A protester displays his multipurpose sign at the Jan. 29, 2025, demonstration outside Redding City Hall. Photo by Mike Chapman for A News Cafe.
President Trump’s edicts from the White House are not only shaking up the nation, his barrage of controversial executive orders is having a seismic ripple where we live in the North State – and not in a good way.
Trump’s immigration crackdown and his Constitution-busting moves have spurred growing protests in Redding, including another one coming up Tuesday outside the Shasta County Board of Supervisors chambers.
This article mainly explores local reaction to the president’s mass deportation order for undocumented immigrants. While some directly affected by anti-immigration policies declined to talk out of fear of reprisals, others would speak only on condition of anonymity, or just give their first names.
Others didn’t hold back, such as the owner of a Shingletown vineyard and winery operation who didn’t mince words. More on that later.
Order creates fear
One person willing to speak out is Sharon Brisolara, a local champion of human rights. She’s a member of the Shasta Equal Justice Coalition, an alliance of local residents and groups that wants everyone in the community to be treated fairly, especially those caught up in the criminal justice system.
The coalition advocates for “all identities, backgrounds, or circumstances,” according to its online statement.
Brisolara and others in her group are concerned about the emotional and material impact on families who have loved ones who are currently undocumented.
Trump’s “border czar” Tom Homan recently said on ABC “This Week” that all undocumented immigrants should realize they could be taken into custody at any time, even if they don’t have a criminal record.
“I don’t even know how to explain the fear around deportation of not seeing someone, fear of your status visiting someone, visiting your family in another country not knowing if you’ll be able to get back,” she said.
There are fears locally that the nationwide roundups occurring under the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, will soon arrive in Northern California.
A CNN article from Feb. 2 said that in the weeks to come, the Trump administration is expected to ask state and local law enforcement agencies to assist in the roundup and arrests of undocumented immigrants, despite a California law that restricts local agency cooperation with the Feds.
Pro-Trump demonstrators take over the intersection in front of Redding City Hall after the anti-Trump protest wound down on Feb. 17, 2025. Photo by Mike Chapman for A News Cafe.
ICE teams are being assisted by agents from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the U.S. Marshals Service, according to reports from the national news media.
The people they’re going after have been branded as threats to public safety and national security.
Brisolara worries that Trump’s campaign against immigrants – or anyone of color, for that matter – will encourage racial confrontations locally.
“We should all be concerned about those who are emboldened by the president’s words to troll, attack or make false claims about people in our community whose race or ethnicity do not match their own,” she said. “There has been much documentation of such actions.”
There’s another aspect to alienating the Hispanic population. Brisolara believes public safety will be compromised through a distrust of law enforcement.
“We should all be concerned that (Trump’s) orders and actions will undermine public safety by making people whose legal status is in process, or who have family members whose status is in process or are undocumented, and make them fearful of reporting crime or sharing information with law enforcement that could help solve cases,” she said.
Brisolara also points to the country’s broken promises over gaining legal status.
“We should all be concerned about the actions the president has taken against those who were told that their status under humanitarian parole policies was protected and who have been abiding by the processes and requirements of those policies,” she said.
Brisolara notes the process of gaining legal status can take many years, even when immigrants hire lawyers and have full access to paperwork.
She also calls out Trump’s dangerous use of words such as “invasion” when referring to border crossings.
“This sets up the possibility of using military powers and invoking the Alien Enemies Act which would give him the power to circumvent the rule of law and set up the kinds of deportation camps that have been in discussion,” she said. “When we think about the kind of country that we want to be, deportation camps should not be an element of that vision.”
Agriculture perspective
Another person willing to share their thoughts is Mike Boehlert, who owns and operates the Lassen Peak Winery with his wife in the Shingletown area.
He spoke about how a labor shortage in North State agriculture “has been bad since the first sitting of our great leader.”
He said the major seasonal employers locally are the strawberry growers whose harvest time is in September and October. He said those growers hire hundreds of people to grow, trim and ship the berry plants.
He said he has 42 acres of vineyards but has had to abandon about 30 of those acres due to worker shortages that affect his ability to pick and ship 20 tons of grapes a day. He’s able to sell a limited amount of grapes locally, and uses the remaining fruit for his Lassen Peak Winery.
“We only use four to eight workers for our harvest. It has not been a problem getting that number of people, but the 40 we would need for commercial harvest is not possible,” he said.
