IMMOKALEE, Fla. — Neighbors in Immokalee reached out to Fox 4 saying there was an ICE raid in their community. They say they saw a bus full of farmworkers on Camp Keais Road being pulled over, and they showed us video of the incident.
WATCH: Fox 4's Eric Lovelace spoke to a neighbor who saw it unfold:
Immokalee is a farming community where people get up early and head to work on local farms. But Wednesday, they say they were met by ICE agents on their commute.
Video sent to us by Unidos Immokalee shows federal agents appearing to pull over and raid a bus heading for a tomato farm. The footage captures chaos and commotion as multiple people were detained.
"When they got pulled over, I guess they're asking people for identification, paperwork, my mom didn't have it," Junior Velazquez said.
Velazquez lives in Immokalee and has for a long time. His mother is a legal immigrant from Guatemala. During the raid Wednesday, she didn't have her papers on her.
"I rushed over there to try and go pick them up so we could give them information so my mom wouldn't be transported to a detention center," Velazquez said.
Velazquez says watching this unfold only made him feel one thing.
"Fear, fear for sure," Velazquez said.
Videos appear to show ICE agents detaining multiple people, with multiple Florida Highway Patrol vehicles and unmarked cars on scene.
Despite the chaos, Velazquez's mother had one thing on her mind.
"The only thing she said was, I'm gonna stick it out because if there's work, I gotta go to work," Velazquez said.
Velazquez says that's the attitude so many carry into jobs that help communities thrive, jobs he says many wouldn't want to do, but they do anyway to make ends meet.
"Immokalee is a beautiful community. The people here we're not monsters, we're just trying to make a living and provide for our families, that's all we're trying to do," Velazquez said.
