

There are already students who are feeling um unable to attend school safely.

There are students we haven't seen in months now.

And we need to learn uh what is the city gonna do to protect our students as they attend um as they attend school?

Uh secondly, we've all have uh it's well established that our community is safer when our residents are confident that when our local authorities are not federal immigration authorities and they can count on local authorities to render aid and assistance.

The harm that is caused to our community when violence is not reported will make our streets less safe for documented and undocumented residents alike.

Uh we are safer when our local law enforcements are focused on local issues and not national policies.

I hear that SAPD is gonna secure scenes for ICE, and I'm curious to learn.

How do we know if these scenes that they are securing are lawful?

How do we know that it's not an indiscriminate detainment?

How do we know that it's not just some untrained uh federal masked agent detaining my family?

If I'm on my way to church and I have an aggressive armed agent with a gun on our face on our families, can I go to an SAPD agent for assistance?

Who is gonna come to my family's aid when an armed man is sh is having a gun to our head?

No ice in in San Antonio.

Thank you.

Kate Sanchez, Kate Sanchez.

Okay, Deanne Cuayar, followed by Martha Jones and Ananda Tomas.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Deanne Quayar.

I'm a proud resident of District One.

I'm queer, I'm Jewish, I'm disabled.

I don't like bringing up those labels, but I've I feel like I need to add context today.

I'm here because I'm scared.

First, they came for the socialists and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me and there was no one left for me.

This is a quote by German pastor Martin Numollier.

It's often referred to as a poem.

But these are words about the guilt and responsibility, indifference and inaction.

There's multiple versions of this quote that exists because the author changed the list of victims for different audiences.

And the quote was a confession to show Germans how to accept personal responsibility.

But what would they say today?

First, they came for the undocumented, and I did not speak out because I had papers and a real ID.

Then they came for the journalists and asylum seekers, and I did not speak out because I'm not a journalist, and my family is safe.

Then they shot and killed a mom in a minivan and took a five-year-old waiting in the cold in preschool for his dad, and I did not speak out.

And then they came for all of us, and there was no one left to speak because silence, violence, and cruelty, learned how to wear a mask and call itself the law.

Thank you.

Martha Jones, followed by Ananda Tomas and Javier Solis.

Okay.

Council members, mayors, uh, mayor, uh Chief McManus, thank you all and your staff for giving us the opportunity to share our feelings.

My name is Martha Jones, PhD.

I am a retired professor from UTSA in St.

Mary's.

I have had a personal experience with its predecessor, INS.

And I'm not going to speak about that either.

What I am going to speak about is the proud heritage of law enforcement of resistance to dictatorship from my family, and I'm sure I speak for many families here.

My first ancestors arrived in this country 395 years ago.

The one who arrived in 1641, arrived under a legitimate colonial government.

The one who arrived in Texas in 1821, who was part of Stephen F.

Austin's 0300, was appointed by Stephen F.

Austin as the first commander of the Austin Colony militia.

So in a sense, he is the forerunner of all the police departments in Texas today.

They followed the law at their time.

However, while they were obeying the law, their governments were replaced by autocrats and dictators.

Peter Stevenson, Santa Anna, I could go on and on.

May I finish my sentence and then I'll go.

Thank you.

Ananda Tomas, followed by Javier Solis and Arturo Madrid.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Ananda Thomas, executive director of Act for SA and a resident of District 8.

I speak, I speak on behalf of our immigrant communities who live in fear every day because of increased ICE presence and terror in our community.

For months we have watched family members, co-workers, and our neighbors get ripped from community at immigration hearings, ice check-ins, their homes and workplaces.

We have witnessed unlawful arrests where people are being disappeared.

And make no mistake, when immigrant mothers hesitate to call 911 during emergencies, when families are going hungry because they fear going to the grocery store, and when folks are not going through a mental health crisis, are too scared to call for help because they fear deportation.

That's not public safety.

It is state sponsored terror.

And while Texas law does require certain collaboration with ICE, my understanding is that SAPD always has the ability to deny a collaboration request due to limited resources to prioritize other community needs.

How many times have we heard that our public safety resources, including SAPD officers, are stretched thin despite their massive budget?

Could SAPD not then deny more collaboration requests?

But outside of this, you as council can act.

Sorry.

Um, in Austin right now, City Council is coordinating with Austin PD to update its policies and trainings related to cooperating with ICE.

Even though police officers cannot be prohibited from asking for immigration status, they are also not required to.

Good afternoon, Council and Mayor.

My name is Javier Solis.

I'm a born and raised San Antonian from District 8.

I've come to City Hall today to advocate against the inhumane and degrading events conducted by ICE and local law enforcement agencies, filling San Antonians and me with disgust and fear.

The reality is they have collaborated with ICE to terrorize the very people who they are supposed to protect.

In November 2025, SAPD sent approximately 50 offers to officers to assist with an ICE raid, kidnapping more than 140 people, only to conclude many were not members of the suspected gang.

No substantial information about 138 individuals has been provided.

The lack of transparency across the board from local to federal levels is pernicious.

Why are you not asking questions?

Why are you not ensuring that your citizens are safe?

Neither state legislation nor local authority supersedes the constitution.

Both have violated the Constitution by assisting a group of lawless, disorderly, transgressing bigots who've done nothing but infringe upon the rights and dignity of our city, your constituents.

Let me remind you all that the Fourth Amendment protects citizens from unreasonable searches and seizures.

Additionally, 2017's SB4 mandates local law enforcement to collaborate with ICE to detain undocumented residents but not to collaborate in raids.

The San Antonio Police Department has proved its commitment to ICE through its actions in the November 2025 raid.

So I asked the city council to hold these leading those leading the agencies accountable to follow the law.

Will we continue to stand by?

I know that constituents will not.

Thank you.

Arturo Madrid, followed by Eliasar Cisneros, and then Lydia Hernandez Tricky.