Boehlert said his operation does not knowingly hire “illegals” and that most of his vineyard workers live in Tehama County.
The problem he encounters, though, is that when he requires a photo ID and Social Security card from workers, he finds out six months later that the papers are stolen or forged.
“The Social Security Administration requires a report in January of each year for the prior year’s wages and employment taxes. Usually in March or April we get a letter back saying the names and SS numbers don’t match,” he said.
He says taxes paid by workers into the system, such as the Social Security general fund, aren’t returned and never credited to the individual workers.
“These workers are contributing to Social Security and Medicare and can never recover those contributions,” he said.
“Their kids are going to school. They may get medical and dental services covered in California, but they are contributing to a system that does not support them. They are paying sales taxes, federal and state employment taxes, but do not get the benefits.”
“All these ‘illegals’ are about the only thing keeping Social Security afloat,” he said.
ICE community forum
Local protests over a month’s time have grown from a handful of sign-carrying demonstrators outside Redding City Hall to a mostly peaceful crowd on Presidents Day that drew more than 400 to the sidewalks, including about a dozen Trump supporters.
Some protesters involved in the upcoming Tuesday demonstration believe anti-immigration raids may have already occurred last year in Shasta County. A forum scheduled for the Tuesday Board of Supervisors meeting might provide answers about local ICE cooperation or, the lack of it.
Maxine Scout of the Facebook page Redding Resistance is helping to coordinate the Tuesday noontime protest. She and other supporters have been submitting questions to the board ahead of the forum, labeled as R4 on the supervisors’ agenda.
“What it’s about is rejecting ICE collaboration in Shasta County,” she said.
A protester supporting undocumented immigrants gives the peace sign to drivers while holding the flag of Mexico during the Feb. 8, 2025, demonstration in front of Redding City Hall. Photo by Mike Chapman for A News Cafe.
Scout pointed to a resolution passed by the Board of Supervisors in April 2024 that stated Shasta would not become a sanctuary county. The directive stated the county would not accept any state or federal money to support providing a safe place for asylum seekers or non-citizen immigrants, except in emergencies.
The board, in a 3-0 vote, was spurred on by Sheriff Michael Johnson, who had traveled to the border with Mexico to witness unauthorized crossings. At the time, the sheriff expressed strong feelings about what he saw.
“There are illegal immigrants being shipped right here into Shasta County. Whether you want to believe it or not, it’s happening,” Johnson said. “Sooner or later, the impacts on Shasta County we’re going to realize.”
Tim Garman, a supervisor at the time, abstained from the vote because he first wanted to know whether the county had a crime issue associated with undocumented immigrants in the county.
“The protest is just basically taking a stand against ICE. We don’t want to pay for police or local sheriffs to collaborate with ICE agents. We don’t want any local funding going to ICE operations and we want ICE out of schools and sacred places and hospitals,” Scout said.
She said she’s concerned about any loopholes in California’s sanctuary law, known as Senate Bill 54/California Values Act, that was approved in 2017. It prevents local law enforcement agencies from spending public money on directly participating in immigration enforcement.
For example, the legislation stops police from turning people over to immigration authorities, although there are exceptions for those who have been found guilty of specific violent crimes.
Protesters hit the streets
A Redding protest on Feb. 8 was organized by the group NorCal Underground, which has a Facebook presence.
Various protesters supported everything from transgender rights, pro-LGBTQ policies and pro-Palestinian stances, while condemning mass deportations of undocumented immigrants and Trump’s axing of government Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) programs. Sacking Trump sidekick Elon Musk and supporting federal workers have been other themes.
“There’s a lot of protection for vulnerable communities within our legal system and our laws, but there’s been a target to minimize those or access to understanding those,” said a NorCal Underground organizer who asked to remain anonymous.
They wanted to drive the point home that unless you’re Native American and indigenous to the U.S., we’re all immigrants.
“No one is illegal on stolen land” was one of the signs carried in Redding during recent protests against Trump policies. Photo by Mike Chapman for A News Cafe.
“I can’t speak for everybody here, but I very much believe that no one is illegal on stolen land. This land was stripped from Indigenous people,” they said.
Another protester, who didn’t want to give her name, sympathized with immigrant families.
