San Diego leaders are expressing concern over how President Donald Trump’s immigration raids could impact places like hotels and restaurants during the region’s peak tourism season, as employees say they’re afraid to go to work with arrests on the rise. Samara Talavera watched Thursday as federal agents in plain clothes arrested her friend and coworker Brenda Valencia outside the Handlery Hotel in Mission Valley, an incident that was caught on video. Both Talavera and Valencia are housekeepers at the hotel and were arriving for their shift.
Stream San Diego News for free, 24/7, wherever you are with NBC 7. WATCH HERE WATCH HERE “I feel a lot of frustration because I couldn’t help her,” Talavera said Monday. “I couldn’t do nothing to help her, and she was screaming for help, and I couldn’t do nothing.” “My coworkers, I talked yesterday to some of them, and they said they don't feel safe anymore.
They feel scared,” she continued. “They don't even want to come to work, and they don't want to come to work because they're scared.” Get top local San Diego stories delivered to you every morning with our News Headlines newsletter. SIGN UP SIGN UP New video of an immigration arrest in the parking lot of a Mission Valley hotel is raising major questions, as the federal agents are seen wearing plain clothes.
NBC 7's Shelby Bremer has the latest. “A lot of people are scared now to go to work, even if they, like, have a green card or they're U.S. citizens,” said Karen Betancourt of the hotel workers’ union. “They don't know what to do, and Fourth of July is coming.
There's going to be a lot of people, a lot of work. So the question is, is people are going to be out there celebrating or not because of what's going on? They don't want to be out in the streets.” Betancourt said many of her members cross the U.S.-Mexico border every day to work in San Diego and are worried about being stopped as they cross or detained during a workplace enforcement operation.
“I think it's really striking to the core of who San Diego is,” said City Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera. “We are a border community. We are a community with immigrants and refugees.” Elo-Rivera said the video of agents arresting Valencia, who has an 11-year-old son, was deeply upsetting, calling the sound of her screams “a gut punch.” “Part of those cries were the cries of a mother who is fearing that she's not going to see her child anymore, and that is, that should be traumatizing to everyone,” Elo-Rivera said.
He said if he owned a hotel or business now, he would consider posting signage notifying federal immigration agents they would not be granted access without a warrant signed by a judge. Six Republican California legislators on Monday made public a letter they sent to Trump last week, asking him to direct Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Department of Homeland Security to "focus their enforcement operations on criminal immigrants, and when possible to avoid the kinds of sweeping raids that instill fear and disrupt the workplace." "We have heard from employers in our districts that recent ICE raids are not only targeting undocumented workers, but also creating widespread fear among other employees, including those with legal immigration status," the letter reads.
"This fear is driving vital workers out of critical industries, taking California’s affordability crisis and making it even worse for our constituents." The letter was signed by two San Diego County lawmakers: Senate Minority Leader Brian Jones and Assembly Member Laurie Davis, who represented the 74th District. They also asked Trump to "modernize" the immigration process to "allow non-criminal undocumented immigrants with longstanding ties to our communities a path toward legal status."
Elo-Rivera highlighted the significance of labor done by immigrants across several sectors in San Diego and beyond. “I think this is the secret that many of us have known for a long time, which is California, this country, does not work without immigrants and refugees, and that means people who have various documentation statuses,” Elo-Rivera said. “Not just tourism, but restaurants and many other industries as well that rely on very, very hardworking people doing jobs that many citizens do not want to do, do not apply to do and have shown no interest for doing for a very long time,” he added.
Talavera said she can hardly concentrate at work and wakes up at night thinking of Valencia. She said their coworkers have no idea what’s next – and little control. “Even if I'm scared, I have to work.
We have to eat. We have to pay rent. We have to pay bills, and we have no choice,” Talavera said.
“So we have to be here, even if I don't want to.” Valencia was released on an ankle monitor, and the hotel workers’ union has arranged for her to meet with an attorney this week as her immigration case continues.
