LA lit a fire last night. It’s time to pour gasoline on it.
California National Guard: Refuse unjust & immoral orders
Dispatch #1 – June 10th, 2025
Storming Heaven
Dispatch #3 – June 12th, 2025
Fan the Flames, Broaden the Battle!
Dispatch #4 – June 14th, 2025
Stand with the rebels & drop the charges!
Dispatch #6 – June 18th, 2025
The battle of LA is over – for now
Dispatch #1 – June 10th 2025
Storming Heaven
Last weekend, the masses of LA stormed heaven.
They stood up to demand a stop to the mass deportations, and showed the people of the world that LA will not stand by while our people are being rounded up and deported. The rebels, mostly Black and Latino youth, battled for hours, persevering despite the hails of rubber bullets, flash bang grenades lighting up the sky, billowing clouds of tear gas, armored personnel carriers filled with riot police, militarized Feds, the National Guard, and now the Marines. This first Dispatch features stories from the Battle of LA, both from the protestors on the ground and the machinations among the government forces arrayed against them.
The spark that lit a wildfire
Donald Trump sent his federal agents, from ICE, HSI, CBP, FBI, ATF, and more to the streets of LA and across the country. On Friday June 6th, they stormed areas where jornaleros (day laborers) gathered to find jobs, like Home Depot parking lots and the Fashion District. They chased migrants down, brutalized them, arrested them, and transported them to the Federal Building in Downtown LA to await deportation.
Soon, sightings went viral on social media, prompting masses of people to show up to stand with the immigrants. Many were just spectating and recording but some actually confronted ICE. Leftists called an emergency protest that drew about a thousand people, who quickly spilled out and clashed with police. The Leftist organizers abandoned the protestors once the cops declared an unlawful assembly. Dozens of youth stood off with the Feds all night despite being outnumbered by the Feds. Throughout the night, Dare to Struggle stood with the rebellious youth on the front lines, who sent a platoon of LAPD officers and a troop of Feds packing, and obstructed Federal vehicles.
The Flames Spread
The feds broadened their assault on migrants to outlying cities like Paramount and Fontana. They were met with even more militant resistance on the streets, with rebels in Paramount setting up barricades made of shopping carts and throwing projectiles at cops. Brave youths persevered amidst dense clouds of tear gas.
Protestors even went on the freeway to physically block a US Marshal’s bus sent to reinforce the pig troops. Protestors took the megaphone to confront the cops to their face and shame them for standing with ICE against the people. Dare to Struggle stood with them that day, facing a maze of police lines that turned Paramount into a field of battle. The protests spread to Compton, where rebels burned a car.
As the struggle intensified with no end in sight, Donald Trump announced the federal government was seizing control of the California National Guard, and deploying them to occupy the streets of Los Angeles. The Battle of LA began its next phase.
The freeway takeover
Protests began early morning on Sunday, with residents outraged at sights of soldiers clogging the streets of LA. After crowds were pushed back, they bravely occupied the 101 Freeway Southbound, paralyzing traffic. Protestors were determined that no business as usual could continue while the government is tearing apart families.
Gavin Newsom’s California Highway Patrol (CHP) took over the other side of the freeway to prevent protestors from spilling over. They were met by a hail of projectiles from protestors arrayed on the overpasses, determined to defend the freeway occupation. A shower of gasoline even set a police car ablaze. Despite their valiant efforts, CHP dispersed the protest around 5 pm, making mass arrests.
LAPD declares war on the protesters
Around 500 protesters gathered at the Federal Building in the early afternoon. They were met by dozens of mounted LAPD riot police armed with riot guns, shields, flash bangs, and tear gas. After getting pushed back a block, protestors formed a thin barricade made out of traffic signs. The rebels were showered with rubber bullets, sustaining many injuries. The air was filled with the screams of the wounded, the chants of the protestors, the blasts of flash bangs, and the ominous clang of rubber bullet casings. LAPD had turned Downtown LA into a warzone.
False rumors of imminent mass arrests spread throughout the crowd. Hundreds ran away from nonexistent cops. The now-isolated the rebels at the front line retreated a block, and LAPD followed. What followed was the standoff we’re calling the Battle for City Hall.
