A day outside an LA detention center shows profound impact of ICE raids on families

LOS ANGELES (AP) — At a federal immigration building in downtown Los Angeles guarded by U.S. Marines, daughters, sons, aunts, nieces and others make their way to an underground garage and line up at a door with a buzzer at the end of a dirty, dark stairwell.

It’s here where families, some with lawyers, come to find their loved ones after they’ve been arrested by federal immigration agents.

For immigrants without legal status who are detained in this part of Southern California, their first stop is the Immigration and Customs Enforcement processing center in the basement of the federal building. Officers verify their identity and obtain their biometrics before transferring them to detention facilities. Upstairs, immigrants line up around the block for other services, including for green cards and asylum applications.

On a recent day, dozens of people arrived with medication, clothing and hope of seeing their loved one, if only briefly. After hours of waiting, many were turned away with no news, not even confirmation that their relative was inside. Some relayed reports of horrific conditions inside, including inmates who are so thirsty that they have been drinking from the toilets. ICE did not respond to emailed requests for comment.

Just two weeks ago, protesters marched around the federal complex following aggressive raids in Los Angeles that began June 6 and have not stopped. Scrawled expletives about President Donald Trump still mark the complex's walls.

Those arrested are from a variety of countries, including Mexico, Guatemala, India, Iran, China and Laos. About a third of the county's 10 million residents are foreign-born.

Many families learned about the arrests from videos circulating on social media showing masked officers in parking lots at Home Depots, at car washes and in front of taco stands.

Around 8 a.m., when attorney visits begin, a few lawyers buzz the basement door called “B-18” as families wait anxiously outside to hear any inkling of information.

Christina Jimenez and her cousin arrive to check if her 61-year-old stepfather is inside.

Her family had prepared for the possibility of this happening to the day laborer who would wait to be hired outside a Home Depot in the LA suburb of Hawthorne. They began sharing locations when the raids intensified. They told him that if he were detained, he should stay silent and follow instructions.

Jimenez had urged him to stop working, or at least avoid certain areas as raids increased. But he was stubborn and “always hustled.”

“He could be sick and he’s still trying to make it out to work,” Jimenez said.

After learning of his arrest, she looked him up online on the ICE Detainee Locator but couldn't find him. She tried calling ICE to no avail.

Two days later, her phone pinged with his location downtown.

“My mom’s in shock,” Jimenez said. “She goes from being very angry to crying, same with my sister.”

Jimenez says his name into the intercom – Mario Alberto Del Cid Solares. After a brief wait, she is told yes, he’s there.

She and her cousin breathe a sigh of relief — but their questions remain.

Her biggest fear is that instead of being sent to his homeland of Guatemala, he will be deported to another country, something the Supreme Court recently ruled was allowed.

By mid-morning, Estrella Rosas and her mother have come looking for her sister, Andrea Velez, a U.S. citizen. A day earlier, they saw Velez being detained after they dropped her off at her marketing job at a shoe company downtown.

“My mom told me to call 911 because someone was kidnapping her,” Rosas said.

Stuck on a one-way street, they had to circle the block. By the time they got back, she says they saw Velez in handcuffs being put into a car without license plates.

Velez’s family believes she was targeted for looking Hispanic and standing near a tamale stand.

Rosas has her sister's passport and U.S. birth certificate, but learns she is not there. They find her next door in a federal detention center. She was accused of obstructing immigration officers, which the family denies, but is released the next day.

About 20 people are now outside. Some have found cardboard to sit on after waiting hours.

One family comforts a woman who is crying softly in the stairwell.

Then the door opens, and a group of lawyers emerge. Families rush to ask if the attorneys could help them.

Kim Carver, a lawyer with the Trans Latino Coalition, says she planned to see her client, a transgender Honduran woman, but she was transferred to a facility in Texas at 6:30 that morning.

Carver accompanied her less than a week ago for an immigration interview and the asylum officer told her she had a credible case. Then ICE officers walked in and detained her.

“Since then, it’s been just a chase trying to find her,” she says.

As more people arrive, the group begins sharing information. One person explains the all-important “A-number,” the registration number given to every detainee, which is needed before an attorney can help.

They exchange tips like how to add money to an account for phone calls. One woman says $20 lasted three or four calls for her.

Mayra Segura is looking for her uncle after his frozen popsicle cart was abandoned in the middle of the sidewalk in Culver City.

“They couldn’t find him in the system,” she says.

Another lawyer, visibly frustrated, comes out the door. She’s carrying bags of clothes, snacks, Tylenol, and water that she says she wasn’t allowed to give to her client, even though he says he had been given only one water bottle over the past two days.

The line stretches outside the stairwell into the sun. A man leaves and returns with water for everyone.

Nearly an hour after family visitations are supposed to begin, people are finally allowed in.

Still wearing hospital scrubs from work, Jasmin Camacho Picazo comes to see her husband again.