Rosita Lida has ceded her time to me.

I'm giving her more two minutes.

Thank you.

My name is Arturo Madrid.

I'm a retired professor, a resident of San Antonio, and a resident of District One, a taxpayer and a voter, as are my colleagues who might identify here today.

They are Professor David Montejano, Professor Gilberto Hinojosa, Professor Jerry Poyo.

My colleagues and I have established a grassroots initiative, surviving the Ice Age, in response to the aggressive, destructive, and outrageous policies and actions of ICE.

Two mantras from the civil rights period movement period, both attributed to the late Martin Luther King, guide our efforts.

The first is the silence of good people is worse than the brutality of bad people.

The second, when bad people plot, good people plan.

We understand, or we've been led to understand, that our city and county officials are severely constrained by both state and federal agencies.

But all of us have the protections against unlawful or arbitrary actions by governmental officials granted to us in the Bill of Rights and the Constitution.

These include being innocent of any allegation of criminality unless proven guilty in a court of law.

Our rights include being able to hold governmental bodies and officials accountable.

At the very least, our elected city officials should provide us with information on what is occurring in our city as related to ISIS immigration activities.

Develop a mechanism whereby city residents can report arbitrary or questionable or illegal actions against them or their neighbors by governmental agents related to immigration issues.

Express their concern to ICE policies and actions that they consider illegal or inappropriate by policies in the violation of civil rights by ICE.

We are particularly concerned because ICE has made it clear that they are targeting people not because they're undocumented or criminal, but simply because they appear to be Mexican, Latino, dark skinned, otherwise.

Stephen Miller, his principal advisor in immigration, is deeply antagonist towards Mexicans.

The Supreme Court decision that allows ICE to detain people based on their ethnic origins, their speech, and their appearance has resulted in the detention of U.S.

citizens simply because they look look Mexican or Latino.

The majority of detainees and deportees are to date, are to date Mexicans, Central Americans, and Venezuelans.

Until recently, media coverage of ICE actions is principally focused on California.

However, over 75% of detentions in 2025 occurred in Texas.

A very large percentage of the detainees are being held in Texas.

ICE is active in San Antonio and is detaining citizens and non-citizens.

But except for the highly publicized actions against members of the alleged tren de Aragua in December, little or nothing is being reported to the media or by our elected or appointed governmental officials.

Over the past 12 months, we have seen elected and appointed officials cowed or stymied, the judicial system hamstrung, institutional officers intimidated, and corporate leaders bought off.

And of course, the mainstream media has been sidelined.

There is no cavalry who will ride to our rescue.

We, as ordinary cities, will have to join the battle ourselves.

We ask you to join us in speaking out and to be mindful of the responsibility you have to defend our rights as residents and citizens.

We have been told over and over again that our speech and our actions and your speech and your actions violate the laws of the United States.

I will remind all of us that the policies and actions of Nazi Germany, of fascist Italy, and the Communist USSR were legal, but that's not to say that they were ethical, moral, right, just judged or humane.

Just judge or humane.

Thank you.

Lydia Hernandez Tricky.

Ari Chagoya.

Okay.

Camille Spears.

Camille Spears.

Is that you?

Okay.

Followed by Shelby Laffery and Pedro Ruiz.

Good afternoon.

Thank you all for listening to some very heightened emotions.

We appreciate you being here.

I'm Dr.

Camille Spears.

I'm speaking on my own behalf as a resident of District One.

District One.

I've been an HIV doctor in San Antonio for four years.

I'm here today to discuss how fear is undermining our community's health and safety.

Last month, a patient I've known for years came in for his follow-up visit.

He is someone I always look forward to seeing because he has this seriously joyful smile and general laid-back ease about life.

Years ago he was granted asylum due to dangerous conditions in his home country, and he's always been consistent with his HIV meds and visits.

Instead of talking about his health, he asked me, how long do you think I could survive without my HIV meds?

I told him the truth, that missing even a few doses would lead to viral rebound, missing weeks to month could mean drug resistance, immune system collapse, and serious consequences.

He responded that he was terrified that he would be forcefully removed from the country and wanted to know if he could survive it.

His fear isn't abstract.

I'll let all the comments speak for themselves for the sake of time.

San Antonio, following SB4, cannot prohibit coordination with ICE, but San Antonio can allow officers to use their good experiences and discretion without prohibiting coordination.

There are two ways SAPD can do that.

First, write a policy allowing discretion in how officers respond to administrative warrants and other calls from ICE.

Local law enforcement triage threats on a daily basis.

They can choose to respond to high priority crime and public safety calls, and they can stand by and report what they're seeing and start to serve as a real force for safety in our communities.

Second, strengthen protections for victims and people in health emergencies.

Them not calling makes our city less safe for everyone.

This is an opportunity for police officers to powerfully increase their public trust.

Let's create an environment that allows our city to thrive, and let's not turn San Antonio into a place where people are afraid to refill their HIV medications, send their children to school, or call 911.

I urge you to write policies founded in community trust and ensure that no resident of San Antonio is forced to choose between their well-being and their safety.

Thank you.

Shelby Laffery.

Shelby Laffrey.

Pedro Ruiz.

Followed by Sarah Cruz and Hannah Esh Gates.

Hello, Mayor.

I'm gonna give my time to Antonio Diaz.

He also signed up to speak.

Sir, your name is Pedro Ruiz.

Okay, thank you.

Okay.

Okay, you have four minutes, sir.

Thanks.

Thought of our land.

Deported, removed, treated as inhuman savages, even though we're human beings.

Gentleman brought up the uh Comanche massacre.

The way it was written, it was flipped, right?

That the Comanches massacred when it was they, they were massacred, they and their families, their wives, or children, thrown into the river, hung on the old oak trees that used to be here at Main Plaza.

A lady with a PhD over here brought up the uh San Jacinto battle, where the Anglos and the Texacans, Tejanos defeated Santa Ana.

