Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass on Friday announced a plan that would distribute a “couple hundred” dollars to people who have been affected by the Trump administration‘s immigration raids.
“You have people who don’t want to leave their homes, who are not going to work, and they are in need of cash,” she said during a news conference announcing the direct assistance.
The Democratic mayor announced the money, which should be available in about a week, would not be coming from the city but instead its philanthropic partners like the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles.
It wasn’t clear what the qualifications would be to get the money, though it’s been compared to the “Angeleno Cards,” which were given out in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic to residents who were struggling. More than 60,000 people benefited from the Angelino Cards. Those who donated included Snapchat co-founders Bobby Murphy and his wife, Kelsey Bateman, CEO Evan Spiegel and his wife, supermodel Miranda Kerr, musicians Jonas Brothers, and producer Steve Tisch, to name a few.
Friday’s announcement about the new funds came during a news conference in which Bass announced she signed an executive order directing all city departments to “bolster protocols” and training to comply with the city’s sanctuary policy. The policy prohibits city employees from taking part in any investigation, detention, hold, transfer, or arrest of anyone for the purpose of immigration enforcement, except in serious crimes. It also prohibits any of these from taking place on city property.
Two weeks ago, the Trump administration sued Los Angeles over its sanctuary policies that limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement, claiming that they led to “lawlessness” when demonstrators took to the streets of Los Angeles last month to protest Trump’s mass deportation plans. The lawsuit also argued that the city’s stance was discriminatory against the administration’s immigration policies.
The executive order Bass signed on Friday also includes a directive to file Freedom of Information Act requests for Immigration and Customs Enforcement to turn over records with the dates and locations of every raid in the city since June 6. This includes dates, locations, names of those detained, the timing of their arrests, and the stated reasons for their detention.
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More than 1.35 million immigrants live in the Los Angeles area, making up more than 34% of the city’s population. Of those, about 10% are illegal immigrants.
“More than one out of three people who live in Los Angeles, including my own parents, are immigrants,” Los Angeles Council member Hugo Soto-Martinez said. “One in ten are undocumented. We refuse to stand by and let Donald Trump deport our neighbors, family, friends, and coworkers.”