She brought a sweater because he had told her he was cold, and his back injury was aggravated from sleeping on the ground.

“He mentioned this morning (that) people were drinking from the restroom toilet water,” Picazo says.

On her phone, she shows footage of his car left on the side of the road after his arrest. The window was smashed and the keys were still in the ignition.

“I can’t stop crying,” Picazo says.

Her son keeps asking: “Is Papa going to pick me up from school?”

More than five hours after Jimenez and her cousin arrive, they see her stepfather.

“He was sad and he’s scared,” says Jimenez afterwards. “We tried to reassure him as much as possible.”

She wrote down her phone number, which he had not memorized, so he could call her.

More people arrive as others are let in.

Yadira Almadaz comes out crying after seeing her niece’s boyfriend for only five minutes. She says he was in the same clothes he was wearing when he was detained a week ago at an asylum appointment in the city of Tustin. He told her he'd only been given cookies and chips to eat each day.

“It breaks my heart seeing a young man cry because he’s hungry and thirsty,” she says.

Four minutes before visitation time is supposed to end, an ICE officer opens the door and announces it's over.

One woman snaps at him in frustration. The officer tells her he would get in trouble if he helped her past 4 p.m.

More than 20 people are still waiting in line. Some trickle out. Others linger, staring at the door in disbelief.

People line up outside the Los Angeles Federal Building in Los Angeles, housing the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

People line up outside the Los Angeles Federal Building in Los Angeles, housing the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Civil Rights Attorney Luis Carrillo, left, stands with clients, Margarita Flores, second from right, and her daughter, Estrella Rosas, far right, outside the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility looking to find her daughter, Andrea Velez, a U.S. citizen who was detained by federal agents in an immigration raid downtown Los Angeles, on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Som Xin, originally from Laos, holds a part number number provided by phone by her detained boyfriend, as she inquires about his whereabouts outside the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility looking to find him in Los Angeles on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Anita Neri Lozano holds a picture of her detained husband, Ambrosio Enrique Lozano, an ice-cream vendor detained in Culver City, Calif., as she stands outside the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility looking to visit him in Los Angeles, on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Som Xin, originally from Laos, inquires about hiring immigration Attorney Kim Carver as she exits the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility, while trying to find her boyfriend's location after he was detained by federal agents in Los Angeles, on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Family members wait outside the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility looking to find their family members detained by federal agents in Los Angeles, on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Yadira Almaraz, originally from Managua, Nicaragua, cries outside the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility after visiting a young family member detained by federal agents in Los Angeles, on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Som Xin, originally from Laos, stands outside the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility looking to find a family member detained by federal agents in Los Angeles on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

U.S. citizen Christina Jimenez looks for her step father originally from Guatemala, who was detained by federal agents, outside the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility in Los Angeles, on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Margarita Velez, mother of Andrea Velez, a U.S. citizen of South L.A, holds to her daughter's current U.S. passport, and her Mexican passport, as she looks for her location, after ICE agents detained Andrea Velez during an immigration raid in downtown, outside the Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

U.S. citizen Christina Jimenez, right, waits for news about her step father originally from Guatemala, who was detained by federal agents, outside the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility in Los Angeles, on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

Margarita Velez, mother of Andrea Velez, 32, a U.S. citizen of South L.A, pictured on her current U.S. passport, is joined by her younger, daughter, Estrella Rosas, 17, left, looking for her location after ICE agents detained Andrea Velez during an immigration raid in downtown, outside the Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

A teenage boy shows a social media post showing the arrest of his father by federal agents, as he stands outside the ICE Los Angeles Staging Facility looking for the location of his father in Los Angeles on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

People line up outside the Los Angeles Federal Building in Los Angeles, housing the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

People line up outside the Los Angeles Federal Building in Los Angeles, housing the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

People line up outside the Los Angeles Federal Building in Los Angeles, housing the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on Wednesday, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

U.S. forces have boarded another oil tanker in the Caribbean Sea. The announcement was made Friday by the U.S. military. The Trump administration has been targeting sanctioned tankers traveling to and from Venezuela.

The pre-dawn action was carried out by U.S. Marines and Navy, taking part in the monthslong buildup of forces in the Caribbean, according to U.S. Southern Command, which declared “there is no safe haven for criminals” as it announced the seizure of the vessel called the Olina.

Navy officials couldn’t immediately provide details about whether the Coast Guard was part of the force that took control of the vessel as has been the case in the previous seizures. A spokesperson for the U.S. Coast Guard said there was no immediate comment on the seizure.

The Olina is the fifth tanker that has been seized by U.S. forces as part of a broader effort by Trump’s administration to control the distribution of Venezuela’s oil products globally following the U.S. ouster of President Nicolás Maduro in a surprise nighttime raid.

The latest:

Richard Grenell, president of the Kennedy Center, says a documentary film about first lady Melania Trump will make its premiere later this month, posting a trailer on X.

