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EXCLUSIVE: TUCSON, Ariz. — Protesters swarmed a Mexican restaurant in Tucson, Arizona, Friday morning, briefly locking a group of federal agents in a gated parking lot as they were executing a search warrant in connection with a sprawling tax and immigration fraud investigation.
It happened outside a Taco Giro restaurant on North Grande Avenue in Tucson. A SWAT team responded after protesters surrounded the feds and allegedly used a bike lock to block the exit with agents inside.
“Special agents and officers from ICE Homeland Security Investigations, IRS Criminal Investigation, and other federal partners, are executing 16 search warrants in southern Arizona as part of a years-long investigation into immigration and tax violations,” an ICE spokesperson told Fox News Digital. “Multiple individuals are in custody.”
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More information is expected to be released soon, he added.
Authorities arrived at the restaurant around 9 a.m. It wasn’t open yet. Between 100 and 200 protesters began gathering outside an hour later, chanting “Go home ICE” and other slogans, some including profanity.
Many of them were carrying identical signs, reading, “illegal arrests require a hood.” One protester was seen shoving a finger in an agent’s face, standing behind a steel barricade.
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Among them was a more confrontational group of about a dozen. Shortly after 11, someone threw a bottle at an ICE vehicle.
Another placed a bike lock around the gate, locking the agents inside.
Authorities deployed flash bangs and pepper spray and arrested at least two people in the mob in front of a photographer.
After authorities cut the lock off with a saw, video shows smoke in the air as they filed out of the parking lot in law enforcement vehicles. Protesters were heard jeering as they left.
Earlier, the agents were also seen entering a house around the corner, just steps away.
Photos taken there show multiple men in handcuffs, being loaded into the back of an SUV.
ICE said the raids were part of a sprawling investigation into immigration and tax fraud.
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