Faith leaders connect Juneteenth to immigration raids at downtown LA prayer vigil

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The backstory: People Improving Communities Through Organizing California, known as PICO California, coordinated the prayer walk. Executive Director Joseph Tomás McKellar said there’s a connection between the raids and the holiday that commemorates the 1865 enforcement of the Emancipation Proclamation in Texas.

“ Juneteenth … marked the end of chattel enslavement of African Americans and a monumental step in the direction of affirming the dignity of all human beings,” McKellar said. “Today in L.A., that dignity is under assault.”

The scene: Several hundred people met at La Placita and then walked to the federal building in downtown Los Angeles, participants said. “Our plan was just to leave flowers in the place to pray for peace and to bring a spirit of kinship where there had been so much fear and so much anxiety than just weeks before,” said Father Brendan Busse, pastor at Dolores Mission Church in Boyle Heights. Photos from the event show Department of Homeland Security police, Marines and National Guard members observing as protesters laid flowers on the steps. “I felt hopeful,” Busse said. “We go through periods of conflict. We go through periods of confusion. But we can also bring into those spaces moments that are really sacred.”

Churches and immigration: In January, the Trump administration rescinded federal policy that prohibited immigration enforcement at “sensitive locations,” including hospitals, schools and places of worship. The speakers Wednesday included the pastor of a Downey church where armed federal agents detained a man last week.

Go deeper: Downey church community on edge after masked, armed officers detain man on church property