The Battle for City Hall
We linked up with the courageous protestors who reinforced their barricade and prepared to advance on the riot police. The rebels advanced foot by foot amid hailstorms of rubber bullets that injured many protestors and eventually halted our advance. Calls for reinforcements and more barricades were answered by crowds that doubled our numbers on the frontline and reinforced the defenses. With a solid line and high spirits, the rebels resumed their advance, with rubber bullets bouncing harmlessly off the barricades and flash bangs exploding ineffectually.
After a few rebels started firing fireworks at the police, they fired back with canisters of teargas. Despite courageous efforts to throw them back, the front line shattered, and the rebels retreated. hundreds of protestors gathered by 1st and spring, while a dozen rebels faced off with riot police without any barricade or protection, putting their bodies on the line to protect the crowd from the pigs.
burn, baby, burn!
As flash bang grenades raged and teargas descended the hill, protestors burned several American flags to show their disgust at this country that rains death and terror on the people of the world. This action got attention from right-wing grifters like Libs of TikTok and made Fox News LA and the NYPost. Trump even said that flag burners should spend a year in prison, despite this action’s status as a first amendment protected activity.
As the cops advanced towards the crowd, protestors marched off quickly. Despite Karen Bass and other lying politicians’ assurances that the LAPD “had the situation totally under control”, major parts of downtown seemed totally abandoned by the police and taken over by protestors. Dense graffiti adorned storefronts. LAPD counts the arrests at 50, a mere fraction of the countless acts of mass sabotage and resistance, let alone the thousands of protestors. It seemed the youth had won the battle, for now.
The aftermath
On Monday June 9th, it turned out that the Federal Building was closed, no longer holding detained immigrants. This was clearly a response to the pressure of militant protests, which struck an important blow against this key pillar of the mass deportation machine in Los Angeles. Without functioning facilities to detain migrants, mass deportations are impossible.
Right-wing media spun a narrative of unruly crowds of “anarchists”, likely outside agitators, battling police and committing violence for the sake of violence. They correctly charged that Downtown LA was out of the control of the LAPD and the liberal politicians who they serve.
Politicians like Karen Bass and Gavin Newsom put aside their different approaches in how to use police to brutalize the homeless in order to stand fast against protestors and more effectively defend ICE. They made a war room to plot the battle (apparently these are some pretty amateurish generals!) They defended themselves against right-wing attacks, laughably claiming that they “had the situation under control” and that the national guard was “unnecessary”. They somehow tried to position themselves against the deportations and against Trump even while sending pigs to shoot anybody with the audacity to criticize ICE to their face.
Where’s the LEFT?
The force of events almost instantly made the Left completely irrelevant to the battle being fought on the ground. Organized Leftist forces were nowhere to be found in any of these clashes. When they realized their yellow-vested peace police were unable to contain the crowds, they gave up and went home even as the youth were undeterred. After the weekend’s shameful performance, they somehow tried to concoct a narrative that they had something to do with the Battle of LA, even though they deserted on the field.
The Republicans have shown their face as brutal wannabe dictators willing to militarily occupy the streets just to break apart families, snatch working fathers from their babies, abduct children from schools, invade houses of worship, and nab immigrants trying to “do the right thing” and show up to their court dates. Their vile racism, xenophobia and hatred of anyone who dares to resist the boot of repression has been laid bare for all to see.
The Democrats have shown themselves to be willing and eager accomplices to the mass deportation machine, fielding thousands of militarized riot police to protest ICE raids and deportation infrastructure. In major cities across the country, they have answered largely peaceful protests with beatings, hails of rubber bullets, explosions of flash bang grenades lighting up the sky, thick fronts of tear gas, the trample of hooves, and the zipties of mass arrests.
The Left has shown their complete irrelevance to the movement against ICE. Events have made it impossible for most Leftist organizations to openly side with the brutally repressive Democrats who prop up the nonprofits and advocacy groups as a “peaceful” alternative to mass rebellion. Instead, Leftists have tried their best to dis-organize and mis-lead the movement back into the confines of the systems.
In Dare to Struggle we say: It is right to rebel!
