Protest of Bay Area immigration crackdown met with apparent stun grenades at Coast Guard base

Tensions flared early Thursday as protesters tried to block federal
Border Patrol agents from entering a U.S. Coast Guard base near Oakland
that the Trump administration was staging as an operations hub for an
anticipated immigration crackdown on the Bay Area. 

One protester was injured shortly after sunrise as several federal law
enforcement vehicles, including one marked Border Patrol, passed through
the crowd stopping traffic onto the island. "Once we start, we won't
stop," one agent told the protesters blocking his vehicle. 

The chaos unfolded before President Donald Trump and Mayor Daniel Lurie
announced that Trump had called off a planned "federal deployment" in
San Francisco. It was not immediately clear whether a major federal
immigration operation would proceed, or whether federal agents will be
deployed in other Bay Area cities. 

During the fracas at the Coast Guard base, federal agents deployed
apparent flash-bang grenades to disperse the crowd and fired a pepper
round that struck a clergyman near the chin. The impact caked his face
and clothing in orange powder. 

The Rev. Jorge Bautista, pastor of the College Heights United Church of
Christ in San Mateo, said an agent shot him in the face with the
projectile from about 5 feet away. 

"I'm in a lot of pain," Bautista texted the Chronicle from an emergency
room in Oakland. "He clearly was aiming for the face." 

About 20 minutes after the apparent flash-bang grenades went off, a
second protester was injured when a vehicle trying to get through the
barrier ran over his foot. 

The protester, Matthew Leber, was part of a security team organized by
an interfaith group to protect demonstrators. He said the driver, who
was not in uniform, flashed a pass to indicate he had authorization to
cross over the bridge onto the island. 

"I asked him to back away," Leber said. "He was upset. He started to
move forward into the crowd, and he hit my foot. His vehicle was on my
foot for a good 20 to 30 seconds, and people were yelling at him to back
up." 

Leber said the driver eventually turned around.

Around 20 California Highway Patrol officers showed up at 12:30 p.m. to
the Coast Guard Bridge, where some 60 protesters remained, blocking
access. A few protesters approached the officers, yelling at them,
"We're not letting ICE in here." 

One California Highway Patrol Sergeant was overhead by a reporter
telling a colleague, "We don't want to make arrests if we don't have
to." 

At 2:10 p.m., 50 more CHP officers arrived. One of the protesters
clashed with the officers, and was forced to the ground. Following the
clash, protest organizers advised the protesters to disperse. "Don't end
up in a jail cell," one organizer said through a megaphone. 

The protesters were bracing for the arrival of more than 100 federal
agents, including from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, that the
Trump administration dispatched Wednesday to Coast Guard Base Alameda,
which is between that city and Oakland. Border Patrol is the law
enforcement arm of CBP. 

The group of several hundred protesters was blocking the intersection at
Dennison Street and Embarcadero in front of the Coast Guard Island
Bridge, holding up traffic for a long line of vehicles stretching back
along Embarcadero. It included many from religious communities. 

Laura Cheifetz, a reverend from San Francisco, condemned Border Patrol
using apparent flash-bang grenades to disperse the crowd. 

"They couldn't even wait five minutes to do what they did," Cheifetz
said. "It is a violation of the First Amendment, which we still respect,
even if the federal government does not." 

Around 9:30 a.m., Lurie announced that he had spoken to Trump in a
late-night phone call. "In that conversation, the president told me
clearly that he was calling off any plans for a federal deployment in
San Francisco," Lurie said in a statement. 

The crowd outside the Coast Guard base cautiously cheered at the news,
while continuing to march around the intersection. Some expressed
trepidation that the president could be trusted. 

"We'll believe it when we see it," said Rabbi Cat Zavis of Beyt Tikkun
Synagogue in Oakland. 

Trump wrote on social media soon after that he had decided to give Lurie
a chance to "turn" San Francisco around instead of following through
with his plans to "surge" San Francisco on Saturday. 

Federal officials had released few details about the scope of the
operation before Trump said he would pull back on it. A spokesperson for
the Department of Homeland Security had said it would target the "worst
of the worst criminal illegal aliens," but similar immigration
crackdowns in other cities around the nation have swept up many others
with no past convictions. 

The mobilization was seen as Trump making good on his repeated threats
of a federal incursion into the deep-blue Bay Area, which ramped up
after Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff on Oct. 10 called for Trump to deploy
the National Guard to the city as a crime-fighting force. 

The move was met with condemnation from local and state officials, who
urged protesters not to be baited by Trump into violence and vandalism.
In other cities such as Los Angeles and Chicago, Trump has responded to
protests over his immigration crackdowns by deploying the National
Guard. 

San Francisco has long struggled with drug dealing and disorderly
behavior on its streets, but its homicide rate is on track to be the
lowest since the 1950s. The National Guard cannot legally fight crime,
and city officials have threatened to sue to block any such deployment.
Border Patrol agents, however, can make arrests and enforce immigration
violations. 

As a wave of anxiety and fear swept the Bay Area, the scene outside a
Home Depot in Oakland was calm early Thursday. Only a few day laborers
sipped their morning coffee and ate breakfast. Others who might have
come to find work stayed home, one man said. 

"I'm nervous, but I need to work," said a 26-year-old man from Oakland,
who declined to give his name. 

https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/federal-immigration-action-op
eration-protest-21115746.php