John Fund of National Review Online describes the latest example of California’s kooky politics.
Move over, San Francisco. Oakland, the city of 420,000 people just ten miles away on the other side of the Bay Bridge, has shoved you aside for the title of Loony Left Capital of the country.
Hasta Muerte, an Oakland coffee shop whose name means “Toward Death” in Spanish, is refusing to serve police in uniform in order to show concern for the “physical and emotional safety of our customers and ourselves.” …
… Local liberals have been remarkably silent over Hasta Muerte’s policy. After all, California laws require businesses to serve the public without regard to race, gender, religion, or sexual orientation. But they are silent about a “suspect” person such as Robert Trevino, a Hispanic sergeant, who was surprised to be refused service last month. Ironically, he happens to be the president of the Latino Police Officers Association of Alameda County. …
… This is the second time in a month that Oakland has made Loony Left headlines. In February, Mayor Libby Schaaf publicly warned illegal immigrants of a pending ICE raid in northern California. Her action may have helped hundreds of illegal immigrants, including those convicted of violent or sex-related crimes, evade capture and deportation. Of the 232 illegal immigrants in the San Francisco Bay Area who were captured despite the mayor’s warning, ICE reported that 180 were either “convicted criminals, had been issued a final order of removal and failed to depart the United States, or had been previously removed” from the country and had come back illegally. ICE director Tom Homan likened Schaaf’s actions to those of a “gang lookout.”
All of this, along with Governor Jerry Brown’s formal declaration that California is a “sanctuary state,” and won’t cooperate with federal immigration laws, prompted U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions to sue the state for violating the U.S. Constitution.
