Trump 'trying to shut down legal immigration': Sen. Alex Padilla reflects on DHS altercation

Evelyn Ronan, The Sacramento Bee on Jun 16, 2026

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

It’s been a year since U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., was forced to the ground and handcuffed by federal agents at a Los Angeles news conference for asking a question. In the meantime, he’s pushed for greater federal oversight at ICE facilities and called out the Trump administration on its management of immigration operations.

On June 12, 2025, Padilla was in a Los Angeles federal building where he’d been scheduled to receive a briefing from General Gregory Guillot when former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem hosted a news conference.

Padilla attended and stepped forward to ask a question of Noem before being physically removed from the room and placed in handcuffs.

On Friday, in an address to the U.S. Senate, Padilla reflected on the altercation. He said he and his colleagues had sought answers about the deployment of federal agents in Los Angeles in September 2025.

“I wanted answers,” Padilla said.

He said before could even finish his question, Padilla was being restrained and dragged out by federal agents, even as he identified himself as a sitting U.S. senator.

Padilla drew parallels in his speech on the floor between his restraint and U.S. Sen. Andrew Kim, D-New Jersey, being pepper-sprayed by federal officers earlier this year while conducting oversight at a protest outside the Delaney Hall Immigrations and Customs Enforcement facility in New Jersey.

“Americans don’t approve. They don’t approve of troops deployed into American cities. They don’t approve of federal agents making indiscriminate stops, arrests, detentions, or even deportations,” Padilla said on the floor. “They don’t approve of families being torn apart, of people being assaulted or pepper sprayed and arrested for exercising their First Amendment rights.”

Padilla has remained a vocal opponent of ICE’s presence in Los Angeles. In January, he co-authored the Dignity for Detained Immigrants Act, which is designed to overhaul U.S. immigration processing and phase out the use of private detention facilities over a three-year period. Padilla’s plan would eliminate the detention of families and would also require DHS to prove someone’s level of criminal threat and conviction history before using it as justification for detaining them.

A key stipulation of the bill is regular, unannounced visits from DHS to ICE detention facilities. After visiting the California City immigration detention center in February, Padilla noted that “basic standards for access to healthcare, food, water and legal counsel” were not being provided to detainees, according to reporting from The Sacramento Bee. Former DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin denied Padilla’s allegations and said the detention center, owned by for-profit company CoreCivic, was “regularly audited and inspected by external agencies.”

Padilla said the Trump administration’s recent actions are designed to “shut down legal immigration altogether.” He cited tactics like “mega master hearings,” where instead of judges processing 15 immigration cases at a time they are met with more than 100; “running out the clock” on Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, protection renewals; and the detention of “500 babies and toddlers” in ICE custody.

In February, the DHS admitted to deporting 86 DACA recipients among a mass deportation of 261.

Padilla has also come down on voter ID initiatives. In February, Padilla rebuked Trump’s State of the Union and said voter ID initiatives were “voter suppression” and “voter purge” mechanisms.

Padilla came down on federal immigration tactics again in March 2026 at a Senate hearing, shortly before Noem was fired from her post as DHS secretary. Padilla questioned Noem about whether she planned to deploy ICE agents to polling places. Nonpartisan research consistently finds that instances of noncitizen registration and voting are extremely rare.

Padilla said he will continue asking questions and demanding answers — and encouraged his constituents to do the same.

“If the DHS is so afraid of one question from one senator imagine what tens of millions of Americans peacefully protesting can do,” Padilla said.

____