The youth on the front lines have sent a signal the ruling class that you can’t terrorize neighborhoods and abduct people’s loved ones without a fight. The fires of LA are now national news, and there’s a unique opportunity for people in Southern California to step up and fan the flames. If you’re ready to stop spectating and start making history, or if you’re already on the front lines and ready to join an organized fighting force for change, join Dare to Struggle.
Dispatch #2 – June 11th 2025
Top 10 Reasons Not to Rebel Against ICE (And why you should fucking ignore them)
ICE, now aided and abetted by thousands of National Guard troops, is implementing a reign of terror across Southern California. The goons in the White House reported that they’ve been kidnapping hundreds and thousands of people a day across the country. They’re aiming to push that number up to 3,000 a day. They have snatched individuals looking for work at Home Depot. In Downey, they arrested one man in front of a church and attempted to arrest a second person inside the church. ICE agents pointed a gun at the pastor of that church who confronted them. In Boyle Heights, ICE thugs rammed a car with their SUV to arrest a man.
While holding press conferences begging Trump to stop, Karen Bass is going out of her way to aid and abet this regime of terror. She’s continued to insist that the protesters who want to confront ICE are the “bad protesters,” using the well-worn ruling class divide-and-conquer playbook. Hundreds have been arrested for protesting ICE in this so-called sanctuary city, and a curfew has been issued for downtown LA.
What this proves is that people are right to rise up! This rebellion against ICE has not only disrupted their operation; it has raised the political cost for them to operate and exposed people like Karen Bass for the snakes they are! In the heat of this moment, Dare to Struggle has been talking to as many people as we can and listening to what people are saying online and offline about these protests.
While most protestors and people of conscience are crystal clear that it is right to rebel against ICE, we’ve also heard many excuses for why people shouldn’t rebel against ICE.
Here’s why they’re wrong:
#1:”You’re just playing into Trump’s hand.”
He wants to declare an insurrection and clamp down on us. Trump and the other functionaries of this system want us terrorized, pacified, and off the streets. Despite their differences in rhetoric or specific plans of action to “deal” with protests, Trump and the bleeding heart liberal politicians share the common purpose of maintaining the order of their rotten setup. The protests in LA and a few other cities actually succeeded in forcing the Federal Building to shut down, literally disrupting the machinery of deportation. How does that play into Trump’s hands?
#2 :”Violent clashes are a setup.”
These and other conspiracy theories are spread by people who have convinced themselves that the masses are incapable of doing anything real to resist this system, assuming that when something does pop off, it must not be real. Not only is the Battle of LA real, it is righteous.
Fuck ICE, Smash the Mass Deportation Machine!
#3: Fear of Repression
Ogres like Donald Trump have been spewing threat after threat against the rebels of LA. He and his lackeys called in ICE, all the three-letter federal agencies, the LAPD, the CHP, and when that didn’t work, they called in the National Guard and now the Marines. Now, with thousands of troops armed to the teeth occupying our streets, with the air clogged with tear gas and filled with the sound of sirens, the chop of helicopters, and the ring of shots in scenes straight from a foreign war, with a curfew declared across downtown, the rebel youth of LA have still not given up. They are still in the streets even as we write this, just to say “Fuck ICE” and hit the deportation machine where it hurts. They know that this massive show of force is actually a sign of weakness from the ruling class. The real fighters are not afraid to do battle with the police and Feds; why are you afraid of doing the bare minimum of standing up to ICE?
#4: “But I’m the wrong identity!”
No matter your skin color, gender, or nationality, the masses of poor and oppressed people, and everyone who wants to stand with them, should unite to take on the common enemy: ICE and all the other Feds and cops who are enabling their reign of terror. Insisting this is “not my fight” has always been an excuse to do nothing. It’s nothing short of a betrayal of the people who are facing the worst this system has to offer. It’s something no one should tolerate, especially when people’s lives and families are on the line. These types of class traitors need to wake the fuck up and choose the right side of history.
#5: “I don’t have papers, or my family is un-documented… I don’t want to endanger them by speaking up.”
While we cannot make individual judgment calls for people, a basic question has to be posed: what horrors will we allow to happen while we hide in the shadows hoping it won’t hit us? The fact that some people can’t be on the front lines is all the more reason for those who do have citizenship to throw down extra hard. Whether your family stays here or is deported, whether you flee poverty or flee ICE, shit is bleak within capitalism-imperialism. The only way out is to rebel against this system and demand a better future.