There were 600 Zapotecos natives left to rot in the field.

They were fighting against slavery.

Mexico had already abolished slavery since 1829.

The battle of 1836 was over slavery.

Because all the Anglos that Santa Ana in Mexico gave uh, which means they were renting land to them, rebelled to take the land, and establish slavery, continued slavery after 1829.

That was what the battle of the Alamo, where the Anglos were defeated, they were slave owners.

They were not freedom fighters.

That is the story in the history of the United States.

It calls itself such a democracy and freedom fighting nation.

When in reality, it had always been a bigoted racist country, always.

In the 1960s, after battles and battles to gain civil rights.

It started to change.

It started to become more just.

Well, that has been turned back with Mega and Donald Trump in the office.

We have Greg Abbott in office that has put razor wires in the Rio Raoul for families to be able to cut up children and die there.

That is Texas law.

We Native people have no status in Texas because of Marabula Mar.

See, I know my history.

Most natives know their history.

This is a racist, racist nation and a very racist state.

We are about changing it.

Trump is one man, he will expire just like Hitler did.

The German people now have a good country, and they work well with the rest of the European states.

Hopefully, the United States will one day recover that after Donald Trump and start working with Mexico, Canada, Greenland, and Central Sud America again, as their neighbors, as their allies and friends, and start respecting all people.

We have something called habeas corpus in the Constitution.

I'm a constitutionalist, by the way.

I believe in the Constitution.

I'm also a veteran.

I've served this nation, but I protect it the Constitution, not a tyrant, not a wannabe dictator.

This Republicans that are kissing boots, doing gerrymandering and redistricting districts to serve Donald Trump, are more just boot licking KKK.

I call out the Republican Party to grow a spine, grow a spine and represent your people, all your people, not just your white supremacist racist people.

All the people that live within your districts and your areas, serve your people.

And let's let's take the lawsuit on.

Let's take it again.

Let's re let it resist as before.

287B, all that.

San Antonio can resist it.

I will pay my taxes for you, for everyone here.

Let's just say, go ahead and sue us.

Go ahead and sue this, Greg Abbott.

We'll pay Sarah Sarah Cruz.

Sarah.

Sarah Cruz, Hannah S.

Gates, William Ripto.

Okay.

Okay.

Good afternoon.

Do you want me to pause?

Okay.

Go ahead.

Thank you.

Okay.

Good afternoon.

My name is Sarah Cruz, and I am here on behalf of the ACLU of Texas and as a member of this SA Stance Coalition to stand in solidarity with my community members that are seeking transparency, accountability, and meaningful action from our elected officials to protect San Antonio residents.

Thank you, City Council members, for calling this special meeting and for the opportunity to raise our concerns.

At a moment where people are being disappeared by federal immigration enforcement agents, even making San Antonio among the cities with the most ISRS in the country's country, residents deserve answers.

We understand that laws like Senate Bill 4 require Texas law enforcement agencies, including SAPD, to honor ICE detainers, and that no policy may prohibit them from cooperating with ICE or other federal agencies.

However, local officials and law enforcement continue to have wide discretion as to how they interact with ICE and other problematic federal agencies.

As part of ensuring transparency and accountability when local officials do collaborate with ICE, this meeting is a good first step and must continue.

The scenes of families being detained at the immigration courthouse at their ICE check-ins and on the street in San Antonio are unfortunately familiar to us all.

But I want to highlight the taxes tactics that ICE agents are using against people.

In addition to racially profiling individuals, agents are using chokeholds, including a report of one 16-year-old in Houston, threatening to tear gas homes, cutting the electricity of homes, and other uses of excessive force.

Then, as you have already heard, a newly revealed internal ICE memo stated that officers and agents can forcibly enter homes without a judicial warrant signed by a judge.

Rubber stamping the intentional violation of people's constitutional rights.

When SCPD chooses to prior prioritize a request from ICE over their other public safety efforts, this is the agency their time, officers and resources are supporting.

This does not make San Antonio safer, and officers shouldn't be co-opted into the efforts of an agency creating a civil rights crisis.

After the passage of SB4, the city of Austin took action by passing Freedom City's policies to help uphold the rights of their residents.

San Antonio can do the same.

Our team in Cole Eglishin would like to work with your offices to craft policies that safeguard the rights and dignity of San Antonio residents.

Thank you for your time.

Good afternoon.

I'm an immigration lawyer, but more importantly, I'm a resident of District 1, and I'm concerned about the safety of my neighbors and my friends.

A lot of people have mentioned the raid that happened in November off of San Pedro, and I want to talk specifically about one young man who was taken that night by federal agents with the support of SAPD.

I represent that young man, and he had already won his immigration case several years ago.

He has indefinite legal status here in this country.

No criminal convictions, no ties to any gangs.

That night he finished his shift at work and he went to eat at some food trucks.

He was sitting in his car when it was surrounded by federal agents.

Without asking him any questions, those agents busted every window in his car except for the windshield.

They pulled him out, put him on a bus, shackled him, cuffed him, and took him to another facility.

Only then did they ask him for ID or any evidence of his immigration status.

When my client presented his driver's license and his social security card, I said they were fake, and they put him in detention.

I don't know where those documents are today, since they were not in his wallet when the wallet was returned to him after we secured his release after four weeks in detention.

Anyone who is here to support ICE and council members, let me tell you that my client's license looks just like yours.

His social security card looks just like yours.

He has legal immigration status, like you likely do.

There is no legal reason for him to be a target for enforcement, and he spent four weeks in a prison, separated from his young children and still struggling to pay for more than two thousand dollars worth of damage to his car.

Don't think that that couldn't happen to any of us.

The leadership of this city and law enforcement have a mandate to look after the well-being and safety of the residents.

I've spoken to people who are afraid to call the police to report domestic violence.

Children are being kept home from school.

There's rising food insecurity because people are afraid to leave their homes.

