Bay Area activists are planning peaceful protests over the deployment of federal agents sent to begin immigration operations in San Francisco.

Bay Area activists are planning peaceful protests over the deployment.

Thousands of people logged onto Zoom Wednesday night for a call to action titled – Stay Out of the Bay. The group Bay Resistance is organizing a rally and march for Thursday in San Francisco to push back ON the presence of Border Patrol agents in the region.

We spoke with Bill Hing, Professor of Law and Migration Studies at USF, about the heightened fear among the immigrant community.

“I’ll be honest with you, many of my students are going to neighborhoods, and Home Depot parking lots and handing out information, we’ve done know your rights presentations at car washes and schools,” Hing said.

ABC7 asked Hing about the difference between Border Patrol and ICE.

“The Border Patrol and ICE agents can arrest people if they have good reason to believe the person is undocumented,” Hing said.

The Trump Administration has already sent federal law enforcement to Portland, Chicago, and Los Angeles.

“The way I would describe it is a combination of fear, and a combination of hope that something different will happen, but honestly, I think things are going to get worse in the Bay Area before it gets better,” Hing said.

ABC7 News spoke with Gabriel Medina, Executive Director of La Raza Community Resource Center.

“We’ve been holding the line for power, not panic, for a long time but I think the threats and the messaging changed in the sense that we’re advising everyone to stay home tomorrow,” Medina said.

In the South Bay, ABC7 News spoke to Huy Tran, executive director of the nonprofit SIREN, who said regardless of which federal agency is deployed in the Bay Area – they want to make their discontent known.

“Protest is most powerful when it stays peaceful,” Tran said. He went on to say, “When violence breaks out, they are going to hyper focus on that one incident and they’re going to say this is the justification to now send in National Guard troops.”

Along with a protest Thursday evening, Bay Resistance is organizing an afternoon rally in San Francisco with a coalition of community groups.