The fear of migrants who hide from the raids in Oxnard, the “world capital of strawberry” in California

Undocumented Mexican, has been collecting blackberries, raspberries and other fruits from six in the afternoon in Oxnard, a municipality of California that boasts of being “the world capital of strawberry”.

But finished her day, today she waits for her to pick her up so as not to run the fate of others in the same immigration status that ended up detained when they were on their way home.

And this week they extended to this valley in the agricultural heart of California the coordinated deportation raids that have been registered in the state for several days, especially in urban areas of Los Angeles County.

Operations that have encountered citizen rejection in the streets, with mostly peaceful protests but in which some disturbances have also been restrained.

Since Trump returned to the White House in January with the promise of carrying out “the greatest deportation in the country's history”, the arrests of undocumented have multiplied.

These have taken place in streets, churches, schools, courts and, increasingly, in workplaces.

Until this week, the agricultural sector seemed to have fought from them.

They make up 4% of the entire undocumented workforce of the country, calculates the Center for Migration Studies.

However, this Tuesday the alarm for the presence of migration agents extended by the fertile Californian fields, from the central coast to the San Joaquín Valley.

Although the Department of National Security (DHS) did not confirm in which areas the operations focused, groups in defense of migrants say they received calls, videos and text messages about it from multiple counties.

In Oxnard, between hectares and hectares of sowed and greenhouses about 100 km northwest of Los Angeles, ICE agents accessed at least nine farms and arrested 35 people.

This is confirmed to the BBC Lucas Zucker, executive co -director of Cause, an organization that works defending the rights of agricultural workers.

“It seemed an incredibly indiscriminate operation, as if they had gone farm by farm trying to grab that they were,” he says.

According to Zucker, many other businesses in the area did not allow agents to enter the facilities by not carrying judicial orders.

“That shows that they have no arrest orders against certain people. They are simply sweeping good communities such as Oxnard, in an indiscriminate search to fulfill their established quotas (of arrests),” he adds.

Stephen Miller, a White House advisor and one of the main architects of the toughest migratory policies of the Trump administration, confirmed during an interview in May with the Fox News chain that the new objective was to reach a minimum of 3,000 arrests of the daily ICE. “

In that line, Trump's “Tsar of La Frontera”, Tom Homan, said there would be more raids “than ever before in history” in workplaces.

However, during a cabinet meeting on April 10, Trump had suggested that farm owners could ask the Federal Government for the possibility of retaining some of their workers, provided that they left the country first and then returned legally with the support of their employers.

“The agricultural worker will come with a letter signed by certain people in which they will say: 'It's great, he works hard.' So let's loosen (the situation) a little for them and in the end we will bring them back. They will come out and they will return as legal,” he said.

Before the raids of this week in Oxnard, the president clarified that alleged plan.

“Our great farmers and people in the hotel and leisure industry have been stating that our very aggressive policy very immigration is taking away very good workers and that they have been with them for a long time, and that they are almost impossible to replace,” Trump wrote this Thursday on his truthsocial networks.

He added that in many cases they are “the criminals who were allowed to enter the country because of the very stupid policy of open border” those who are occupying those works.

“That is not good. We must protect our farmers, but get the US criminals. The changes are coming!” He added.

Among the raids registered in Oxnard, migration officials tried to enter a Boskovich Farm packer.

Raquel Pérez recounts how he saw “two trucks from the Office of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and another without brands” in the direction of the company from its restaurant, Casa Grande Café, located a few 30 meters.

While showing a video of the moment to the BBC, remember that when crossing the agents he felt “very intimidated”, scared despite being an American citizen by birth.

More fear had to pass a friend of her who has no documents and works in the collection of strawberry.

When they heard patrols in the area, the managers closed access to the fields to prevent any raid. But as if I could go home I had to go to the road and cross the city, he called the restaurant to ask for help.

Raquel's father, Miguel Pérez, went to verify whether or not there was an ICE control, and when he found nothing, he made his way until he was safe and saved in his home.

“It has been requested every day that corresponds to him in a row to stay at home. He does not want to take children to school,” Raquel tells the BBC about her friend.

This generalized fear in the community is also having an impact on the restaurant in Los Pérez, where they serve chilaquiles, divorced eggs, beef or chicken broth, “homemade flan” and other Mexican delights.

When we visit it at noon, it is completely empty.

“Here we have fixed customers, but nobody came today,” explains Paula Pérez, the matriarch. “We are all with the hair of end.”

The business of pallets That is a few meters further and from which they usually get diners also looks deserted. There are barely cars in the opposite parking lot and the mechanical workshops around the corner did not open their doors.

“We have been here for 18 years (at the head of the restaurant) and we had never seen anything like that,” says Raquel.

At the business door they have hit a role that remembers some of the constitutional rights and summarizes the steps to follow when interacting with migratory agents.

And in the bar they rest a series of pamphlets of the 805 Immigration Coalition organization with a telephone number to which to report the presence of patrols.

According to several messages and images that the community organization hung on Instagram, on Wednesday there was still the presence of ICE in Oxnard.

“They do not realize the domino effect that this will have,” says Raquel Pérez on the raids.

“If strawberries or vegetables are not collected, companies will have nothing to pack. Trucks will not come to take the load. He will not do product in stores. Prices will shoot,” he says.

At the moment, Óscar, who sells strawberries at the road, already started to notice some effects.

“Less people are going out for a walk, and they buy me less,” he laments.

Originally from the Mexican State of Tlaxcala and with children born in the US, it is still undocumented.

“I am in the process of regularization,” he tells the BBC.

Now, in view of the fact that the raids have reached the gates of the migration courts, doubt what way to follow.

“There are no longer many ways to get legal here.”

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