The way ICE is operating in this country is incompatible with the safety and the well-being of the residents of San Antonio.

William Ripto.

William Ripto.

Christina San Miguel, Miguel Rodriguez.

Howdy, my name is William Thomas Ripeto.

I live in District 10 under Representative Mark Wright.

And I'm here to oppose any cooperation with ICE, and I dare say they should be removed from this city to end never step foot here ever again.

I have the Supreme Court case of No MV back as Podomo, which gave ICE free weighing to go after anyone using any one of four factors.

One, the presence of any particular locations, such as bus stops and stores, two, the types of jobs they work, such as construction and landscaping, three, whether they speak Spanish or English with an accent, four, their apparent race or ethnicity.

As Justice Sotomayor said, quote, the government has all but declared that Latinos, U.S.

citizens or not, are fail game to be seized at any time, end quote.

According to the 2020 census, about 1.5 million people live in San Antonio, with a roughly 64% of the population being Hispanic.

That makes around 900 950,000 San Antonians a target to these illegal ICE raids.

ICE is nothing more than a state-sponsored terrorist, and there is no cooperation, no negotiation with these thugs, only just removal.

And before y'all dare to try to hide behind a 2017, 2023, Senate Bill Ford, here's a quote from Thomas Jefferson.

If a law is unjust, a man is not only right to disobey it, he is obligated to do so.

And finally, to all ICE agents and anyone considering working with them.

If you want to kidnap our neighbors, our friends and our family, come and fucking take them.

Miguel Rodriguez.

Okay.

Joe Garza.

Joe Garza.

Followed by Jessica Lambert and Esmeralda Alde.

Thank you.

Hello, uh, my name is Joe Garza.

I'm part of District 8.

And I kind of want to tell you what happened today.

So I got here about 12 o'clock, and I am, as you know, against uh um for ice and to can I reclaim my time?

Okay.

So um I've been harassed outside.

I've been fat shamed.

I've been against gays.

They've been hating I mean, call me faggots and all kinds of words.

I I think it's it's really sad.

They say it's a uh a uh room of love and it's not.

As you see, they just tried to uh stop somebody's from their first speech, having Hernando Ause speak.

That's against that's this first amendment right.

Also, um the other thing that I have done was I asked everybody, I told everybody that they can cut in line and nobody cut in line.

It's it was it was pretty messed.

It was pretty amazing.

Nobody cut in line.

That is law and order.

That is order that is orderly.

Uh so in law enforcement works, order works, and the city SAPD is offering perimeter security.

They need to secure ICE, they need to secure the uh protesters, they need to keep them separate, and let ICE do their job.

There'd be a lot, there wouldn't be any incidences like what has happened in San Antonio and the United States.

Uh so I ask you to please work with ICE, not against.

Work against ICE is dangerous for all.

And I hope you sign the 287G and cooperate.

Balconies Heights has signed the 287G, and I hope SAPD does.

Order, order, order.

Do you see what I mean?

Order.

Go ahead.

Yeah.

And it's been like this all day.

They're misrepresenting themselves.

All they've talked about, all they've talked about.

I'll reclaim my time.

Continue, sir.

Thank you.

Everybody's talking about immigration.

This is not.

We welcome immigration, but they need to do it the right way.

This is all about illegal immigrants.

I thank you for your time.

He was here legally under time.

Jessica Lambricht.

Jessica.

I'm also to a citizen.

Jessica Order.

Jessica, Jessica Lambert.

Yeah, she she gave her time to Addisella.

Order, order.

Jessica Lambricht, followed by Esmeralda Alde.

Abigail Stevens.

Okay, you're Esmeralda.

Thank you.

And then Abigail Stevens and then Debbie Benke.

Thank you, Mayor Jones and City Council for the time this evening.

I am going to be relaying some messages on behalf of our families that are communicated in Spanish.

So I'd like to keep to the authenticity of their messaging.

Could I possibly get additional time to be able to translate?

You'll have an additional two minutes, so four minutes total.

Thank you so much.

Like I said, my name is Esmeralda Aldai.

I am here representing the families that we support through M Schools, an organization that supports families and our schools to ensure that our learning spaces are safe and welcoming environments for students, regardless of their status.

So I'm gonna start with sharing direct testimonials from families that have been shared with me.

These are these have been shared in confidence through families that we've built trust with.

The majority of these uh moms are Spanish speaking, um, and they reside throughout the city of San Antonio.

We our offices are located in District 5, so we do heavily support families on the west side of San Antonio.

I'm gonna start uh with the first mom here.

Uh si ustedes have de alguna squella in Linia in la que puedo inscribir a mi niña con esto de immigration.

I'd like to ask if you know of any resources for online schooling for my uh for my daughter with all of this stuff happening with immigration.

We we have a lot of fear.

I want to take her completely out of school, but I don't want her to stay without um an education.

Second message Yo tango mucho miedo a la escuela oy no lo you are because public.

This one is recent.

I uh I am very afraid of taking my son to school.

I'm not gonna take him to school today.

Uh there's reports that ICE is in the area.

This is a family um that lives on the border of Balcones Heights and the San Antonio IST uh border.

A third message.

Uh I am very um uh perplexed about this uh this issue with our students in our schools.

I um I am afraid of sending my my child to school to this school.

And uh truly I'm not sure whether I should keep sending them or not.

I don't know what to do.

So what we're hearing here um is confusion, fear, uh what uh what are our guarantees of safety in in our schools, and this isn't just one school district that that we are speaking on behalf of or parents uh that attend several school districts across the city.

Last message here.

Travamos con miedo y incertidumbre and no saber que va passar, no nos vamos a rendir.

We work with fear and uh uh in certitude, not knowing what's gonna happen.

Of course, we're not going to give up.

The only thing that would completely tear us down is knowing that schools would no longer be safe places for our students.

And so these are messages that we've been hearing um over the course of you know, of I would say seven years.

