Today, the Trump administration deployed over 100 federal agents to the Bay Area, using the Coast Guard Base Alameda as their base for an immigration enforcement operation.
There is no specific timeline for when federal agents will arrive.
San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie held a public address today reiterating that San Francisco does not need federal law enforcement to improve the city and that immigrants contribute to its betterment.
“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, sending the military to San Francisco will not help our city or country,” Lurie said.
In this public address, Lurie disapproved of immigration officers promoting aggression and the use of the National Guard’s force.
“These tactics are designed to incite backlash, chaos and violence, which are then used as an excuse to deploy military personnel,” Lurie said. “They are intentionally creating a dangerous situation in the name of public safety. And while we cannot control the federal government, here in San Francisco, we define who we are. We stick to our values.”
On Tuesday, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors questioned Lurie about his plan to keep residents safe from Immigration and Customs Enforcement. His response stated that crime rates have been lower this year than in any previous year. Within Lurie’s first four months in office, overall crime was down 28% year over year, according to SF.gov.
“This scenario has become increasingly and terrifyingly more real for thousands of our constituents over the past six days,” said District 9 Supervisor Jackie Fielder.
San Francisco and California politicians have pushed back against the possibility of the National Guard and ICE coming to the Bay Area after President Donald Trump urged their deployment earlier this month.
This possibility has since sparked controversy between the city’s local officials and Trump’s administration, particularly since he deployed the guards in Portland, Oregon. In response to Trump, Lurie and Gov. Gavin Newsom said that San Francisco’s law enforcement can handle public safety without the integration of federal law enforcement.
Trump appeared in an interview on FOX News’ “Sunday Morning Futures,” where he discussed deployment of the National Guard to Chicago, Illinois, and how San Francisco was next, along with other blue cities like Los Angeles, as a part of his crackdown on crime, public safety and immigration enforcement.
“We’re going to San Francisco and we’ll make it great,” Trump said on Sunday. “It’ll be great again. San Francisco is a great city. It won’t be great if it keeps going like this. We’re gonna go to San Francisco. The difference is they want us in San Francisco.”
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff initially showed his admiration for Trump and stated that he was in favor of deploying the National Guard to San Francisco in an interview with the New York Times on Oct. 10. An apology from Benioff on X shortly followed this on Friday.
“Having listened closely to my fellow San Franciscans and our local officials, and after the largest and safest Dreamforce in our history, I do not believe the National Guard is needed to address safety in San Francisco,” Benioff said. “My earlier comment came from an abundance of caution around the event, and I sincerely apologize for the concern it caused.”
Lurie urged that when the National Guard and ICE are deployed to San Francisco, residents continue to protest peacefully and San Franciscans continue to protect one another in every way possible, make their voices heard peacefully and support each other.
“We support our community the way we always have by doing these three things first: we are going to protect any San Franciscan in any way possible, second, we are going to make our voices heard peacefully,” Lurie said. “We have already seen this federal administration deploy cruel, un-American tactics to target immigrant communities in our city. Finally, we’re going to support each other.”