U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna stood outside of Levi\u2019s Stadium on Sunday as thousands of football fans streamed inside the venue. <\/p>\n
The congressman wasn\u2019t there to cheer on his favorite team. He had stopped by to send a message: Federal immigration agents were not welcome at the Super Bowl. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis is my district and this is a time for elected leaders to be outside with people,\u201d said Khanna (D-Fremont). \u201cI\u2019ve communicated to the NFL and to the administration to keep ICE out, but I think physically being here in the community makes a big difference.\u201d<\/p>\n
At a news conference earlier this month, NFL chief security officer Cathy Lanier said she was confident that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents would not conduct operations at the Super Bowl. But Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem previously confirmed that ICE would be present. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll be all over that place,\u201d she told Benny Johnson,<\/a> a right-wing podcaster, in October. \u201cWe\u2019re going to enforce the law.\u201d<\/p>\n Khanna said his office had been flooded with calls and emails as the mixed messaging left many local residents fearful. He kept his district office open Sunday in case constituents had run-ins with ICE and needed assistance. <\/p>\n As of 2 p.m., there hadn\u2019t been any reports. <\/p>\n Khanna was among 21 Democrats in Congress, including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who sent a joint letter<\/a> to Noem last week voicing opposition to immigration raids at the Super Bowl. <\/p>\n \u201cThis should be a moment of celebration, unity, and economic opportunity, not a flashpoint for fear, polarization, and violence,\u201d the lawmakers wrote. \u201cHaving ICE at the Super Bowl would undermine public safety, disrupt communities, and threaten the peaceful enjoyment this event should bring to the region and the nation.\u201d<\/p>\n Khanna wasn\u2019t the only speaking out against ICE on Sunday.<\/p>\n A handful of activists, including Shasti Conrad and Michael Ceraso, passed out rally towels with the words \u201cICE OUT\u201d emblazoned on one side and a picture of a rabbit kicking a football enclosed in an ice cube on the other. The rabbit was inspired by halftime performer Bad Bunny, who has spoken out about the administration\u2019s immigration raids, including at the Grammy Awards<\/a>. Trump has called Bad Bunny \u201ca terrible choice\u201d for halftime performer.<\/p>\n \u201cMy heart told me to do it,\u201d said Ceraso, explaining that he felt called to speak up for others currently living in fear.<\/p>\n Conrad wasn\u2019t initially sure how football fans would react but said most people eagerly accepted a towel. \u201cWe have had overwhelming support,\u201d she said, adding that most of the thousands of towels were gone by the early afternoon. <\/p>\n Others used music to get their message across. At one point, a song disparaging Noem and serving as an anti-ICE anthem that\u2019s been widely circulated on social media, could be heard coming from a crowd gathered outside the stadium. <\/p>\n The Trump administration\u2019s immigration raids, often conducted by masked agents<\/a> in unmarked cars, have come under fire due to aggressive, and some argue unconstitutional, tactics \u2014 such as allegedly using children as bait <\/a>or forcibly entering homes without a judicial warrant. The recent fatal shootings of U.S. citizens Renee Good<\/a> and Alex Pretti<\/a> by federal immigration officers in Minnesota sparked further fear and backlash. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna stood outside of Levi\u2019s Stadium on Sunday as thousands of football fans streamed inside…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169870,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2672,7,9,8,7289,32890,8684,71738,2871,14,34960,4446,81492,81485,11466,21670,776,11730],"class_list":["post-169869","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-administration","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-congressman","tag-fear","tag-federal-immigration-agent","tag-football-fan","tag-ice","tag-immigration","tag-khanna","tag-message","tag-rabbit","tag-shasti-conrad","tag-sign","tag-stadium","tag-sunday","tag-super-bowl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169869"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169869\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169869"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}