Detainees transported to facility in Texas after major enforcement action
by MARGARET KADIFA and GUSTAVO HERNANDEZ
June 5, 2025, 2:37 pm (MissionLocal.org)
Update: ICE on Friday provided a statement. See end.
More than 15 people were arrested Wednesday at an ICE field office in San Francisco — a move that has prompted widespread fear and confusion in the Bay Area.
Immigrations and Customs Enforcement undertook the action on Wednesday at an ICE field office at 630 Sansome Street, said Priya Patel, a supervising attorney with the California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice. The people who were arrested were members of three different families; they included at least four children, including one child who was three years old, said Patel.
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One of those families was a 25-year-old woman and her two children. The woman’s sister, who spoke under the pseudonym Yaneth at a press conference Thursday, said her sister had been complying with all ICE requirements when she was detained.
“The fact that they let this happen was wrong,” Yaneth said in Spanish, through an interpreter. “I’m asking for justice and for something to be done.”
When Yaneth’s sister was arested, she was wearing an ankle monitor, Yaneth said. This is a standard tool that ICE uses as an alternative to detention, often for recent arrivals. As people stay in the United States for longer and demonstrate that they will turn up to check-ins and hearings, they often have the ankle monitors removed—though this happens more slowly during Trump administrations, said Milli Atkinson, the Immigrant Legal Defense Program Director for the Justice and Diversity Center of the Bar Association of San Francisco.
Patel said that Yaneth’s sister and nieces were transferred to Dilley Immigration Processing Center, a for-profit detention center in Texas.
It was not immediately clear Thursday where the other two families were being held. All three families are believed to have spent Wednesday night at the ICE field office, Patel said.
A spokesperson for ICE hours ago said a statement would be ready shortly. This story will be updated if and when one is released.
News of arrests sparks uneasiness among city immigrants
Among both legal and undocumented immigrants, the brazen act sparked uneasiness and fear.
“I am afraid to go out on the street,” a man who asked to only go by his first name, Felipe, told Mission Local in Spanish, at the start of his shift as a server at a Mission area restaurant.
As he cleaned the front window of the restaurant, he said had come to San Francisco two years ago from Mexico to earn money to support his family. He said he was still working on paying back the cost of traveling to the United States.
“I’m afraid of getting caught,” he added. “To have them take me? I don’t want that. I’m still getting started. Getting here to the States cost lots of money and I owe lots. … I like it here. I came to work. I didn’t come to steal from anyone. I didn’t come to hit anyone. No, I came to work. The only thing I came here to do is to help my family.”
Some people nearby who have legal status said they weren’t concerned — “He who owes nothing fears nothing,” said a man waiting for the 14-Mission bus. Others, however, said news like ICE arrests complicates people’s ability to live their daily lives and even do things like get out of the home to go to the doctor.
A criminal defense attorney who works in San Mateo County said one of her clients was afraid to come to a previously scheduled court hearing Thursday because he had heard about arrests in San Francisco. (The defense attorney asked to remain anonymous to protect her clients.)
The three families had all voluntarily gone to the ICE field office on Wednesday. They were there either for regularly scheduled check-ins, or they were instructed, some at the last minute, to come to the ICE office, Patel said.
Generally, ICE requires check-ins to make sure people are showing up to court hearings, or meeting other requirements based on their legal standing, Atkinson said. Attending mandatory check-ins is often a precondition of supervised release, so failing to show up could result in an arrest.
The San Francisco mayor’s office said it had not been notified that any of the people who were arrested Wednesday were San Francisco residents.
These arrests followed ICE arrests last week at an immigration court in San Francisco, at 100 Montgomery St. Immigration attorneys and advocates told the San Francisco Standard they saw four arrests.
Those four people have since been moved to a detention center called the Golden State Annex in McFarland in Kern County, Atkinson said.
Their cases were moved to a detention court based in San Diego, she added.
ICE has not yet given any clear reasons why the agency detained the three families on Wednesday, Atkinson said. ICE confirmed Yaneth’s sister’s legal status had not changed, Patel said.
Immigration rights advocates, however, believe that ICE field offices are being pressured to increase deportations; President Donald Trump has called for “mass deportations” in the United States.
Said Atkinson: “Calling in people who they know will show up voluntarily is the easiest way for them to detain people.”
Update, Friday, June 6: A day after being contacted by Mission Local, ICE provided the following statement:
“Those arrested had executable final orders of removal by an immigration judge and had not complied with that order. If you are in the country illegally and a judge has ordered you to be removed, that is precisely what will happen. During the Biden administration, thousands of illegal aliens—including violent criminals—with final orders of removal were on ATD and allowed to roam our communities. This should never have been the case. Thanks to the leadership of Secretary Noem and President Trump, the proper policy is back in place.”
GUSTAVO HERNANDEZ
Gustavo Hernandez is a freelance photojournalist and videographer currently living in Excelsior District. He graduated in Fall 2024 with a double major in Journalism (Photojournalism) and BECA (Broadcasting and Electronic Communications Arts) from San Francisco State University. You can periodically catch him dodging potholes on his scooter and actively eating pho.More by Gustavo Hernandez
