The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will refer a California teacher for a possible criminal probe after he made threatening comments toward immigration officials, the agency told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) history teacher Ron Gochez said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents “are not the only ones with guns” and that “people have every right to defend themselves” against them during a Tuesday press conference denouncing ICE raids. DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin told the DCNF that Gochez’s comments endanger agents’ lives and “looks criminal.”
“Calling for violence against law enforcement is un-American and beneath the conduct of someone teaching the next generation of Americans,” McLaughlin told the DCNF, adding that the DHS will refer him to the Department of Justice (DOJ).
“Our law enforcement officers are already facing a 1000% increase in assaults against them including terrorist attacks, cars being used as weapons, and rocks thrown at them,” McLaughlin said. “Words have consequences and this type of rhetoric is going to get one of our officers killed.”
LAUSD and Gochez did not respond to the DCNF’s requests for comment. Gochez led the press conference on behalf of activist group Unión del Barrio (UDB), which did not respond to a request for comment.
“The Department is actively tracking these targeted assaults against our law enforcement and will hold offenders accountable to the fullest extent of the law,” a DOJ spokesperson told the DCNF. “Anyone encouraging reckless behavior should think twice before inciting further violence and putting federal agents in harm’s way.”
Gochez claimed he was not “calling for violence” by suggesting that anti-ICE agitators carry guns, though he also praised rioters for throwing bricks at federal agents.
“This is South Central Los Angeles … they are not the only ones with guns in this city. They’re not the only ones and don’t forget that,” Gochez told his audience. “And I don’t say that because we’re calling for violence, I’m saying that because the people have every right to defend themselves against masked, unidentified gunmen with AR-15s and other military rifles.”
“The people have every right to defend themselves,” he said. “That’s not violent, that’s intelligent.”
Gochez went on to boast that rioters had effectively reduced ICE raids in California, mentioning those who threw hard objects at federal agents in Paramount after mass protests kicked off in June.
“They caught some bricks. Y’all remember Paramount? They caught those bricks,” Gochez said. “This is Los Angeles and this is South Central. The people will fight back.”
UBD received a letter from Senate Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism Chair Josh Hawley of Missouri in June announcing an investigation into its possible ties to California’s anti-ICE riots. UBD “has not organized, aided, abetted, financed, or engaged in any illegal activity,” the organization said in response to Hawley.
Gochez was seen telling an audience at a UBD-led press conference to resist ICE “by any means necessary” a day after the riots broke out, the DCNF previously reported.
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