‘I feel betrayed,’ California Marine says of seeing his father punched by federal immigration agent
A former Marine says he feels “betrayed” by the U.S. after seeing a video on social media of his father being pinned to the ground and repeatedly punched by a federal immigration agent in Santa Ana on Saturday.
The post of the blows to his father also helped to spark a demonstration with dozens of protesters demanding the agents leave Santa Ana, as well as an online fundraiser to raise money for the man’s legal expenses.
Narciso Barranco, the 48-year-old landscaper who was seized off the street, has three sons who are U.S. Marines, including two on active duty, the oldest son, 25-year-old Alejandro Barranco, said in an interview on Sunday.
The two other sons are currently stationed at Camp Pendleton, he said.
“I feel betrayed,” Alejandro Barranco said. “My dad has no criminal history. He wasn’t doing anything bad. He was just working. The way they (federal agents) attacked him, I don’t think it’s right.”
His father was in the process of applying for a form of immigration called parole-in-place, which can grant family members of active-duty military who are without legal status permission to stay in the U.S. for a while, usually a year, and which can be extended, Alejandro Barranco said.
He said his father, who is undocumented, has lived in Orange County since the 1990s and owns a landscaping business. He has no criminal record, he said. An independent search of the local court system confirmed that.
On Sunday, Narciso Barranco was in a detention facility in Los Angeles, the son said.
“This is just madness,” said U.S. Rep. Lou Correa, D-Santa Ana, who describes America’s current immigration policies as flawed. “You have a family of three kids that took an oath for the country, ready to lay down their lives for this country, and their parents can’t stay here?”
Correa said he has been in touch with the Barranco family since Narciso was detained, along with many others in similar circumstances.
Narciso Barranco was in the middle of a landscaping job at a local IHOP on Saturday, June 21, when he was approached by several armed masked men in civilian clothes in the area of Edinger Avenue and Ritchey Street.
The son, who has since spoken to his father, said he told him as he saw the men walk toward him, in a “natural human reaction,” he ran towards his truck to grab his ID.
Video footage posted on social media shows Barranco being chased by federal agents as he carried a weed whacker before multiple U.S. Border Patrol agents restrained him on the ground.
He was punched in the face multiple times by at least one agent and pepper-sprayed at a close distance, his son said. Alejandro Barranco believes his shoulder may also be dislocated. The family did not know if he received any medical care after being detained.
“I’m honestly really hurt because I love this country a lot, and I love my parents a lot. I gave up four years of my life to serve this country and show that I’m a patriot,” said Alejandro Barranco, who added that he served in Afghanistan.
He believes his father was racially profiled.
Narciso Barranco was born in Morelia, MX, and moved to Orange County in the 90s, where he works as a landscaper for companies and under his small business, Barranco Landscaping, his son said.
As of Sunday evening, a GoFundMe set up for Narciso Barranco’s legal expenses raised more than $41,000.
“He is a good, hard-working man. He has raised his family here and has established himself here,” the GoFundMe says. “What we all saw today was disgusting and heart-wrenching.”
Later, after the video spread online, a protest of some 100 people took to the streets, waving American and Mexican flags and demanding that federal agents stop the sweeps they’ve been carrying out in Santa Ana, as shown in an NBC4 report.
Santa Ana Mayor Valerie Amezcua could not be reached for comment.
A spokesperson for the Border Patrol confirmed their agents were the ones who apprehended Barranco, but declined to comment further.
President Trump has repeatedly stressed that his administration would focus its immigration enforcement on criminals. But a significant number of people apprehended by federal immigration agents have no serious criminal convictions, or any criminal past at all, according to published reports.
Staff writer Sydney Barragan contributed to this report.