“It’s definitely not OK that we have kids afraid to go to school. Kids are afraid to be taken away from their families. People are afraid to show up to work. ICE is coming into buildings. It’s not OK,” she said.
A protester who only wanted to give her first name, Jacqui, came to the Presidents Day gathering from neighboring Trinity County. She sympathized with the protesters and described her personal issues as freedom and women’s rights.
“I’m opposed to the coup that’s occurring. And we are in a constitutional crisis. We want our representatives to actually represent us. Don’t roll over and play dead. I’m tired of it,” Jacqui said.
She was impressed that some 400 people turned out. “Lots of people for a really red town,” she said, referring to Redding.
“It’s a shame that it’s come to the point where a 75-year-old woman has to come out and carry a sign around,” she said, speaking about herself.
Law enforcement policies
The Tuesday noon protest corresponds with a community forum focusing on ICE’s countywide access – if there was any and to what extent – from last year. County supervisors also are set to hear a presentation from the Sheriff’s Office.
“A community forum will be held to provide information to the public to consider and receive public comment regarding federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) access to individuals for civil immigration enforcement that was given by county law enforcement departments in 2024,” a county statement says.
A News Cafe didn’t hear back from the Sheriff’s Office after repeated requests for comment, but the Redding Police Department and Anderson Police Department shared their policies that conform with SB 54.
Redding Police Chief Brian Barner told A News Cafe that the RPD has not worked with ICE on any operations in his 28 years of experience with the department.
“I asked my leadership team (lieutenant and captain ranks) and none have any past experience of working with ICE on any operations in the city,” Barner said.
Barner added that his department has not had any requests to assist ICE or of ICE conducting operations in the city since he’s been chief starting in October 2023 or since the new Trump administration has taken over.
Likewise, Sgt. Eric Haynes of the Anderson Police Department acknowledged his agency has a policy regarding immigration violations that follows state law.
“Our agency is committed to the safety of the citizens of Anderson,” Haynes added.
The Sheriff’s Office has a similar policy in its custody manual. A Sheriff’s Office spokesman ignored a request to elaborate.
In an interview with KPBS TV, Bonta said his office is monitoring statewide compliance – or lack of compliance – with SB 54.
“If there is a failure to comply, we will act,” Bonta told the station.
Suggestions for change
In a KKRN radio interview that Brisolara conducted in August 2023 on her “Bending the Arc” show, Redding immigration attorney Tania Narciso made a telling statement long before Trump began his second term.
Narciso described the changing legal landscape surrounding immigration. One of her observations certainly rings true today.
“Things change all the time. It really does have a lot to do with who we have as president and just the times we live in,” Narciso told Brisolara.
In addition to reacting to Trump, both Brisolara and winery owner Boehlert suggest practical ways of handling immigration, absent the chaos.
Brisolara sees an answer in working with elected officials to revamp immigration legislation, including forms of legal immigration including the H-1B visa. The H-1B is a nonimmigrant visa that lets foreign professionals work in the U.S. for a temporary time.
“That would require a willingness to abide by rules established by representatives of the people. Investing in such efforts would likely cost less than the $86 billion that border czar Tom Homan has estimated that actions set in motion by these executive orders would take,” she said.
That effort would examine “true data on immigration trends, costs, and benefits, and would better serve national security interests,” she said.
From his perspective on employing immigrant farmworkers, Boehlert sees the need for a comprehensive agricultural work program for temporary workers.
“Something along the lines of the old Bracero Program of the 1950s and 1960s with better living, health and medical programs,” he said. “They can work during harvest, planting, or whatever season, and go home in the off-season.”
Under federal guidance from 1942 to 1964, the Bracero Program let Mexican workers come to the U.S. legally on short-term contracts to work the fields and railroads.
Boehlert has choice words for what’s happening at the start of Trump’s second term.
“Trump is the perfect example of an emperor with no clothes. … All his Republican friends would not have the balls to tell a 300-pound ass that he is naked,” he said.
Boehlert stands up for the work ethic of undocumented immigrants.
“Do you ever see Hispanics begging for money in front of Safeway or Winco? No. Do you see whites? Yes,” he said. “Who wants to work? Not so much here, but in SoCal and elsewhere, Hispanics line up at Home Depots to work … what a concept.”
“Good thing I have no strong opinions on this subject,” Boehlert said with more than a hint of sarcasm.
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