I've been a public educator for 20 years.

I now work in the nonprofit sector.

I taught newcomers, middle school students for many years.

This is terror that I've heard from families uh throughout my my uh um my tenure as an educator, but never to this degree.

These are families that won't be here, that can't be here.

We also have educators that don't feel comfortable coming and speaking here just because of the um a fear of of retaliation and retribution um in a state like Texas.

These are the words of our families.

Um thank you for for your time.

Thank you for protecting our schools and our families.

I'm gonna ask if possible that Region 20 or that this the superintendents in the area come together and come up with a proactive plan so that we're not where Minneapolis is right now.

Thank you.

Abigail Stevens.

Abigail Stevens.

Let's study.

Followed by Debbie Benke and Vridiana Caezales.

Good afternoon, Mayor and City Council members.

My name is Abigail Stevens, and I'm a lifelong resident of San Antonio.

I'm here today because of my deep love for the city and the community that we've created.

I want to begin by reminding you all of something that is often forgotten about your positions.

You work for every single person that you see in front of you today.

What the public says here matters more than any pressure from the state and more than any so-called higher authority.

SV8 is being presented as something you must comply with.

Every system that causes harm is presented the exact same way.

Our federal government selectively ignores laws it finds inconvenient.

So don't you dare even say that this is about the law.

This obsession with your legality in the face of oppression will be the death of us.

The truth is you have a choice, and that choice demands an honest answer.

So think.

What is your purpose in your position?

Why are you in that seat?

Is it so that you can turn your back on all of us while ICE is terrorizing our community?

Is it so that you can keep your job while our neighbors get ripped out of theirs?

So I ask you, are your hands truly tied, or are you just choosing to turn away while ICE is tying up people's entire bodies?

Mayor, council, now is the time to choose.

Will you stand up for the people of San Antonio, or will you back down?

Compliance has never protected people.

It never has.

When SAPD is pulled into immigration enforcement, you do not create safety, you foster fear.

SAPD cannot protect or serve this community while having any cooperation with ICE.

You still have agency.

You can limit cooperation.

You can refuse to volunteer city resources for injustice.

We would not be the first city to do so, and we would not be the last.

During the civil rights era, cities and local officials chose resistance over compliance when state and federal mandates enforce discrimination.

Many other cities chose compliance on the grounds of following the law, and trust me, history judged them harshly for it.

History remembers choices and it will remember yours.

Debbie, Debbie Benke.

Debbie Benke.

Veridiana Carizales.

Kristen Colt Harp.

Kristen Colt Harp.

Claudia Torkelson.

Justice Martinez.

Followed by Janelle Ortega and Daniel Hattum.

Hello.

My name's Justice Martinez, as you just said.

Um, and I take pride in that name.

Specifically justice.

And what I see is a lot of injustice.

I see a lot of threats, a lot of discrimination, racism, all this BS that's happening right here.

Why is it that we have someone like in New York, Zoran Mandani, who has condemned ICE and is able to, as a mayor, as an elected mayor by his community, has said, hey, these people are threatening our citizens, our people, and it said, hey, I don't want them in my city.

Yet I have yet heard anything from you, Gina, a person who I voted for.

I'm a constituent here of District 9.

Did not vote for you, Misty, but I hope that you, after hearing all of these citizens, all these people who are voted citizens, we have a little bit of a change of mindset here.

We can stand against ICE, against tyranny, against fascism.

Right now, we have all these laws and stuff like that, and there is people more qualified than I who have spoken on the legality of this.

But I want to speak to you, human to human.

Every single one of you, our elected officials that are supposed to represent our city.

This is the power of the people.

Every single person who's come out here today, who stood forward, put their life on the line, because yes, our names on here.

Ice, I guarantee it does not give a fuck.

They do not care.

Right?

We are putting our lives on the line just to speak and voice our concerns.

I have 30 cops in my neighborhood.

Why are there 30 cop cars?

Don't know how many cops were in those cars.

Why are the 30 cop cars driving through my neighborhood at 11:30 p.m.

at night?

That's crazy.

That's insane.

We're not gonna allow this fascism to exist.

I ask you, every single one of you, to denounce this fascist regime to denounce ICE.

Thank you.

Janelle, Janelle Ortega, Janelle Ortega.

Daniel Hattum.

Daniel Hatum.

Okay.

Followed by Briar Barrera and then Ruben Arseniega.

Hello, my name is Daniel Hatoum, and I'm a civil rights attorney here in San Antonio.

But the thing I want to talk about tonight is not what I do for a living, but how inspired I have been today.

And the people who have come up here, while sometimes rough around the edges, I've also noticed there are others who are shaking like a leaf.

Nervous, but they stood up with courage in their hearts, doing what they didn't want to do because they knew they needed to defend their neighbors.

I know that that very courage not just exists in San Antonio, but on the city council as well.

And the reason that those folks were up here tonight is because we must be spurred into action after what has happened in our country.

And because there are steps that this city council can take to do so.

But first, we must be spurred to action.

After the killing of Nicole Renee Good, many folks are wondering who is next.

If one innocent life can be taken, when will another be taken?

The reality is that it's not just Nicole Renee Good, but it is many folks across the country who have been placed in immigration detention, whether lawful or not, who have lost their lives.

Last year was one of the deadliest years on record for ICE detention.

And in fact, just recently, in the East in the Camp East Montana facility, there was a death that a medical examiner ruled was a homicide as a result of the folks working in that ICE detention facility.

The people here tonight are here to try to stand up for their neighbors, neighbors that I have represented who are stuck in immigration detention, in illegal detention, because they don't want to see the same thing happen to them.

And this city council is not powerless to do anything about it.

Mayor Ortiz, at the beginning of today, you had asked questions about whether there were steps the city could take.

For example, something like telling folks their rights when SAPD is investigating someone for their immigration background.

And in fact, this is a policy that the city of Austin implemented, that they implemented in 2018, nearly eight years ago, and they haven't been enjoyed by 2017 SB4.

