Protesters Reject Trump’s Newest Crackdown on Democrat-led City
Residents of Charlotte, North Carolina, are rallying in opposition to the invasion of their city by federal immigration enforcement agents under President Donald Trump.
On Saturday, Homeland Security official Tricia McLaughlin announced that the Trump administration is “surging DHS law enforcement to Charlotte” in an operation dubbed “Charlotte’s Web.”
Agents conducted searches and arrests across the Democratic-led city, which is home to a significant immigrant population. Thus far, the operation has targeted local retail stores and a church. Many businesses closed down because, as a local bakery owner told The Charlotte Observer, “They’re not chasing criminals. They’re chasing anyone who looks, speaks like me, who has an accent like me, who looks like me.”
In one incident, agents detained a U.S. citizen—who had also been stopped previously by agents—after shattering the window of his truck.
In a statement, Charlotte’s mayor and other local officials said the operation was “causing unnecessary fear and uncertainty in our community as recent operations in other cities have resulted in people without criminal records being detained and violent protests being the result of unwarranted actions.”
Hundreds have peacefully protested the agents’ presence, with one major demonstration at a park in uptown Charlotte, and others at locations where Border Patrol agents were spotted.
“They’ve been doing terrible things in Chicago, and we’re not happy that they’re bringing it here to North Carolina,” one protester, who held a sign that read “Stop kidnapping our neighbors,” told the Observer.