https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iIkJhZwWls

by Dylan Gascon

At first glance, it would seem as if nothing was amiss in the seaside town of Laguna Beach.

Visitors casually left their cars at the $10 a day parking lot to take a trolley shuttle toward the town, passing the local arts festival that happens at this time of year. Posters decorated the theater, advertising A Night with Janis Joplin on the outer walls of the building, enticing people to come and see. There was traffic in the streets and the trolleys lurched forward toward Main Beach. But the closer they got, the more apparent it was something more was going on.

At Main Beach the crowds had already gathered early, even though the event didn’t officially start until 6:30 p.m. Counter protesters arrived on the scene in droves. Many carried signs, some sung chants, while on some green nearby others danced to the rhythm of bongo drums. The police made their presence known, with officers posted in nearby parking lots and a nearby gas station, while horse mounted officers got ready to ride into the crowd to separate the two sides. There was a fire alive in the air that lit everything up, almost rivaling the illumination of the sun.

Officers were dressed in riot gear and armed with batons or non-lethal shotguns loaded with beanbags and zip ties on their sides. And at the center of everything in far fewer numbers, were the right-wingers themselves, organized by a group called AmericaFirst!

Holding an event in Laguna Beach is nothing new for AmericaFirst! The group has held three events, all of them occurring without incident. The man behind the AmericaFirst! rally is Johnny Benítez, who in a YouTube video has stated of he and his group: “We oppose immigration from anywhere in the world.”

On Sunday, the group was scheduled to have an “Electric Vigil for the Victims of Illegals and Refugees”, with members of the group wearing rainbow colored gear, reminiscent of decorative pieces’ people at music festivals wear.

Although Benítez asserts he and his group aren’t racist, didn’t condone violence at the event, and even called the event “family friendly”, police weren’t taking any chances after last week’s event’s in Charlottesville, Virginia.

On Aug. 11, in the quiet town of Charlottesville, what started as a peaceful protest turned violent over the removal of a statue of confederate general Robert E. Lee. White nationalists came to protest the statue’s removal, while they were met with counter protesters, some of them being masked ANTIFA (anti-fascist) members.

The day ended in tragedy, with the death of one and injury of 19 others at the hands of a right-wing extremist drove his car into a crowd. Two police officers would also lose their lives at the rally when their helicopter crashed while attempting to give assistance to other officers.

Since that day, conservative groups have planned protests across the country, even in states like California, which is known for its liberal tendencies. There were three protest rallies planned in southern California this past weekend; one in front of Google headquarters in Venice, protesting the firing of James DeMoore, one in Huntington Beach, which was to be a book burning of leftist literature, and a third in Laguna Beach, being the vigil spearheaded by AmericaFirst!

Of the three events, the only one not cancelled was the latter of the three.

“I’m from here, and it’s sad to see events like this happening,” said Jody, a counter protester who came with a couple friends holding signs. She was one of about 2,500 counter protesters who came out against the small band of conservative supporters. According to AmericaFirst!’s Facebook event page, only 125 people showed up to support the vigil.

On Saturday, the day before the AmericaFirst! vigil, left wing groups Indivisible OC46 and Indivisible OC48 organized a counter rally that was comprised of around 350 people who were demonstrating against the AmericaFirst! Rally. These groups did this to avoid confrontation with AmericaFirst! But even so that didn’t stop people from attending the rally on Sunday.

Although they are criticized for being “racist” or “fascist”, AmericaFirst! doesn’t consider themselves anything of the sort. As they like to point out, not only is Benitez originally from Columbia, but they also have members of different ethnic groups as well, including Latinos and a few African Americans and Asians.

“I’ve never had any issues with them,” said a right-wing supporter named Hanzel, a Filipino who showed up in support of the vigil. Yet that didn’t stop the appearance of a few neo-Nazis from showing up to support the conservative cause; they are a presence that has been known to stalk events such as this. “I hate when they come out.” Hanzel said.
As the sun fell into the horizon and clouds began to obscure the darkening sky, the police made a clear division from the area where the vigil was to take place, keeping the counter protesters at bay.

Around the outskirts of the vigil were scattered members of AmericaFirst! and the Proud Boys, members of a right-wing group created by ex-Vice media founder Gavin McInnes, all engaged in heated debates/shouting matches by virtually everyone around them. Although grossly outnumbered, none of them backed down from their views.

By the end of the night, police had arrested three people and one 12-old boy claimed he had gotten pepper sprayed. At one point, horse mounted officers had to disperse counter protesters who began to crowd into the street who were blocking traffic. The SWAT team was called in, issuing via loudspeaker that if people didn’t disperse, they would be arrested. Eventually everything would calm down, returning the night to silence. Yet both sides knew this was far from over.

“Love will always win” Jody said as she and the crowds dissipated into the night.

By the end of the night, police had arrested three people, and one 12-year-old boy claimed he had gotten pepper sprayed.