So, insofar as you're hearing that you're powerless to do something, those are statements you should push back against, and I'm happy to act as a resource to help you with that.

Briar Baretta.

Briar Baretta.

Ruben Arseniego.

Followed by Tim Wright and David Maldonado.

Thank you, Mayor and City Council.

Real quickly, for the most part, everything has been said.

I think I take great pride in our community and their ability to stand tall amidst the difficulties that we face.

But more importantly, I want to focus on not necessarily the activities or rather the actions that you will have to take once we exit this meeting, but also the idea that we're here to civically engage, protect, defend, and work with our communities, not necessarily just for the sake of immigration, but the sake of human rights.

But history will judge us correctly if in fact we decide to do the right thing.

Let's be honest with ourselves, it's not that hard.

Because if we do, if we decide to go forward in that step, understand there will be implications for our largely Latino majority minority community.

More importantly, there are people that are not able to be here today with us.

And even though that's a reality, that doesn't mean that they're not heard.

That's why we're here today to advocate and to speak to that.

And lastly, I'll say this it's not controversial, but more specifically to all the Latino men who advocate for ICE, who advocate for a racial injustice, who advocate for this prejudice that we call immigration policy, understand that you will be next too.

And there are some of those men I know standing in this hall today.

They must understand there will be no limits to this.

So whether you agree with me or not, I say this.

Please help defend our most vulnerable communities.

We believe that you can do it.

It won't be easy.

But in addition, we're with you.

So understand you have that support.

Now is not the time for cowards and people that don't have spines.

Thank you.

Tim Wright.

Tim Wright, followed by David Maldonado and then Mary Salcedo.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, uh, City Council, and I appreciate you taking the time to hear all of our voices.

But I wanted to highlight two uh major incidences.

One was 52 um migrants that were killed, uh left in the back of a semi-trailer here in San Antonio.

And that was due to uh illegal traffickers bringing those people in with no safeguards, and those people were all those are 52 deaths that happened right here.

And then also over the last four years, we've had 300,000 migrant children who have been gone missing and who have been trafficked.

And fortunately, fortunately, fortunately, the new administration has been to um just as last count two days ago has been able to recover 162,000.

ICE.

ICE and HSI has been able to recover, confirmed 167,000 of those missing children.

And all of you here on the city council and the mayor, you'd have taken oath to uphold the rule of law.

And in the United States, the rule of law is what separates us from civilization and from anarchy.

And anarchy.

And I would highly recommend, given the state of the open borders we had in the last four years and the unprecedented millions of illegal aliens that invaded the country.

That you not only do the bare minimum to partner with Plan B with Senate Bill B, and also 287.

And 287, that I would I would actually advocate order, order, order.

Please finish your sentence, sir.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah, because they interrupted my time.

Please finish your sentence.

Go ahead.

So I would recommend that you actually not only look to the bare minimum to cooperate with ICE and the federal government and the state with SAPD and the sheriff's office, but to try to go to think of ways to work with them and to make their job easier.

Thank you, sir.

And to help protect them.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

David Maldonado.

David Maldonado.

Followed by Mary Sauceto and then Zach Vigil Minyard.

Thank you.

I'm gonna talk a little fast because I was under the impression that we had three minutes.

Amidst all the other commenters, empirical data, I would like to use my time to address the council not only directly but personally.

District one, sit core.

Your pillars are infrastructure, public safety, parks, community centers, small businesses, and affordable housing in District One.

And you are not only aware but extremely vocal about how ICE affects your district, its constituents, and its community.

This is what we need more of.

District 2, Jalen McKee Rodriguez.

Pillars on equitable investment in our city's infrastructure, increased focus on social determinants of health, accountability, and transparency in city operations, and the reimagination of public safety to prevent crime.

You openly advocate in your re-election campaign to ensure that city maintains no contracts with ICE, and you also openly oppose migrant any migrant detention centers in District 2.

This is what we appreciate and need more of from the rest of your city council members.

District 3, Phyllis Viagrin, not here right now, but I wish you could hear me.

She was an elementary school teacher, then moved to the SAPD police force as a domestic violence advocate, moving to the tourism industry, and having more in between then and now to her to her role as a city member council.

And I don't mean to speak for her, but her resume clearly shows that San Antonio embodies her entire career.

You grew up in the Southside, and again, I don't mean to speak to you on your behalf even further, but my mom grew up in the south side of San Antonio.

So I know how proud Southside San Antonians can be.

I also know I also know that I could not find anywhere her stance on ICE.

I could not find anywhere her stance, whether for or against ICE.

I can only hope that you stand against them in tandem with your background.

But frankly, your lack of public disclosure on your stance, in tandem with your background, is extremely discouraging to that idea.

District 4, Edward Mungia, you pillar on advocating for residents to ensure better quality infrastructure projects, greater access to city services.

I'm gonna run through because I'm running out of time.

I'm sorry, but I would like to address Mark White specifically.

You support law enforcement openly, and while I have no problem with that, you cannot use that in tandem with supporting ICE.

ICE is not a respectable law enforcement entity.

In the 2025 San Antonio ICE protests, you called them distasteful openly and publicly.

What is so distasteful about a peaceful protest?

I I question further what you find so distasteful about a protest that openly condemns ICE raiding schools.

Your kids attend schools.

God forbid ICE decides that your schools are next.

God forbid that you so you can submit the rest of your comments for the record.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Mary Sasedo.

Mary Sacedo.

Zach Vigil Mineyard.

Followed by Noelle Sagapelli and Marissa Grimaldo.

Hello, my name is Zach V.

Hill Miniard from District One.

I am deeply sickened by the daily news of the continuous malpractice of ICE across America.

We all see the violence perpetrated on American citizens by these mass thugs.

We witness the constitutional and human right violations being recorded for the White House's propaganda on social media.

