On June 6, masked federal agents wearing tactical gear and armed with rifles mounted sweeping raids across multiple neighborhoods and workplaces in Los Angeles, California. Since then, the Los Angeles labor movement and its allies have met the moment with resistance to the Trump administration, the result of years of deep organizing on multiple fronts — and a blueprint for how a militant labor movement can develop the social movement infrastructure to fight back against rising authoritarianism.

Since early this year, a coalition of groups — including the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), along with immigrant rights groups like the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA) and the Los Angeles chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) — have built a Los Angeles Rapid Response Network (LARRN), with “first responders” to respond to immigration raids in real time. That network was activated as soon as news of the raids broke, with hundreds mobilizing to confront the agents and provide community support.

Among the first responders on the scene was David Huerta, vice president of the California Federation of Labor Unions, president of SEIU California and SEIU United Service Workers West (USWW), one of the largest unions in the state with nearly a million members. SEIU-USWW started the iconic the Justice for Janitors campaign in 1990 in LA to organize predominantly immigrant Latina women who cleaned commercial office space for wages as low as $7 an hour.