Fuck the border wall, we want the whole damn world.
#6: “Anarchists and vandals are making the movement look bad. Protest the right way.”
More divide-and-conquer tactics from people who make careers off of dividing others and profiting from the struggle. The fact is that if protesters hadn’t taken to the streets, Mayor Bass would be desperate to put the genie of mass resistance back in the bottle of safe Democratic party and NGO politics. The people should have no interest in condemning the righteous rage of protesters who are resisting kidnappings and terror by agents of the state. We need to stand with the defiant youth and resist any and all calls, from politicians, faith mis-leaders, or the media, to separate ourselves from the best among us.
#7: “There are 3,000 police officers surrounding us on all sides; they’re about to kettle us. We need to run now!”
Anyone who’s been at a real protest has encountered rumor-mongers, gossips, and hallway monitors who spread lies that divide, confuse, and demoralize protesters. We’ve seen hundreds of protesters run away from a handful of cops just because they saw others running and thought they were in danger. We’ve heard multiple people claim that we’re “about to be kettled” and need to retreat, or invent thousands of non-existent cops bent on mass arrests, with no evidence. People spreading rumors and lies are doing the enemy’s work for them. Don’t believe everything you hear, and definitely don’t let it stop you from doing what needs to be done to stop the deportations.
#8: “Protest arrests are bad.”
Certain anarchist activists and grifter “influencers” online are spreading the idea that anytime anyone gets arrested at a protest, it’s automatically a failure or a setback. While we certainly appreciate tactical sophistication and don’t advocate getting arrested on purpose just for the fuck of it, the reality is that arrests are sometimes an unavoidable part of any protest because in a police state like ours, the pigs can arrest people whenever they want.
What determines whether that was ‘worth it’ or not is whether people come together to defend those who were arrested and demand an end to their repression and that their charges be dropped. Hundreds have been arrested in this wave of struggle, and we need to get serious about the political defense of all of them.
#9: “What good will protesting do anyway?”
Coming together in collective struggle against this murderous system may not do “good” in the sense of advancing your career or getting you a lot of “likes” or social approval. The good it will do is throwing sand in the gears of the machine that’s destroying lives as you read this, showing our determination to not allow these deportations to go down unopposed, and to build the fighting capacity of the people in the streets. Our ruling class is raining death and destruction on the people of the world, and there is no end without righteous rebellion. Refusing to fight means accepting this system and siding with the greatest criminals in human history. Which side are you on? It’s time to choose the right side of history and stand with the people rebelling against this system.
#10: “Just work with the established groups and donate to them.”
There are many existing organizations, charities, churches, etc. that advocate for and support immigrants’ rights. Some do admirable legal, medical, and humanitarian work, while some are mere chowlines for the Democratic party.
None of these are the groups that are going to actually obstruct ICE, confront the National Guard, and call for resistance against illegitimate orders, or politically organize the immigrant masses in bold and audacious protest.
It’s gonna take mass militant resistance to smash the mass deportation machine, and that is what Dare to Struggle is trying to organize and channel.
If you don’t buy the bourgeois bullshit being peddled by your enemies to stop you from rebelling against the babysnatchers and human traffickers with a badge and a gun, you need to roll with some of the only people out here not only standing with the militant youth on the frontlines but organizing and leading them. Join Dare to Struggle.
Dispatch #3, June 12th 2025
Fan the Flames, Broaden the Battle!
The people of Southern California and across the country have been inspired by the shining example of LA’s rebel youth who last weekend knocked Trump’s mass deportation machine on its ass. Wherever ICE has dared to show their face, they have been met with outraged locals, spontaneous acts of protest, and brave skirmishes.
We’ve been lucky enough to take the streets with the rebellious youth, learning from their militant spirit and leading them in the struggle. This dispatch features stories from our organizers on the ground, who witnessed some of the most defiant acts of resistance in this country in years in cities outside of LA.
Paramount Stands Up
On Saturday, hundreds of Latino youth amassed to stand up against an ICE raid going down at a Home Depot in the small, proletarian, majority Latino immigrant town of Paramount. When Dare to Struggle got the word, we headed down to the scene. We arrived to find hundreds of local youth staring down a line of DHS and ICE feds guarding the location where we suspected working migrants were being detained, across the street from the Home Depot. Whenever a youth would get too close to the line, the pigs would fire “less lethal” munitions or tear gas, at very close range.
