Press Democrat 1/28/26

Santa Rosa City Council member Victoria Fleming has called on her fellow city representatives to pass a local ordinance prohibiting federal immigration operations on city-owned property.

In an open letter addressed to Santa Rosa residents, Fleming condemned President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign that has escalated in recent weeks across Minnesota communities, resulting in the fatal shooting of two residents by federal agents in as many weeks.

Fleming characterized U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, as a quasi-military organization emboldened by the federal administration to act with impunity to send a message “not just to immigrants, but to all of us.”

“What we are witnessing from ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Patrol is not ‘targeted law enforcement.’ It is the beginning of a domestic paramilitary — weaponizing fear, vilifying communities of color, and deliberately targeting states governed by this administration’s political opponents,” she wrote in the Wednesday afternoon email.

Local government officials can no longer sit idly by, she said, equating silence and inaction to complicity.

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She asked that the city support creating so-called ICE-free zones that would prohibit immigration officers from operating on city-owned property and policies that require a judicial warrant for ICE to access city-owned property, resources and communications.

Fleming appears to be the first local official to openly call for the city to follow steps taken in other Bay Area communities. Alameda County on Tuesday adopted an ordinance banning federal immigration enforcement activities on county buildings and requiring all law enforcement officers to identify themselves upon entry ordinances. The San Jose City Council adopted a similar policy earlier in January and Santa Clara County did so last October.

A working group of Sonoma County supervisors is studying developing an ICE-free zones policy amid renewed pressure from community groups to take action.

Fleming said Santa Rosa must step up to protect immigrant communities “and affirm that our city will not be used as a staging ground for fear.”

“Our city’s resources and our public facilities exist to serve our residents — to provide safety, shelter, services and opportunity — not to be used as launching points for enforcement actions that invoke fear, tear families apart, and destabilize entre communities,” she wrote.

“I ask my colleagues to stand with me in drawing a line and in affirming that Santa Rosa is a city of courage,” she added.

Her comments come on the heels of the council’s Tuesday meeting where Council member Caroline Bañuelos reiterated earlier calls for the city to take a stand against the immigration crackdown.

Bañuelos, a seasoned civic advocate and longtime community organizer who became the first member to publicly identify as Latina when elected in 2024, said she decided to speak out because she could no longer remain silent.

“I keep asking myself when did we become a country that allows cruelty and inhumanity to be normalized,” she said during her Tuesday remarks. “Even though we have not seen these kinds of acts here, we’re very lucky, I don’t believe we can bury our heads in the sand and think it can’t happen here or to someone that we know or even to ourselves.”

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

You can reach Staff Writer Paulina Pineda at 707-521-5268 or paulina.pineda@pressdemocrat.com. On X (Twitter) @paulinapineda22.