LOS ANGELES (CONVERSEER) – United States Senator Alex Padilla, representing the state of California, was in tears after he was arrested in Los Angeles.
Converseer reports that Padilla was arrested after being forcibly removed from DHS Secretary Kristi Noem’s press conference in Los Angeles.
According to a video from the press conference spotted by our Reporter, the Democrat Senator was heard saying, “I have questions for the secretary! … Hands off!!”
Although his arrest by the secret security lasted within minutes, he later choked up and practically started crying while addressing the press afterwards.
Padilla says he stumbled upon Noem’s press conference and “wanted to ask a question.”
“I’m here in Los Angeles today, and I was here in the federal building, in the conference room, awaiting a scheduled briefing from federal officials as part of my responsibility as a senator to provide oversight and accountability.
“While I was waiting for the briefing with General Guillot, I learned that Secretary Noem was having a press conference a couple of doors down the hall,” he said while crying.
Continuing, the California Senator said: “Since the beginning of the year, but especially over the course of recent weeks, I, several of my colleagues, I have been asking the Department of Homeland Security for more information and more answers on their increasingly extreme immigration enforcement actions. And we’ve gotten little to no information in response to our inquiries.
“And so I came to the press conference to hear what she had to say, to see if I could learn any new additional information and at one point, I had a question. And let me emphasise, just as we’ve emphasised the right for people to peacefully protest and to stand up for their First Amendment rights, for our fundamental rights.
“I was there peacefully. At one point, I had a question, and so I began to ask a question. I was almost immediately, forcibly removed from the room.
“I was forced to the ground and I was handcuffed. I was not arrested.
I was not detained. I will say this. If this is how this administration responds to a senator with a question, if this is how the Department of Homeland Security responds to a senator with a question, you can only imagine what they’re doing to farm workers,
to day labourers out in the Los Angeles community and throughout California and throughout the country.”
After the incident, Noem later said she would reach out to Padilla and “try to have a conversation” with him.
The incident has received gross condemnations, with Senator Chuck Schumer saying he was “sickened” by the “manhandling” and is demanding “immediate answers as to what the hell went on.”
Also, a “sombre” Pete Buttigieg says his stomach is queasy after watching Senator Padilla get arrested, adding that President Donald Trump has crossed the “reddest” line ever.
Recall that Padilla had earlier made a statement that, “No one is above the law. Not even Donald Trump.”
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