How insurance companies use a Florida law to get undocumented immigrants arrested and deported when they get injured on the job — and what it means in Trump’s America

by Michael Grabell, ProPublica, and Howard Berkes, NPR

At age 31, Nixon Arias cut a profile similar to many unauthorized immigrants in the United States. A native of Honduras, he’d been in the country for more than a decade and had worked off and on for a landscaping company for nine years. The money he earned went to building a future for his family in Pensacola, Florida. His Facebook page was filled with photos of fishing and other moments with his three boys, ages 3, 7 and 8.

But in November 2013, that life began to unravel.

The previous year, Arias had been mowing the median of Highway 59 just over the Alabama line when his riding lawnmower hit a hole, throwing him into the air. He slammed back in his seat, landing hard on his lower back.

Arias received pain medication, physical therapy and steroid injections through his employer’s workers’ compensation insurance. But the pain in his back made even walking or sitting a struggle. So his doctor recommended an expensive surgery to implant a device that sends electrical pulses to the spinal cord to relieve chronic pain. Six days after that appointment, the insurance company suddenly discovered that Arias had been using a deceased man’s Social Security number and rejected not only the surgery, but all of his past and future care.

Desperate, Arias hired an attorney to help him pursue the injury benefits that Florida law says all employees, including unauthorized immigrants, are entitled to receive. Then one morning after he dropped two of his boys off at school, Arias was pulled over and arrested, while his toddler watched from his car seat.

Arias was charged with using a false Social Security number to get a job and to file for workers’ comp. The state insurance fraud unit had been tipped off by a private investigator hired by his employer’s insurance company.

With his back still in pain from three herniated or damaged discs, Arias spent a year and a half in jail and immigration detention before he was deported.

One of SouthEast’s first cases involved a hotel housekeeper at the Comfort Suites in Vero Beach. Yuliana Rocha Zamarripa was cleaning a hotel room in 2010 when she slipped on a bathroom floor and slammed her knee on the bathtub, leaving her with pain and swelling so severe she was unable to walk.

Lion sent her to a doctor, but quickly denied her claim based on a false Social Security number.

Rocha’s mother had brought her to the United States from Mexico when she was 13, and when she turned 17, her father bought her the fake ID so she could work.

With few options, Rocha, now 32, settled her workers’ comp case for less than $6,000 plus attorney fees. But she never got the medical care she needed. The week before she was to receive the check, she was arrested while making breakfast for her 4-year-old son.

Rocha spent the next year cycling through jail and immigration detention, separated from her three children. She couldn’t sleep, worrying what would happen to them if she were deported.

“I said the Lord’s Prayer all the time, and I would end by asking, ‘God, give me a chance to return to my children. Don’t let anything bad happen to them,’” she said. “I had a feeling that something was not right.”

Rocha’s instincts were correct. While she was in jail, the father of her children started sexually assaulting their 10-year-old daughter, according to his arrest warrant. “I was left shattered,” Rocha said tearfully, “because I didn’t know what was happening.”

With the help of an attorney, Rocha pleaded to a lesser charge — “perjury not in an official proceeding” — and was finally released. Because of what happened to Rocha’s daughter, the attorney was able to get Rocha’s deportation canceled and help her obtain a green card.

Rocha eventually received her settlement but had to spend all of it securing her release and dealing with immigration. She now walks with a limp because her injury didn’t heal correctly.

“I think it’s an injustice what happened to me,” she said. “All because I fell, I slipped.”

However people feel about immigration, judges and lawmakers nationwide have long acknowledged that the employment of unauthorized workers is a reality of the American economy. From nailing shingles on roofs to cleaning hotel rooms, some 8 million immigrants work with false or no papers nationwide, and studies show they’re more likely to get hurt or killed on the job than other workers. So over the years, nearly all 50 states, including Florida, have given these workers the right to receive workers’ comp.

But in 2003, Florida’s lawmakers added a catch, making it a crime to file a workers’ comp claim using false identification. Since then, insurers have avoided paying for injured immigrant workers’ lost wages and medical care by repeatedly turning them in to the state.

Workers like Arias have been charged with felony workers’ comp fraud even though their injuries are real and happened on the job. And in a challenging twist of logic, immigrants can be charged with workers’ comp fraud even if they’ve never been injured or filed a claim because legislators also made it illegal to use a fake ID to get a job. In many cases, the state’s insurance fraud unit has conducted unusual sweeps of worksites, arresting a dozen employees for workers’ comp fraud after merely checking their Social Security numbers.
What’s quietly been happening to workers in Florida, unnoticed even by immigrant advocates, could be a harbinger of the future as immigration enforcement expands under President Donald Trump.

One of Trump’s first executive orders broadened Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s priorities to include not just those convicted of or charged with a crime, but any immigrant suspected of one. The order also targets anyone who has “engaged in fraud or willful misrepresentation in connection with any official matter or application before a governmental agency.” That language could sweep in countless injured unauthorized workers because state workers’ comp bureaus and medical facilities typically request Social Security numbers as part of the claims process.

(This story was shorten to fit space).