Pasadena Mayor Victor Gordo took a break on a heat day, wiped his forehead and identified the Folgers espresso can within the nook of his workplace.
He’s informed the story many occasions, however felt it was price repeating, given latest occasions.
For years, Gordo’s dad and mom had been undocumented. They crossed the border from Zacatecas, Mexico, when he was a younger youngster, settled in Pasadena and raised their household. Gordo’s father was a dishwasher and prepare dinner; his mom was a seamstress in a manufacturing unit that was throughout from Metropolis Corridor. The household lived in a transformed storage.
“Beneath my dad and mom’ mattress was a Folgers espresso can, and in that may was money, an inventory of names and telephone numbers, copies of start certificates and identification playing cards,” stated Gordo, who was the oldest youngster and describes himself as a latchkey child.
“If my dad and mom didn’t come residence, I used to be to take that may and go knock on the neighbor’s home” and get assist, Gordo stated.
The can in his workplace isn’t the unique. It’s a reproduction, and a reminder.
Pasadena Mayor Victor Gordo is the son of immigrant dad and mom.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Instances)
With federal raids throughout Southern California, households and neighborhoods have been reeling. Folks have been afraid to go away the home following arrests at automobile washes, constructing provide facilities, eating places, the Garment District and avenue merchandising places.
Gordo is aware of how they really feel.
“We lived in concern, and that’s what’s so offensive about this, and painful, frankly,” he stated.
In Pasadena, Gordo stated, it hasn’t been clear whether or not the sweeps are being carried out by legit federal brokers or vigilantes. Their automobiles are unmarked. Their faces are shielded. Their uniforms don’t reply any questions.
In latest days, a person exited a car in Pasadena and pointed a gun at pedestrians earlier than rushing away, emergency lights flashing. At a bus cease, a number of males had been detained, a few of whom had been on their option to work on development websites within the post-fire rebuilding of Altadena, in accordance with Gordo.
And the town canceled some swimming and different leisure packages Saturday amid fears of elevated federal enforcement exercise. Gordo informed The Instances that masked males with weapons and vests had chased a number of males at Villa Parke.
“They’re creating unstable, harmful conditions,” Gordo informed me, saying he fears that bullets will fly by means of neighborhoods, or that police will arrive on scene and never know what’s what or who’s who.
Even folks with authorized standing are cautious, Gordo stated, as a result of a few of the raids seem like arbitrary and indiscriminate. As my colleague Rachel Uranga reported, the majority of these arrested within the first 10 days of June in Southern California had no felony information, regardless of Trump’s vow to reel in “the worst of the worst.”
“I’m carrying my passport with me,” Gordo stated.
Pasadena Mayor Victor Gordo exterior Metropolis Corridor in Pasadena.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Instances)
“The overreach is stigmatizing a whole swath of our society. Whether or not you look or sound like an immigrant, within the eyes of others, you’re robotically thought of an outsider, and that’s morally and legally improper.”
Gordo’s positions on immigration enforcement haven’t all the time gotten straight As from immigrant rights advocates. In 2017, L.A. Progressive stated Gordo’s espresso can story was compelling, however accused the then-councilman of waffling on a proposed metropolis ordinance prohibiting police contacts with immigration authorities.
The article stated Gordo was against native police “having contacts with ICE,” however stated on one event that he “favored an exception for dangerous guys.”
Gordo finally voted in favor of that ordinance, which handed unanimously, and informed me he feels now as he did then. The overwhelming majority of undocumented immigrants are right here to work exhausting and create alternatives for his or her households, he stated. Identical as his household. However there need to be penalties for “dangerous actors,” he added, and that’s a felony justice matter, not an immigration challenge.
“If the federal authorities or our personal police consider there’s somebody who has violated the legislation, they need to handle that challenge,” Gordo stated. “However they need to do it respecting the Structure of the US, and what the federal authorities is doing now could be lacking due course of.”
Additionally lacking, says Gordo, is any dialog about immigration reform that might serve the wants of employers and provides immigrants a pathway to creating even better contributions.
He recalled that when he was about 10, his household moved again to Mexico quickly as a part of the method of building authorized standing within the U.S., which was made doable underneath the Carter administration. His father is a U.S. citizen, as was his late mom. Gordo and a sibling turned attorneys; one other is a health care provider and yet one more is an educator.
Now, stated Gordo, there’s no path to legalization. There’s simply this hypocritical system in which there’s demand for immigrant labor in lots of industries, together with demonization of those very contributors.
Pablo Alvarado, a Pasadena resident and govt director of the Nationwide Day Laborer Organizing Community, informed me he’s had variations with Gordo through the years. However he thinks the occasions of the final month have prompted the mayor to extra totally embrace his immigrant identification.
“He’s stepping up to date and I’m very happy with what he’s doing,” stated Alvarado, who has joined Gordo at vigils and demonstrations. “It’s one factor to inform the story of the place you got here from, and one other factor to … confront the powers … behind these illegal ICE operations. … I believe he’s been fearless.”
Gordo informed me he visited the Metropolitan Detention Middle in downtown Los Angeles on June 18, with Rep. Judy Chu (D-Monterey Park) and state Sen. Sasha Renée Pérez (D-Alhambra), to examine on arrestees. They had been denied entry, however Gordo met a distraught girl from Pomona who was not being allowed to ship coronary heart medicine to her husband.
Gordo provided his companies as an lawyer and was allowed entry together with the girl. He stated he later discovered that the husband had been arrested throughout his lunch break on a landscaping job, had been within the nation 22 years with no arrest document and was within the technique of acquiring a inexperienced card.
Gordo stated that when he and the girl entered the detention middle, the husband and spouse had been separated by a glass partition.
“She was crying and shaking,” Gordo stated. “He was telling her it was all going to be okay. He was comforting her, and making an attempt to smile.”
The partition had a small opening. They couldn’t match their fingers by means of it, however Gordo watched as the pair hooked their pinky fingers.
“All she might muster was, ‘I informed you,’” Gordo stated. “‘I informed you to not go to work.’”
steve.lopez@latimes.com
