Democratic Long Beach, Calif. mayoral candidate Rogelio Martinez invited 55 gang leaders to join him Monday peacefully protesting against Immigration and Customs Enforcement in a video posted to social media Friday.
Martinez is one of five declared candidates for the November 2026 election to lead the city of about 450,000, having completed his Candidate Intention Statement in late 2025, according to the Long Beach City Clerk’s website. He originally posted the more than two-minute-long video message to Instagram declaring, “Long Beach needs to be ICE FREE.” He also expects to “see 55 gang leaders in front of City Hall this Monday at 5pm [sic].”
“My name is Rogelio Martinez. I am calling all 55 gangs in my beautiful city,” the candidate says in the video recorded in front of Long Beach City Hall. “I expect a gang leader from every gang, all 55 gangs.”
“I’m not going to name them by name, but I’m calling the Latino gangs. I’m calling the Cambodian gangs. I’m calling the Filipino gangs. I’m calling the black gangs. I’m calling the Pacific Islander gangs,” Martinez added. “I’m calling all gang leaders to meet me right here, Long Beach City Hall this coming Monday.”
WATCH:
Long Beach mayor hopeful Rogelio Martinez is urging all 55 gang bosses across the city to unite and push ICE out. pic.twitter.com/MRZSxdwt7B
— aka (@akafaceUS) January 31, 2026
“Specifically, I need you to be here to meet me in person, to take back this city, because our leadership is not doing anything about it, and our police are powerless,” the mayoral hopeful continued, again stating his name and calling himself “Your 2026, Long Beach City mayor.”
Martinez told the Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview his intentions in making the video were “to show that every member of the city is part of the community” and were “never to harm anybody, never to incite any type of violence.”
“It was kind of like a crazy, radical but fresh approach to gain attention to what’s happening in America specifically in cities that that are predominantly Hispanic and Latino,” he told the DCNF. “I actually am surprised that it went viral on a national level. Not surprised that it went viral on a on a local level — but on a national level I actually am very surprised.”
The candidate said that, as of Sunday afternoon, none of the 55 gang leaders he invited to the Monday protest contacted him.
“And I knew they wouldn’t. And the reason why is because I didn’t name any gangs by name,” he explained. “I was very strategic in producing the video. So, no. No gang members are going to respond, no gang members are going to show up. That’s not the reality of the video.”
About 44% of Long Beach residents are Hispanic or Latino, 13% are Asian, and 12% are black, according to 2024 estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau.
“Enough is enough. ICE needs to get out of Long Beach, and this is the only way that I know how to get them out peacefully, but with strong force, but peacefully,” Martinez also states in the video, adding “the police are not at fault.”
“The police are not doing anything wrong. I’m not here to defund the police,” he clarifies in the video. “I stand with my Long Beach police officers, my men and women that serve the Long Beach Police Department, but they are powerless. They are powerless against ICE.”
“I’ve been 100% supportive of our local police department,” Martinez told the DCNF. “And why? Because if I’m going to be mayor, the police department works for the mayor. How in the heck am I going to contradict my employees? That makes no sense. I’m pro police.”
Martinez — a political outsider — is a grandfather of two, a licensed steam engineer by trade, and is enrolled in online classes at Harvard Law School, he told the DCNF.
He also said he entered the race to unseat incumbent Democratic Mayor Rex Richardson in November 2025. His decision was made shortly after Richardson’s city government tried to increase its local sales tax rate two years before the date voters had approved it to go up. Martinez said the move was an example of “taxation without representation.”
Although Martinez and Richardson are both Democrats, Long Beach’s mayoral election is officially nonpartisan.
“I’m just a normal person. I’m not a politician. I’ve never run for any public office, and I just so I need to do things completely different, unorthodox, and the reason why is because I need to bring attention to my cause,” Martinez said. “I know that because I’m not a career politician, I have to do things out of the box, just like that video.”
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