This image shows a young man with a skateboard being pelted by pepper rounds without so much as flinching. The rebels’ impressive physical bravery in the face of overwhelming force from militarized police is a model for all people of conscience to step up and see how far they are willing to go in the struggle against ICE.
Some militant youths smashed up bricks in the Home Depot parking lot and used them as projectiles against the pigs. We saw a bush nearby burst into flames. A member of Dare To Struggle went up in the face of the pigs and called them out to their faces for being the shock troops for the mass deportation machine. She called on the crowd to confront their oppressors and not back down. Around this time, an LA Sheriff’s helicopter circled around us and a piggie declared the protest an “unlawful assembly”. Predictably, the dozen or so opportunists of the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) tucked their tails between their legs, gathered up their lame signs and left, doing exactly what the police told them to. They even posted on social media telling people not to come to the area because it wasn’t “safe”, abandoning the rebels without hope of reinforcements. We continued standing with the defiant youths through several more rounds of tear gas and munitions before we got pushed back.
We regrouped with some rebels at the entrance to a neighborhood on the block next to the Home Depot. The Sheriffs had set up a perimeter and were not letting anybody through. Residents came out of their houses to observe the scene. People were pissed.
We led them to chant “Pigs go home!” and to graphically curse these pigs for terrorizing the people and assisting ICE in their kidnappings.
At one point, the riot cops allowed a Trump wannabe fascist vigilante to break through their lines and harass a young woman – likely a High School student! He pepper-sprayed her directly in the face, under pig protection. Other protesters quickly jumped to her aide and cursed the pigs for facilitating this unprovoked assault.
ICE out of OC!
On Monday, news of ICE raids throughout Orange County spread throughout the day. A protest was called at the Federal building in Santa Ana (the county seat of O.C., and a majority-Latino city with a large undocumented population), which started in the late afternoon. When we arrived, the Feds were already shooting pepper balls and tear gas at the crowd of several hundred youths and others who surrounded the Federal building housing immigrant detainees on two sides. The pigs were soon backed up by Santa Ana PD decked out in their finest riot gear. The spontaneous chant which marked the day was simple and clear: “ICE OUT OF OC!” More than 26 total in Santa Ana were snatched by the pigs that day.
We rallied people to hold the line in the face of the pigs and chanted “Make it great like ’92, pigs we ain’t afraid of you!” and “It is right to rebel, ICE, go to hell!”. When the pigs were reinforced, threatening to push us off our position, we chanted in the intersection, stood our ground for a few more minutes, and made the call to take to the streets in a march, broadening out the protest and escaping police encirclement. We ran our banner up to the front of the crowd, and led chants all the way through downtown Santa Ana. Hundreds of youths followed us, chanting in unison, our voices echoing off the pre-war facades and gentrifier apartments of downtown alike. People in the restaurants, bars, and shops applauded as we shut down traffic.
Throughout the day, the leading edge of rebellious youth faced off with the police. Whenever people got tear-gassed or shot, they would go recover and then come right back to the protest. Aside from the front-line fighters, there were some families as well who were motivated to stand with the immigrants against the mass deportation machine. Protestors started to set off fire works, first in the back of the crowd, and then they started being fired at the line of pigs. A tense stand-off continued for several more minutes before the police started pushing back against us.
During the protest, some militants threw bottles, rocks, and pieces of shrapnel at the pigs, while other protestors began to scream “nonviolent protest” and “stop throwing things”. We insisted that it is right to rebel against ICE, and that the pig violence against the people is illegitimate. To smash the mass deportation machine, we can’t have the false unity of people who preach nonviolence towards the riot cops occupying our streets and the Federal goons snatching families away. We need to unite all who can be united around the defiant spirit of the rebellious youth who have taken this country by storm and struck a blow against the mass deportation machine.
Right now, all eyes are on Southern California! While Karen Bass has decided that grafiti is the biggest problem in LA, and senators are being thrown down and arrested, the battle lines are drawn. Dare to Struggle is going to the people to fan the flames of revolt, right now in Southern California and across the country.