And we see our public leaders either cheer on this Gestapo or turn a blind eye to its atrocities.

SAPD's assistance in ICE raids is unacceptable.

These men and women who claim to protect and serve this community are aiding in the harassment and illegal detainment of its people.

Any assistance an SAPD gives to ICE deems them accomplices in these atrocities.

And if their defense is that they're just doing their job, I recommend seeking new employment.

I personally know people who have been wrongfully harassed by ICE.

I know teachers who have told me about their students whose parents and siblings have been taken from them.

And I ask, who is this benefiting?

How is this doing a service to San Antonio?

Our vice president has made it clear that ICE is above the law and will never have to answer for their atrocities.

I cannot think of anything worse for our city or our country than our pedophile president's lawless secret police conducting an ethnic cleansing in the gaze of making this country great again.

I also ask our elected leaders to push against the pressures of Abbott and Trump.

We the people are paying attention and we will remember who was here for us in these troubled times.

Thank you.

Noelle.

Noel Segapelli.

Marissa Grimaldo.

Followed by Juan Rivera and Diana Flores Uriegas.

I am tired of this show that conflates this meeting with public safety.

If this body was actually concerned about public safety, then Mark White would have his driver's license revoked.

If this meeting was about public safety, would we we would be calling for the immediate arrest of Renee Nicole Good's killer Jonathan Ross?

If this meeting was about public safety, we would pass legislation to ban masks on these terrorist thugs.

If this meeting was about safety, the mayor wouldn't capitulate to white supremacists in these chambers.

But this couldn't possibly be about safety because ICE is not compatible with public safety.

ICE directly opposes public safety.

ICE is a threat to our safety to all of us.

Their violence is indiscriminate, and ICE is incompatible with safety because ICE is state-sponsored terrorism.

And let's be clear, it's also not about trust or transparency.

It feels a little performative when council members White and Spears met with ICE officials last week before even hearing from their own constituents.

I mean, actually, between Mark's texting and snack breaks, he spent more time with ICE officials than with the residents of this city that he claims to represent.

And we urge council members to actually speak with organizers who have been boots on the ground for our immigrant siblings, and to stop acting like your hands are tied.

There are ways to honor the oaths that you took and protect your constituents.

You hear the people's opinions here today.

Well, at least the members that are present.

My council isn't present.

But it's the popular opinion of the people.

We demand no immunity for ICE, no collaboration with ICE.

Thank you.

Juan Juan Rivetta.

Followed by Diana Flores Uriegas and then Kevin Meislin.

Uh good evening.

I had good afternoon earlier.

Uh my name is Juan Rivera.

I'm in District 4.

I am asking today for us to prioritize dignity.

I was recently told by an educator in Edwin ISD that an ICE arrest happened outside an elementary campus next to a convenience store.

My statement is not about contesting federal authority, but to protect dignity.

The issue is when and where these actions happen, especially when they can occur right next to our schools and perhaps hospitals.

For safety of students and the dignity of families, I'm asking the city to explore creating protective zones around educational institutions as well as other locations of vulnerability.

Similar to other public safety buffer zones, the city already recognizes.

This would not interfere with federal law.

It would reflect our local values and our responsibility to protect to protect kids.

If this already exists, please make it public to assure students and families.

The Supreme Court has made clear in Pilar v.

Doe 1982 that undocumented students, all students, that all students have the right to an uninterrupted public education.

The city of San Antonio can help protect that promise by ensuring schools remain safe and stable and sorry.

And for at least in those moments, avoiding the distractions created by federal operations.

At the end of the day, protecting dignity, especially that of our children, should come first.

Thank you.

Diana Flores Uriegas.

Okay.

Kevin Meislin.

Kevin Meislin.

Kyle Sinclair.

Angel Garza.

Luzana Santibanes.

Sir, are you Angel Garza?

Okay.

Angel Garza, followed by Luzana Santibanes and then Erica Kiros.

Uh good evening, uh Mayor Gina Jones and City Council.

My name is Angel Garza.

I'm from District 3.

I'm a husband, father of three.

I'm a proud son of the late Teresa Lades Magarta.

I'm a local artist, creative, and a musician.

I'm here today to use my First Amendment right to help my neighbors and Tejanos, too scared to voice their concerns.

What I'm what I'm about to say is out of love and reverence for my city and beautiful people that call it home.

This year, a group of armed men composed of convicted felons and gross opportunists have made America's cities more unsafe and left a path of destruction and violence in their wake.

ICE under DHS disappeared, 622,000 people, been responsible for 30 plus deaths in their custodies, and have maimed and blinded citizens exercising their constitutional rights.

Sadly, our federal tax dollars pay for this bullshit.

It pays for this bullshit.

This tyrannical machine, but the local taxes pay for local law enforcement to protect and serve us.

Now an unlawful group is here.

You either be complicit in this historical shame and stand up and protect the laws of the people that you swore a north to.

But I can proudly say that I know what side of history I will be on.

I urge you to use to be strong and be a force actively that supports liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Please hold these lawbreakers accountable, protect our constitution, the United States for from all enemies, foreign and domestic.

I say rise up against this injustice and thank you and God bless.

Erica Kidos.

Followed by Kristen Hook and Anna Smitherman.

Hello.

I'm with the Coalition for Dignified Housing.

Uh, board member for HWRA and Cornelismo Brown Brays.

Um I'm just gonna read uh a quote that I had heard.

Um terrible things are happening outside.

Poor helpless people are being dragged outside of their homes.

Families are torn apart.

Men, women, and children are separated.

Children come home from school to find that their parents have disappeared.

Diary of Anne Frank, January 13th, 1943.

Today is January 22nd, 2026.

This is happening right now.

We are going backwards.

Just really think about that.

And um, I wanted to go against this with the police working with ICE.

I don't know, I know I don't have a lot of time, but um I have a lot more to say.

Um I think that's it for right now.

Thank you.

