*This article first appeared on SFGATE
Federal law enforcement officials fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters Thursday during a large immigration raid in Ventura County at one of California’s largest and most notable cannabis farms, according to a local mayor at the scene.
The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid occurred in the town of Camarillo at Glass House Farms’ greenhouse facility, which is one of the largest cannabis cultivation facilities in the state.
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Federal officers created a barricade on Laguna Road, a few miles south of Camarillo Airport, Thursday morning and blocked access to the site as protesters gathered at the scene, according to Oxnard Mayor Luis McArthur, who told SFGATE in a phone call that more than 500 protesters were at the scene. He said federal agents eventually fired tear gas and rubber bullets at the crowd.
The Ventura Fire Department took three people to area hospitals and currently has units stationed at the scene to provide assistance, according to Andrew Dowd, a spokesperson for the department.
“That number may change as this incident progresses,” Dowd told SFGATE by phone. “We’ve set up medical receiving points at the incident so that patients can be treated and transported as needed.”
Dowd said he did not know if the injured people were workers at the cannabis farm or protesters, but said the department is committed to providing support to any injured person.
“Immigration status is never a factor in the care we provide patients,” Dowd said. “We don’t ask for nor report any of that information.”
Glass House confirmed that it was visited by ICE officials Thursday and “fully complied with agent search warrants” in a post to X. The company did not return an SFGATE request for further comment. ICE officials had previously tried to raid the farm in June but the farm’s owners denied the agents access to their private property, according to the Los Angeles Times.
ICE has increased its armed raids across California’s coastal and agricultural communities in recent months as part of President Donald Trump’s pledge to conduct mass deportations of undocumented people. Sarah Saldaña, a former ICE director, told the New York Times that the agency is likely making mistakes that are “very concerning” as they conduct the massive raids. Republicans in Congress recently gave an additional $175 billion in funding for immigration enforcement, including $75 billion in extra funding for ICE, making it the most well-funded federal law enforcement agency, according to CBS News.
McArthur said that ICE raids have been terrorizing his community and breaking up families by suddenly deporting people without any due process, including people who have been in the country for decades.
“Families are being broken up,” McArthur said. “The breadwinner has been deported expeditiously and when this administration is calling that a win, the burden of having to support the family falls upon a mother or a teen who is forced to be that breadwinner. That’s causing trauma.”