Dispatch #4, June 14th 2025
Stand with the rebels & drop the charges!
The swirl of events unleashed by ICE terrorism and the response from the rebels of LA continues!
Just yesterday, a federal judge ruled that the thousands of National Guard troops deployed to LA by Donald Trump must be returned to the control of the Governor of California.
Meanwhile, Alex Padilla, a sitting US senator, was thrown to floor and handcuffed just for asking questions of Kristi Noem. Noem, in LA auditioning for the role of Eva Braun (and trying to find someone to fix her Jersey Shore-ass makeup), personally supervised a raid in Huntington Park. In that raid dozens of heavily armed officers stormed the house of pregnant women, terrorizing her children and threatening to show up at her daughters school.
ICE kidnappers rolled up on a taco truck in East Los Angeles arresting all of the employees and several of the customers. The truck owner described that, “They snatch you like a dog. The streets ain’t safe, that’s all I gotta say.” The people have no choice but to continue, expand and escalate mass resistance against ICE terror.
Dare to Struggle has been out on the streets, on the front lines, and everywhere in between organizing people and talking to them about the Battle of LA. Here’s what we’ve heard from people:
The rebel youth are still out on the streets waging courageous resistance against heavily armed cops, feds, national guards, and even soldiers despite often being outnumbered. They have literally lit a fire that has spread across the country, shown an example of what real resistance looks like, and made the Left that preaches “nonviolence” against state terrorism look irrelevant.
Why are rebels still coming out?
When we’ve asked the rebels what motivated them to come out, a few common answers emerged. From many Latino youth, they shared that they have undocumented family. They live in constant fear that their parents, uncles, cousins, grandparents, nieces and nephews might be abducted and sent away to a country they don’t even know. One protestor at the frontlines said “My parents are undocumented. If they take them, I don’t know what I would do. I would be alone.” They are fighting for themselves, their families, their community, and their very existence in this country. That’s what motivates them to put their own body on the line night after night to do battle with an enemy hell-bent on destroying them and putting the genie of mass militant resistance back in the bottle.
From youth who don’t have direct family connections to undocumented people, they’ve told us that they’re horrified at the ICE raids. It sickens and angers them to see masked thugs coming and abducting children, working fathers, pregnant women. They are outraged by the way LAPD is clamping down on protests. We’ve led chants of “Fuck ICE”, “Fuck Trump”, “Fuck Karen Bass”, and “Fuck the LAPD”, and the last two are just as popular as the first two. The repression itself is a provocation and a scandal that is motivating even more youth to flood the streets and resist. These kids are crystal clear that it is right to rebel against ICE, and they are determined to continue it.
Even regular petty bourgeois (middle class) people who lean liberal are being pulled into political life by the force of events. Some of them are openly siding with their government against the protestors, often rhetorically claiming to be against Trump and the deportations while siding with the liberal politicians who have smashed militant protests night after night. Others have been drawn to the side of the rebels. People are offering housing, donations, supplies, and political support to the brave ones at the front. Despite not being prepared to engage in militant acts of protests themselves, they respect the righteousness of the fighters who are putting their bodies on the line to resist ICE.
Whether this wave of resistance continues, or temporarily subsides, it’s critical to defend the hundreds people who caught charges for standing up to ICE terror. Right now reports indicate that more than 500 people have been arrested, including at least 14 people facing federal charges.
The federal cases include the egregious case against California SEIU president David Huerta for “Conspiracy to impede an officer.” These federal charges prove that the rebellion has struck at the heart of the deportation machine-that’s why they’re striking back so hard.
The hundreds of arrests of righteous protesters by the LAPD once again prove that “sanctuary city” is a cruel joke. Karen Bass should not spend a single day on the planet without being confronted for her complicity in the ICE abductions.
It’s right to rebel! And it’s incumbent on everyone who opposes these ICE abductions to stand with the people arrested and demand that all the charges be dropped. This fight against political repression needs to be waged in the courtroom, as well in public and politically, extending support to the people facing the charges, and resisting good-protester/bad-protester narratives.
