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Democratic legislators expressed indignation after the American senator Alex Padilla of California was roughly withdrawn from a press conference of the Ministry of Internal Security (DHS), then forced to the ground and handcuffed.
A video of the incident shows that Padilla seeming to interrupt a press conference Thursday in Los Angeles held by the DHS chief Kristi calls.
“I am the Senator Alex Padilla,” he said while advancing when Noem was talking. “I have a question for the secretary.”
But he never had the chance to ask the question. The agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had already surrounded Padilla and pushed him out of the conference room. A mobile phone video shot by a member of Padilla staff showed that the senator was crying: “Hands off” when he was escorted in an adjacent corridor.
The agents finally forced him on the ground, while Padilla protested that he could not keep his hands behind his back as requested and put his body flat at the same time. An FBI agent then stood in front of the camera and ordered the staff member to stop the recording.
The senator’s office said Padilla was currently not detained. In a statement, he explained that Padilla had hoped to question Noem and General Gregory Guillot about the American military deployment against demonstrators in Los Angeles.
“Senator Padilla is currently in Los Angeles by exercising his duty to monitor the Congress of Operations of the Federal Government in Los Angeles and through California,” said his office in a statement.
“He was in the federal building to receive a briefing with General Guillot and listened to the press conference of secretary Noem. He tried to ask the secretary a question and was forcibly removed by federal agents. ”
Which has just arrived at @SenAlexPad is absolutely odious and scandalous.
He is an American senator looking for.
The violent attacks of this administration against our city must end.pic.twitter.com/qbh9zpe8i9
– Mayor Karen Bass (mayor) June 12, 2025
Padilla himself held a press conference thereafter, where he established a parallel between his raw treatment and the immigration raids occurring under the administration of President Donald Trump.
“If this is how this administration reacts to a senator with a question, I can only imagine what they are doing to agricultural workers, cooks, Day workers in the Los Angeles community and throughout California and throughout the country,” Padilla told journalists.
The recent demonstrations in Los Angeles came in response to the aggressive deportation campaign of the Trump administration, which targeted undocumented workers in places such as the Home Depot hardware chain.
Trump has since responded to these demonstrations by deploying nearly 4,000 National guard Troops and 700 American navies in Southern California, in what criticisms have called illegal use of military power against civilians.
On Thursday, Padilla Democratic colleagues in the Senate rushed to express their support after the incident.
“I just saw something that has missed the stomach – the mistreatment of an American senator,” said the head of the Senate minority Chuck Schumer. “We need immediate answers to what Devil has passed.”
Florida Maxwell Frost representative then fired video Showing the Democrats walking towards the office of the leader of the majority of the Senate John Thune to call for action.
“There must be a responsibility for the detention of a senator. It is not normal,” wrote Frost.
On social networks, however, the DHS accused Padilla of engaging in an “disrespectful political theater”. He argued that the senator did not identify himself while he “rushed” to Noem, which seems to be contradicted by the video of the incident.
DHS said Noem had met Padilla after the press conference for 15 minutes.
Californian officials accused Trump of having caused tensions in the state by sending the military to rage against demonstrations, some of which have become violent but have already started to relax.
The last time a president deployed the National Guard in a state on the objections of a governor, it was in 1965, to protect demonstrators from civil rights against violence in separate Alabama.
Governor Gavin Newsom has since continued the Trump administration to block the use of American military power outside the federal sites, calling a step towards “authoritarianism”.
Earlier this week, Padilla said that Trump’s immigration raids “terrorize the communities, separated families and put American citizens in danger”.
Trump suggested that he could have a California governor Gavin Newsom Order and thought about the declaration of martial law if the demonstrations continue. He also described demonstrators as “animals” and “a foreign enemy”, supervising them within the framework of a broader “invasion” which justifies emergency powers.
“If they can handcuff an American senator for having asked a question, imagine what they will do to you,” said Newsom in an article on social networks that showed a photo of Padilla held on the ground by three agents.