Jasmine Hereda, you can um submit the rest of your comments for the record if you'd like to do so.

Kristen Hook, followed by Anna Smitherman and Chris Koons.

Good evening, Mayor and Council members.

My name is Dr.

Kristen Hook.

Mi parasco cumena gringa, pero soy Media Latina.

I'm a Democrat running for US Congress in Texas's 21st congressional district, and I'm here to speak on behalf of the constituents that I hope to represent here in San Antonio.

I'm urging you to vote no on any measure that would have San Antonio police coordinate with ICE.

As a scientist, I'm reminded of the Stanford Prison Experiment.

In that study, students were given power as guards with little oversight, and it quickly turned into abuse, forcing the study to end early.

Not because they were evil, but because absolute power corrupts absolutely.

That lesson matters today.

ICE was created under the guise to keep our communities safe, but it has done anything but.

Who's this?

Hi, your name, please.

Erica Versalovic.

You're Erica.

Okay, got it.

The next person will be Leviathan Almonte, followed by Diana Huxic.

Go ahead, thanks.

My name is Erica Versolovic, and I am a proud resident of Beacon Hill and a constituent of District One.

I stand here today as a San Antonio community member pleading you to help protect those we love and who call your districts home.

I'm a volunteer at a nonprofit that combats food insecurity through garden-based learning and regular produce and food distribution.

This year we have seen children shown up, show up alone looking for food, their parents too afraid to come.

Those same children drop down and run at the sight of a white van for fear that it is ice.

Coming to the door to drop off food, a child said to me, knocks on the door, make my mom tremble in fear.

Instead, can you tap your fingers on the window like a song?

I talk to parents terrified each morning when their kids go to school increasingly close to keeping their children at home.

But as we have seen this past week on the West side with reports of ice going door to door, being home to is increasingly dangerous.

The people of this city of your districts are living in terror.

To allow any city resources to funnel into ICE operations is to fund violence and harm to your district members.

To do so in a city that already struggles to find sufficient city resources to fund basic city needs like functional infrastructure, food programs, essential health care, and keeping school doors open is absolutely unacceptable.

All of us here know that there is more that we can do to combat ICE's presence and protect the city.

We do not need to look far to see examples of protective actions as of others have mentioned.

Austin City Council passed its Freedom City policies that prevent the risk of ICE detain upon arrest for minor disdemeanors, requires officers to advise everyone of their basic rights, and for them to provide basic transparency for the ways that it assists ICE operations.

As a lifelong Texan, I know that the oppressive power of state politics can be overwhelmingly restraining.

But as San Antonians, we are also acutely aware of the power of collective care and the agency that can be found when we're willing to be scrappy, creative, persistent, and unyielding.

It is this work that I call you all to today.

Thank you.

Followed by Diana Huxek and then Lindsay Andrews.

Hello, my name is Leviathan Almonte, born and raised San Antonio.

South side San Antonio to represent.

Seeing that we have proof, visual proof, time and time again, even just testimonies from people that ICE is just unjust and unlawful and will kill anybody they see fit.

It doesn't matter what the law is.

They have proven time and time again they will not follow the law.

And it is discouraging and disgusting to go outside and see my neighborhoods becoming empty because nobody wants to go outside because they're too afraid that they are either going to get shot or deported, even though they have been living here for countless years.

And it is disgusting seeing that my high school was told I was told that my high school was going to be a part of another ICE raid.

For what?

They're just kids trying to learn.

What threat could they possibly pose?

Gang violence?

What gangs?

What proof?

It's your responsibility to keep us safe.

How is this?

How is collaborating with literal fascists safe?

And let me remind people that yes, it may be reminiscence of Nazi Germany, but America did it first because America would tear gas immigrants at the border, and it did not stop until the 70s.

Mexicans, Latino and Americans were being tear gassed.

They were being stripped, beaten, abused, and raped at the border, trying to get a better life in America.

And this is what they we did to them.

And we are doing it again today after we tried to end it back in the 70s.

All that asked is that we do not collaborate with ICE at all.

Thank you.

Diana Hucksack.

Diana Huxek.

Lindsay Andrews.

Soraya Centenno.

Isabel Herreta.

Hi, your name, please.

Okay, please come forward.

Followed by Isabel Herrera and Jonah Wilson Leos.

If I may have a little more time to try to translate in my speech in Spanish, if that's okay with you.

You'll have four minutes.

Thank you, appreciate it.

Thank you for having me here.

I appreciate all of your time.

When I was little, I used to get all excited when at my elementary school, police officers went to host a program call there.

It was to prevent children from the dangers of drugs.

I used to think it was admiral how the police officers fought crimes, how they were there to protect us.

I used to look up for them.

For me, law enforcement officers were meant to serve and protect the community around them.

No matter who they were, where they're from, where they were born, whom they're love, or what beliefs they had.

What's happening today in different states and cities may relate may raise that belief and admiration towards them?

If someone has an accident, if someone is extorted, if someone is being robbed, if someone is being raped, if someone is suffering domestic violence, which we already know is hard for victims to come forward.

Would call in the police mean destroying their daily lives in future?

Because now they would have to be worrying about being deported.

How many more families will get separated for a traffic stop?

Not for not for not having a criminal record, which most of them don't, but the reason of the traffic violations will be having no license, which is not even an option for them.

Because if they had the opportunity of acquiring one, they would.

Just like they actually paid car insurances, car registration taxes, and many more things required by law.

A family would get tear apart and destroyed for this.

Children will get traumatized for life.

The emotional damage that this is causing to human beings and to our community is unbearable.

When will the community be able to trust a police officer if they start cooperating with ICE?

When we people feel safe to ask for help if the help becomes a danger.

Hi, I'm Isabel, and I'm allocating my time to Ruby.

Okay, uh Ruby Jimenez, okay.

Followed by uh Jonah Wilson Leos and Choi Rocka.

You have four minutes.