Protesters rallied outside the A.F. Bray Courthouse in Martinez, California, on Thursday to denounce U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents who, they say, are using a county parking lot beside the courthouse and the Martinez Detention Facility to stage immigration arrests, Bay City News reported. The protest was published on Saturday, November 14, ahead of a Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors vote on Tuesday on how county staff and county property should deal with federal immigration officers.
Source: Bay City News via Contra Costa Pulse
The claims about the parking lot come from the county public defender's office and from organisers at the rally. Attorneys with the public defender's office said ICE agents have been conducting operations on county property for the past two weeks, that video footage shows agents detaining a person in the courthouse parking lot last week, and that another person was detained in a similar way on Thursday, according to reporting by San Francisco Focal. Those are allegations by the public defender's office and advocates; ICE did not respond to a request for comment in that reporting.
“We're here to let the people and the county know that we know what's going on,” said Hernan Soto, an organiser with the Contra Costa Immigrant Rights Alliance, speaking at the protest on Thursday. Soto called ICE's use of county property “unacceptable” and said, “While other counties are strengthening their policies and issuing cease-and-desist orders to ICE, Contra Costa remains silent.” Bay City News reported that Contra Costa does not currently prohibit county cooperation with ICE, though immigrant-rights advocates have called for such a prohibition for more than a year.
Advocates said the enforcement is also being felt away from the courthouse, particularly in Concord's Monument Corridor. “The Monument is the holder of most of the immigrant community,” said Julia Quintero of Monument Impact, a nonprofit serving low-income families, at the protest. “We've seen a huge increase in the last two weeks,” she said, referring to ICE activity in the neighbourhood. “Monument is a really bustling part of the city, but right now, nobody's out. It automatically puts fear in people's minds.” Quintero said most of the arrests she described had targeted men — typically fathers — on their way to work in the morning.
Other demonstrators directed their anger at county leaders as well as at the federal agency. “It's aggravating, it makes me angry. It makes me sad. I can't believe that our country is doing this,” demonstrator Sheila McGrath said, according to Focal's reporting of the rally. Mary-Beth Meyer, another protester, said: “It's obscene. I'm outraged by it and I'm outraged that our county leaders haven't done anything to stop ICE from operating on our county property.” Legal observers with the public defender's office said they have been monitoring ICE activity in the courthouse parking lot and believe the agency is breaking the law — an allegation ICE has not answered in the reporting reviewed — and the office argued that ICE's presence has made the community less safe.
A family case raised at the rally
The rally also heard about the case of Ann Lawani, described by Focal as a John Muir nurse and University of San Francisco professor who was arrested by ICE at her Lodi home eight weeks ago. Her brother, Sam Lawani, told the rally her detention has taken a heavy toll on the family: she had been caring for their 83-year-old father, who has spine cancer. “The day she was picked up his health took a dive, his nervous system completely crashed. And then that's when we started this whole running to the ER and ICU,” Sam Lawani said. He said there has been no movement in her case because the court is backlogged, and that she remains detained in Louisiana. Those details are the family's account as reported from the rally, not findings by a court.
Policy or ordinance: the September split
The fight in Contra Costa is, in part, about the legal weight of the county's answer. At a County Board meeting in September, Supervisors Shanelle Scales-Preston and John Gioia voted to put forward an ordinance — a legally binding local law — that would require county staff to adhere to rules around interacting with ICE and the agency's use of county-run facilities. They were outvoted by Supervisors Candace Andersen, Diane Burgis and Ken Carlson, who opted instead for a policy — a non-binding guideline — rather than an ordinance, Bay City News reported.
That distinction is what Tuesday's vote will test. The board will vote on Tuesday on the proposed “policy for responding to Immigration Issues,” which is intended to guide county staff on their rights when interacting with immigration officers, according to Bay City News. Focal reported the scheduled vote in similar terms, saying the new policy would make clear that ICE is prohibited from staging on county property. A policy can direct county staff and the use of county land; it does not, by itself, remove federal agents' authority to operate in public places in the county — which is why advocates continue to press for a binding ordinance and for ICE-free zones on county property.
Not whether ICE can operate in Contra Costa County at all, but what the county's own rules will be: how county staff interact with immigration officers, and whether ICE may stage operations on county property such as the courthouse parking lot in Martinez. Advocates want a binding ordinance; the board majority in September chose the policy route.
Why this matters beyond Martinez
Courthouses are a sensitive place for immigration enforcement because the people who come there include defendants, witnesses, victims and family members with appointments they are required — or trying — to keep. When advocates allege that people are being detained in the courthouse parking lot itself, the practical fear they describe is that residents will stop showing up: for court dates, for services, and for work in busy immigrant neighbourhoods such as Monument Corridor. For Punjabi and other immigrant families across the Bay Area and California — including families in Concord, Richmond and the wider East Bay — the county's rule for its own property is therefore not a paperwork question; it decides whether a trip to the courthouse feels like a routine civic duty or a risk.
The dispute also comes as other Bay Area local governments weigh how far they can go to limit federal immigration enforcement on public property, Focal reported, and as immigrant communities and their allies press elected officials for clearer protections. Contra Costa's answer has, so far, been slower and weaker than its critics want: no prohibition on county cooperation is in place today, and the September majority rejected the binding-ordinance path.
What happens next
The Board of Supervisors votes on Tuesday on the proposed policy. If it passes, county staff will have a written guideline for interactions with immigration officers and, on Focal's reporting, a clear statement that ICE may not stage on county property — and advocates will then test whether a non-binding policy is enforced in the courthouse lot. If it fails or is weakened, the alliance and the public defender's office have already signalled they will keep monitoring the lot and pressing for an ordinance. ICE's own position is not in the reporting reviewed: the agency did not respond to a request for comment, and no ICE statement confirming or denying the parking-lot allegations was published in the sources used for this report.