Another Orange County city is looking to intervene or lend support to a lawsuit challenging how federal immigration sweeps are being conducted in Southern California while also considering creating a legal defense fund to help protect residents in court from being deported.
Officials in Santa Ana, Anaheim, Irvine and Fullerton either voted to join or support the federal lawsuit, spearheaded by the ACLU, which alleges federal immigration officers are racially profiling people to make warrantless deportation arrests.
At their 4 p.m. meeting on Tuesday, Costa Mesa City Council members are slated to discuss behind closed doors potentially joining or supporting the ACLU’s lawsuit filed on behalf of five people arrested in Los Angeles County and immigrant rights organizations.
Later on at 6 p.m., city officials are scheduled to bring the discussion back up in front of the public while also getting a briefing on ways they can offer legal defense funding for immigrants caught up in the widespread deportation sweeps that ramped up back in June.
[Read: Costa Mesa Donates $100K for Immigration Aid; Explores Joining Lawsuit Against ICE Sweeps]
It would be the first time city officials in Orange County publicly discuss participating in the ACLU lawsuit.
Tuesday’s expected debate comes after Orange County Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento and nonprofit leaders announced the launch of the Orange County Liberty Fund – a $1.5 million pot of public and private dollars intended to support nonprofits that help immigrant families navigate the legal system.
“At a time when immigrant families face vicious abuse from unjust federal policies and an absence of due process, it is more important than ever that we stand together,” said Sarmiento in a Wednesday press release.
“We must support trusted community organizations fighting for the rights and dignity of our families, friends, and neighbors.”
Costa Mesa Mayor John Stephens, who requested the discussion on Costa Mesa participating in the lawsuit, said the lawsuit is an important case that two of the county’s biggest cities are looking to join and officials will get a briefing on how they could participate behind closed doors.
“We certainly have impacts that we can show, but I just don’t know from a procedural standpoint what options we have available to us to participate in that case, and how we can,
be of any use to the cause,” Stephens said in a Wednesday phone interview.
“It’s an important constitutional principle.”
Roberto Herrera, leadership development director with Resilience OC – an immigrant and renters advocacy group in Costa Mesa – said the city supporting the lawsuit would be historic.
“Costa Mesa is setting an example and helping to co-lead with other cities in signing on to this lawsuit that seeks to affirm civil rights for all,” he said in a Wednesday phone interview.
Officials in neighboring Santa Ana – Orange County’s only sanctuary city – approved a $250,000 agreement with Immigrant Defenders to provide immigration defense legal services to protect residents from deportation.
[Read: Santa Ana Renews Legal Defense Fund for Immigrants; Will Costa Mesa Follow?]
If Costa Mesa were to launch such a fund, they would be the second in Orange County to do so.
Herrera said the city is taking bold steps to support Latino residents at a time when families are being separated.
“Costa Mesa being positioned to be the second city in Orange County to protect due process rights and immigration court sets a precedent for other cities to follow suit. Santa Ana has taken lead, but Costa Mesa – its sister city – is right behind,” he said.
Stephens said it was important to consider such a fund because immigrants don’t always have access to lawyers
“When you have people either being detained or potentially being detained, who are residents of the city of Costa Mesa – they do have constitutional rights, but constitutional rights aren’t worth very much if there’s no attorney to assist the person in invoking those rights,” he said.
According to a city staff report, funding for a legal defense fund in Costa Mesa could come from general fund reserves – a rainy day fund that other cities have avoided pulling from to fund immigration aid programs.
The staff report said they could consider contracting with groups like the Public Law Center or Immigrant Defenders, a plaintiff in the ACLU lawsuit, or creating their own in-house legal assistance team – a route that staff says would be more costly.
The city council meeting also comes as local activists worry that federal agencies are not following a temporary restraining order – upheld by a federal appellate court – barring them from making warrantless arrests in parts of Southern California solely based on factors like race or place of employment.
[Read: Deportation Sweeps Pick Up Steam Again in Orange County]
So far, Costa Mesa is one of three cities in Orange County, including Anaheim and Santa Ana to allocate hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars to financially support immigrants impacted by the deportation sweeps.
On Tuesday, officials will get an update on their $100,000 donation they approved last month to be used to assist residents after city leaders debated splitting the money between two nonprofits, Someone Cares Soup Kitchen to provide daily meals and Enough For All to help with rent and groceries.
According to a city staff report, Enough For All can accept the funding but Someone Cares Soup Kitchen’s board of directors would have to approve their share of the donation. The money is expected to come from the city general fund’s contingency fund.
City council members are also expected to discuss creating a rental registry and how they can track at-fault evictions at the request of Councilwoman Andrea Marr as some immigrant families stay home, afraid to go to work in fear of getting caught up in the deportation sweeps.
Marr did not respond to requests for comment last week.
Costa Mesa officials launched a rental assistance program at the end of 2023 in an effort to reduce the number of no-fault evictions.
[Read: Costa Mesa Looks To Expand Rental Assistance]
Herrera said the deportation sweeps are having an economic impact on Orange County cities and to the state.
“It’s not as though people don’t want to work, it’s that fear and terror is being weaponized, and that has economic consequences,” he said.
“Fear of immigration raids and arrests is having a ripple effect on people’s ability and right to remain in their homes because the rents are so high and people are failing to pay their rents, even though they seek to do so.”
Hosam Elattar is a Voice of OC reporter. Contact him at helattar@voiceofoc.org or on Twitter @ElattarHosam.