By Nick Valencia
LOS ANGELES — She didn’t say a word, but everything about her posture said enough. A Latina police officer stood rigid as a protester leaned in, inches from her face, screaming. The man called her a traitor. Told her she should be ashamed. She didn’t flinch. But she looked like she wanted to disappear.
For Latino officers in Los Angeles, scenes like this are becoming all too common. The uniform they wear no longer grants them authority in the eyes of some — it erases everything else about them. Their language. Their roots. Their story.
The job has always been difficult. These days, it feels impossible.
These officers are often first-generation Americans. Many are children of immigrants. They speak Spanglish at home, eat at the same taquerías as their neighbors, and frequent the same barbershops, panaderias, and churches. But once they put on the badge, something shifts. They are no longer seen as part of the community — they’re seen as betraying it.
One officer I spoke to described watching a video of two fellow officers — one Black, one Latina — wounded in the anti-ICE protests. They sat slumped and dejected in a booth at a small Mexican restaurant. They had just been attacked. Despite the chaos, employees, some of whom may have been undocumented themselves, tended to them with compassion. There was no hesitation. Just instinct.
“A lot of us eat and frequent these places,” the officer messaged me afterward. “LAPD, LASD and all local agencies do not enforce immigration laws nor do we ask immigration status. If there’s a call for help — officer down or officer needs assistance — we will help them. Always.
The misinformation is getting very old and tiring.”
These officers aren’t outliers. Nearly half of all sworn personnel in the LAPD are Latino, a reflection of the city’s demographics. Roughly 15 percent are foreign-born, many the very first in their families to wear a badge. A large number are bilingual — not just linguistically, but culturally. They navigate Spanglish at home and police radio codes on the job. And yet, despite their presence in the ranks, Latino officers remain underrepresented in the command structure, where decision-making and public-facing leadership happen. So when an officer tells me that the misinformation “is getting very old and tiring,” it’s not just frustration — it’s fatigue from being seen as both everywhere and invisible at the same time.
That absence at the top has consequences. It shapes not just how policies are made, but how officers on the ground feel about enforcing them. When Latino officers don’t see themselves reflected in command — when the people making decisions don’t look like them, don’t speak their language, or don’t come from the neighborhoods they patrol — morale erodes. Trust does, too. It becomes harder to believe the department understands the full complexity of the communities it serves, or the weight its officers carry. And without that representation in leadership, there’s often no one in the room to push back, to add cultural context, or to slow down decisions that disproportionately affect their own.
Even as the LAPD publicly distances itself from enforcing federal immigration law, its real-world coordination with ICE tells a more complicated story. Earlier this month, photos emerged online purporting to show LAPD officers helping ICE stage tactical operations in the parking lots of Exposition Park. They weren’t making arrests — but they were providing perimeters, crowd control, and logistical support.
Through federal partnerships like Section 287(g), select local police departments across the country may assist with background checks, intelligence, or detention transfers — even without officially participating in enforcement. These layered relationships reinforce perceptions that LAPD and ICE are collaborators, even when officers themselves push back on that label. For communities long targeted by immigration policy, the distinction doesn’t always matter. And for Latino officers caught in the middle, it only deepens the burden.
Another officer — a longtime family friend — reached out after the June 14 “No Kings” protest, which described in some local media reports as peaceful.
“Nick, this turned into a violent protest,” she wrote. “It was great early in the day. But we started to get bottles and fireworks thrown at us. Only after that we declared it an unlawful assembly, and even then the crowd continued with rocks and bottles — which is why we deployed less lethal. Hope this clarifies some wrong info you’ve seen.”
There was no anger in her words. Just exhaustion. Not just from the protest, but from the constant effort to explain what actually happened — and to justify her presence there in the first place.
Another mixed-race Latina CHP deputy confided in me that she hadn’t been called in yet but was dreading the moment. That fear wasn’t theoretical. It was personal. Because like so many others in her position, she knows that when things escalate, being Latino won’t protect her — it might make her more of a target.
And then there’s the officer who warned a colleague not to return to a protest site where tear gas had just been deployed the night before.
“From one Latino to another,” they said, “don’t come back. It’s not worth it.”
We’ve seen Latino officers take a knee. We’ve seen them try to de-escalate. We’ve seen them hold the line while taking abuse from both sides. Some are people living the contradiction every time they clock in.
Latino police officers in Los Angeles are caught between their badge and their background—mistrusted by the communities they come from, and misunderstood by the institutions they serve. Expected to enforce order without losing touch with where they come from.
It is not lost on them that the people yelling “traitor” might have once been them — or someone in their family.
And in quieter moments — like that video of the Latina officer holding her breath as a man screams in her face — the toll becomes visible.
She doesn’t cry. But she looks like she wants to disappear.
The community wants them to speak Spanish, to be empathetic, to understand. But it also calls them traitors. The department wants them on the front lines, but too often doesn’t let them in the rooms where policy is made. So they are left in between — alone, fatigued, and still showing up.
Still holding the line. Even when no one seems to be holding it for them.