Dispatch #5 – June 15th 2025
While tens of thousands of people gathered in downtown LA yesterday for the nationwide “No Kings” protests, dozens of ICE agents staged a military-style raid on a concert during a swap meet in Santa Fe Springs. Onlookers reported over 50 agents in multiple vehicles, with helicopters nearby, storming the grounds and detaining people seemingly at random. Back downtown, the carnival atmosphere of the protest turned more militant when marchers headed to the Federal Building to confront the ICE agents and their Marine protectors. This was quickly met with resistance from the LAPD and other law enforcement agencies. Seemingly out of nowhere, Karen Bass’s enforcers—not the Marines or National Guard—decided that they had seen enough free expression for the day and unleashed a volley of rubber bullets on the crowd, choking them with tear gas and clubbing people from atop horses. All in defense of the ICE terror and military presence in LA that Karen Bass claims to oppose.
While Karen Bass was siccing the LAPD on families, the elderly, and people simply demanding an end to ICE abductions, a section of the protesters met the police provocation with the determined defiance that has marked the last week of LA protests. Activists from Dare to Struggle were in the mix, promoting our protest today and standing shoulder to shoulder with those confronting the unjust repression of the demonstration. This righteous fury and refusal to comply with either the mass deportation of people or the “sanctuary city” police brutality is exactly what is needed at this moment. We invite the rebel youth and those who want to get serious about sustaining mass resistance against ICE terror, as well as the people who want to fight for the more than 500 individuals arrested in the past week, to join us tonight for our anti-ICE protest.
Dispatch #6, June 18th 2025
The battle of LA is over – for now
The stormtroopers of the LAPD, the Feds, and the National Guard have taken back the Civic Center through overwhelming brutality. They are enforcing a vicious “peace” that includes continued deportations for the immigrants of LA County. Just days ago, they were shooting at peaceful protestors, trampling an old man, shooting a journalist in the head, and flooding the air with the acrid smell of tear gas. 30 protestors have been charged by DA Nathan Hochman, with many at risk of long sentences for their resistance to the mass deportation machine.
Meanwhile, the Trump Administration is revving its mass deportation machine back up, rounding up immigrants at their places of work and tearing children from their families.
The millions who have shaken by the Battle of LA are now asking: What was the Battle of LA? Was it a riot, the actions of a small group of outside agitators, or an inspiring act of mass resistance? Can ICE be defeated, or is the mass deportation machine here to stay? Was it right or wrong to rebel against ICE?
If you believe the shit being said in the media and online, the resounding answer is: protest the right way or stay home, it was wrong to rebel against ICE. Liberal politicians like Karen Bass, Gavin Newsom, and Nathan Hochman sent their armed thugs to smash the protests, rounded them up with indiscriminate mass arrests, and are now holding dozens of political prisons in the medieval dungeon that is the Men’s Central Jail.
Yet these lying hypocrites have the gall to criticize Trump and pretend to side with “the vast majority of protestors” who were “peaceful”! If Karen Bass likes the protestors so much, why did she send in her LAPD goons to brutalize crowds of protestors chanting “peaceful protest”? If they are so appalled by the mass deportations, why did they spend tens of millions of dollars to bring every single LAPD officer out into the field on Saturday for a peaceful liberal march? If they are so mad at Trump, why are they locking up the people who stood up to him instead of the Gestapo agents he sent into our city to kidnap our neighbors?
If you open up social media, the answers you will find are usually just as bankrupt. Most organizations are unwilling to defend the actions of the most daring and defiant protestors. As a result, the actual rebels who brought down the wrath of the government are largely isolated, while most Leftists are busy saving their own skin. The NGOs are still letting everybody know about the rights they supposedly have, and failing to expose how the government has been violating those rights.
Anarchists and professional protestors are still giving tips for “protest safety”, or how to wear ninja costumes and dress for war to go to protests that now barely exist. Grifters and Leftist influencers love to share the spectacle of mass militant resistance with their armies of followers and clicktivists. They are most concerned with keeping you glued to your phone screen so they can wrack up clicks and watch times and sponsorships and merch deals, making money off a movement they had nothing to do with while fooling you into thinking you’re a revolutionary because of the Reels and TikToks you watch on your phone.
Dare to Struggle held its Second National Conference during the last days of the Battle of LA. We brought dozens of activists from around the country to LA to learn from each others’ struggles, create nationally coordinated campaigns against police brutality and displacement, and to learn skills crucial for mass organizing.