As the Trumps prepared to return to the White House last year, Amazon Prime Video announced a year ago that it had obtained exclusive licensing rights for a streaming and theatrical release directed by Brett Ratner.

Melania Trump also released a self-titled memoir in late 2024.

Some artists have canceled scheduled Kennedy Center performances after a newly installed board voted to add President Donald Trump’s to the facility, prompting Grenell to accuse the performers of making their decisions because of politics.

Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum says that she has asked her foreign affairs secretary to reach out directly to U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio or Trump regarding comments by the American leader that the U.S. cold begin ground attacks against drug cartels.

In a wide-ranging interview with Fox News aired Thursday night, Trump said, “We’ve knocked out 97% of the drugs coming in by water and we are going to start now hitting land, with regard to the cartels. The cartels are running Mexico. It’s very sad to watch.”

As she has on previous occasions, Sheinbaum downplayed the remarks, saying “it is part of his way of communicating.” She said she asked her Foreign Affairs Secretary Juan Ramón de la Fuente to strengthen coordination with the U.S.

Sheinbaum has repeatedly rebuffed Trump’s offer to send U.S. troops after Mexican drug cartels. She emphasizes that there will be no violation of Mexico’s sovereignty, but the two governments will continue to collaborate closely.

Analysts do not see a U.S. incursion in Mexico as a real possibility, in part because Sheinbaum’s administration has been doing nearly everything Trump has asked and Mexico is a critical trade partner.

Trump says he wants to secure $100 billion to remake Venezuela’s oil infrastructure, a lofty goal going into a 2:30 meeting on Friday with executives from leading oil companies. His plan rides on oil producers being comfortable in making commitments in a country plagued by instability, inflation and uncertainty.

The president has said that the U.S. will control distribution worldwide of Venezuela’s oil and will share some of the proceeds with the country’s population from accounts that it controls.

“At least 100 Billion Dollars will be invested by BIG OIL, all of whom I will be meeting with today at The White House,” Trump said Friday in a pre-dawn social media post.

Trump is banking on the idea that he can tap more of Venezuela’s petroleum reserves to keep oil prices and gasoline costs low.

At a time when many Americans are concerned about affordability, the incursion in Venezuela melds Trump’s assertive use of presidential powers with an optical spectacle meant to convince Americans that he can bring down energy prices.

Trump is expected to meet with oil executives at the White House on Friday.

He hopes to secure $100 billion in investments to revive Venezuela’s oil industry. The goal rides on the executives’ comfort with investing in a country facing instability and inflation.

Since a U.S. military raid captured former Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro on Saturday, Trump has said there’s a new opportunity to use the country’s oil to keep gasoline prices low.

The full list of executives invited to the meeting has not been disclosed, but Chevron, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips are expected to attend.

Attorneys general in five Democratic-led states have filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s administration after it said it would freeze money for several public benefit programs.

The Trump administration has cited concerns about fraud in the programs designed to help low-income families and their children. California, Colorado, Minnesota, Illinois and New York states filed the lawsuit Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

The lawsuit asks the courts to order the administration to release the funds. The attorneys general have called the funding freeze an unconstitutional abuse of power.

Iran’s judiciary chief has vowed decisive punishment for protesters, signaling a coming crackdown against demonstrations.

Iranian state television reported the comments from Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei on Friday. They came after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei criticized Trump’s support for the protesters, calling Trump’s hands “stained with the blood of Iranians.”

The government has shut down the internet and is blocking international calls. State media has labeled the demonstrators as “terrorists.”

The protests began over Iran’s struggling economy and have become a significant challenge to the government. Violence has killed at least 50 people, and more than 2,270 have been detained.

Trump questions why a president’s party often loses in midterm elections and suggests voters “want, maybe a check or something”

Trump suggested voters want to check a president’s power and that’s why they often deliver wins for an opposing party in midterm elections, which he’s facing this year.

“There’s something down, deep psychologically with the voters that they want, maybe a check or something. I don’t know what it is, exactly,” he said.

He said that one would expect that after winning an election and having “a great, successful presidency, it would be an automatic win, but it’s never been a win.”

Hiring likely remained subdued last month as many companies have sought to avoid expanding their workforces, though the job gains may be enough to bring down the unemployment rate.

December’s jobs report, to be released Friday, is likely to show that employers added a modest 55,000 jobs, economists forecast. That figure would be below November’s 64,000 but an improvement after the economy lost jobs in October. The unemployment rate is expected to slip to 4.5%, according to data provider FactSet, from a four-year high of 4.6% in November.

The figures will be closely watched on Wall Street and in Washington because they will be the first clean readings on the labor market in three months. The government didn’t issue a report in October because of the six-week government shutdown, and November’s data was distorted by the closure, which lasted until Nov. 12.

FILE - President Donald Trump dances as he walks off stage after speaking to House Republican lawmakers during their annual policy retreat, Tuesday, Jan. 6, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)