LOS ANGELES – Earlier today, Mayor Bass met with family members of Angelenos who have been taken in recent raids and also visited businesses that have been directly impacted. She later responded to the Vice President’s remarks. A recording of the press conference is available here. Read a transcript here:
“Hello, everyone. Today, the Vice President of the United States spent three or four hours in L.A. before holding a press conference and spewing lies and utter nonsense in an attempt to provoke division and conflict in our city.
“This is consistent with the provocation from Washington that began two weeks ago when our city was calm and millions of Angelenos were going about working and contributing to our city.
“The provocation has resulted in lives disrupted, terror and fear spread throughout our city. I spent the day today meeting with businesses. We met on Sunday, and businesses were empty, owners were suffering, and describing the situation as worse than COVID. Just think for a minute how profound that is. Workers who are too afraid to come into work, and customers who feel they can't go outside of their house.
“I also met with mothers who do not know where their husbands are, and their sons. They told me about their children, who spent Father's Day wondering why their fathers did not come home. And I just want you to know that that's a trauma to a child, that that child will always carry with them.
“Unfortunately, the Vice President did not take time to learn about our city and understand that our city is a city of immigrants from every country and continent on the planet. But then again, he did need to justify the hundreds of millions that wasted taxpayer dollars that were wasted in the performance of a stunt and an experiment in the city and using men and women of our armed services, whose mission it is to protect our country.
“He accused state leaders and myself as Mayor of this city of encouraging violence, of siccing mobs on ICE officers. But let me just tell you, like yesterday, what happened at the Dodgers? We're not sure who these armed men are. They show up without uniforms. They show up completely masked. They refuse to give ID. They're driving regular cars with tinted windows, and in some cases, out of state license plates. Who are these people? And frankly, the vests that they have on look like they ordered them from Amazon. Are they bounty hunters? Are they vigilantes? If they're federal officials, why is it that they do not identify themselves? You can imagine the fear and the terror that that has created in our city, when you have cars driving around, people jumping out of those cars with guns and rifles and pulling people off the street.
“How dare you say that city officials encourage violence? We kept the peace. You know that the federal officials that were here protected a federal building. They were not involved in crowd control. Crowd control was handled, most aptly by the Los Angeles Police Department, the Sheriff's department, and local law enforcement. We were able to handle the violence and the vandalism that occurred. We put a curfew in place. We’ve lifted that curfew. Our streets have been peaceful, and even when there was vandalism at its height, you were talking about a couple of hundred people who were not necessarily associated with any of the peaceful protests – and for those of you who were watching outside of Los Angeles, I will say it over and over again, Los Angeles is a city that is 500 square miles and any disruption took place took place in about two square miles in our city. The most – over 100 people were arrested. We are a city of 3.8 million people.
“And finally, Mr. Vice President, how dare you disrespect our Senator. You don't know his name, but yet you served with him before you were Vice President, and you continue to serve with him today, because the last time I checked, the Vice President of the United States is the President of the U.S. Senate. You serve with him today and how dare you disrespect him and call him Jose. But I guess he just looked like anybody to you. Well, he's not just anybody to us. He is our Senator, and you fly in, you parachute in this city. I don't know if you've ever been here before. You parachute in this city, you pass all kinds of judgment, and then you leave, and you add to the provocation, you add to the division – or you attempt to create division in our city.
“But I just want you to know that our city is standing together. We are united. You might attempt to create division, but we are united. Standing with me today are families, business owners, community leaders, representatives, and nothing can divide us.”