Hola everyone,
My name is Trustee Gabriel Medina. I serve the Pajaro Valley Unified School District, representing the families of Pajaro, Las Lomas, and Watsonville. I am the son of farmworkers. I am a Chicano. And I represent communities whose lives are shaped by borders, but defined by resistance.
Immigration isn’t just policy where I live, it’s personal. It’s the voice of elders speaking Mixteco in our clinics. It’s the students translating for their parents at school. It’s the fear that rises when a white van slows down near your house, not knowing if it’s delivering a package or taking someone away.
And this past week, that fear became real again.
Rumors spread across our community, ICE agents were stationed in Monterey, planning raids in Salinas and Watsonville. People panicked. Some pulled their kids from school. Others skipped work. By 7am, I was on San Juan Road with community members, no reporters, and me as the only not elected officials, just us, protecting each other the way our ancestors always have.
But that same evening, I sat in a board meeting where we were asked to vote on expanding campus security, bringing more law enforcement into schools that serve undocumented and Indigenous youth.
Let me be clear:
We cannot call ourselves a sanctuary district in the morning, and vote to criminalize our students by night.
We cannot separate the trauma of ICE raids from the trauma of school policing. It’s the same uniform. The same fear. The same message: You don’t belong here.
And this is where I want to speak directly, not just as a trustee, but as a Chicano and as someone who refuses to stay in my lane.
What’s happening in Palestine-to our hermanos and hermanas is also happening here.
The checkpoints. The detentions. The surveillance. The disappearances.
It’s not a metaphor. It’s a mirror.
Palestinian families are being bombed by U.S.-funded weapons. Children are being buried in rubble. And at the same time, here in Watsonville, we’re watching ICE vans pull up to homes, detain parents, and disappear green card holders with no warning, no due process, no humanity.
These aren’t isolated systems. They are deeply connected.
Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian green card holder, was detained by ICE without cause.
Luis Leon, an 82-year-old Guatemalan grandfather, was secretly deported while renewing his residency.
A farmworker in Camarillo fell to his death during an ICE raid just this month.
In Mesa Verde and Golden State Annex, detainees are held in for-profit prisons with no timeline, no justice, no names.
Let’s name them for what they are:
Concentration camps.
Built to strip people of dignity.
Funded to break spirits.
Designed to disappear.
And it’s not just happening “to them.” It’s happening to us.
It’s happening to our Muslim neighbors.
To our Arab neighbors.
To our Haitian, Dominican, pCentral American, and undocumented neighbors.
And yes, it’s happening to our communities, too.
This is why we must speak the words out loud:
From Watsonville to Rafah, oppression looks the same.
This country is not just funding genocide abroad, it is practicing displacement at home.
We cannot be divided into our issues, into our neighborhoods, into our hashtags.
Palestine is not just a foreign policy debate. It’s a moral line in the sand.
That’s why I’m proud to endorse Sean Dougherty for Congress.
Sean doesn’t walk the middle of the road while people are being hurt. He stands firmly on the side of justice. He supports a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. He believes in ending ICE’s unchecked power. He supports pathways to citizenship, not pathways to prison. And he knows that real school safety comes from trust, not militarization.
Sean doesn’t treat our communities as political liabilities, he treats us as people worth fighting for.
So to my fellow Chicanos, Mexicanos, and Latinos:
This isn’t just about immigration, it’s about liberation.
And to our Muslim and Palestinian neighbors:
We see you. We believe you. We fight with you.
Our struggles are not the same, but they are bound together by a shared enemy: state violence.
And we will not win until we rise together.
Let’s build a future rooted in dignity, not detention.
A future rooted in solidarity, not silence.
A future rooted in love, for all people, across all borders.
¡Viva Palestina! ¡Viva la gente! ¡Y viva la justicia!