We quickly shifted gears to intervene in the protest movement, going to Downtown on Saturday to split off and lead hundreds of rebels and their sympathizers who were dissatisfied with the passivity and compromising stand of the No Kings’ Day protest and who resonated with our insistence that it is right to rebel against ICE.
Even though we didn’t have a great plan and were left scrambling, we still managed to lead some actual confrontational acts of protest against ICE and the police repression, drawing a sharp dividing line from the peace police who aggressively protected the cops from the rage of the masses.
The next day, we held a protest that started at Pershing Square, took the streets, and confronted the Hilton Hotel, part of a chain that has housed ICE agents and forms an integral part of the mass deportation machine. Happily, the Hilton was recently redecorated, and two flags were burned in a defiant act of protest, despite the aggressive attempts of Hilton staff to stop it by assaulting protestors. These actions struck a political blow against a despicable corporation that has willingly accepted the blood money of ICE, collaborating with the assault on immigrants just to line their own pockets.
Having made our point, we returned to Pershing Square and took the intersection, disrupting downtown traffic to say that business as usual cannot continue while the Trump administration is kidnapping immigrants, putting them in concentration camps, and throwing them out of the country.
In the process, a psychotic driver (Red Kia, plate WA BWJ6681) ran over a protestor, who suffered injuries and was briefly hospitalized. She is facing nerve damage and extensive bruising, and will be out of work for some time. We are working on a fundraiser to support her recovery. We were impressed by her bravery: she even chanted “Fuck ICE!” on the megaphone even as she lay on the ground after being run over. She is determined to keep fighting, and we intend to go after this reckless lunatic who hates us for protesting. The police were nowhere to be found, and dispatchers only sent an ambulance. We demand the LAPD investigates and apprehends this suspect immediately. We are going to publish a lengthier summation of the conference that will sort through the advances we made as well as the mistakes, so that we can continue to learn and grow from them and not keep repeating them.
Now, with the deportations continuing and the battles in the streets over, it is up to all people of conscience to keep the flames simmering and prepare the ground for battles to come. We must seek nothing less than to smash the mass deportation machine, to tear down the borders that divide us and build a just world. To do this, our main task right now is to defend everybody who took heat from the enemy just for standing up to the deportation machine. That includes all 575 people (and counting) arrested for their actions in the LA rebellion; the LA 30, courageous protestors who face charges for their just acts of resistance against the mass deportation machine; the 17 people who are facing federal charges; the others who might still be hit with repression; and the hundreds and thousands of people who were brutalized by the LAPD for no reason, and who deserve just compensation for their injuries, their psychological trauma, and the violation of their civil rights.
We must insist that it is right to rebel against ICE, defend the LA 30 inside and outside the courtroom, and fight against the disgusting bourgeois propaganda that insists it was wrong for the people of LA to fight back against state terror. We must go to the people, listen to how they’re understanding the protest movement, and challenge them to join the fight to drop the charges. We must stand with the rebels facing charges and support their struggles, and promote the righteous acts of rebellion that have shaken the ruling class and knocked the mass deportation machine on its ass. This is crucial to winning the battle of public opinion in support of the rebels who shook this country to the core, defeating the government’s continued repression of protest, and creating sustained organized resistance to the mass deportation machine based among the people. That way, when the next flame of mass resistance catches, it will become a wildfire that can finally melt ICE and burn down this mass deportation machine.
If you’re ready to be a part of this movement, you need to join Dare to Struggle. We stood with the rebel youth on the front lines, challenging them to brave the attacks of the enemy and to organize a movement that can outlast the Battle of LA. We took rubber bullets and tear gas, putting our bodies on the line in the struggle against ICE. And we are determined to keep the struggle going, despite the lull in the mass protest movement. We believe that the masses are the makers of history, and the Battle of LA proved this. Join us on outings to the parks, neighborhoods, stores, skateparks, parties, and workplaces to talk about the Battle of LA and organize the people to defend the rebels.
IT IS RIGHT TO REBEL AGAINST ICE!
DROP THE CHARGES, defend the LA 30!
SMASH THE MASS DEPORTATION MACHINE!
Dare to Struggle 