Six antiwar demonstrators were arrested Wednesday at the Garden Grove office of Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Santa Ana) after camping there overnight and telling her they wouldn't leave unless she promised not to approve more funding for the war in Iraq.
Most of the protesters are members of the group Military Families Speak Out, and some have relatives in the armed forces. They entered the office about 7 p.m. Tuesday during an open house. They sat on the floor in the lobby and refused to leave unless the congresswoman made the statement they wanted. Sanchez, who opposes the war, refused.
The lawmaker's staff initially chose not to call police and allowed the group to stay overnight. Police removed the protesters in handcuffs about 8:15 a.m. Wednesday, while Sanchez was attending a meeting of Orange County Latino leaders.
The protesters were taken to the Garden Grove Police Department, where they were issued misdemeanor citations for trespassing.
Five were released pending an October court hearing, but Robert Dietrich was being held because he refused to sign a document promising to appear in court.
Sanchez, Orange County's only Democratic member of Congress, voted in 2002 against giving President Bush authorization to invade Iraq. More recently she voted to begin pulling troops out within 90 days.
Tuesday night Sanchez said she could not support the protesters because the $145 billion in Iraq war funding was in the same bill that would provide money to build the C-17 aircraft in California.
"I never voted for this war," she said. But "I'm not going to vote against $2.1 billion for C-17 production, which is in California. That is just not going to happen."
Protesters did not accept Sanchez's argument.
"This is a war that was made up and people are dying, and there is no reason for it," said Ed Garza, who was one of those arrested and who has a nephew in the military.
Medea Benjamin, who was not at the protest, said, "It's quite immoral for Sanchez to say she is more concerned about jobs in her district than the lives of our soldiers." Benjamin is co-founder of the national women's peace group Code Pink.
Declaring the start of the sit-in, Patricia Alviso, whose son has served two tours in Iraq, said, "We risk arrest to demonstrate the level of our commitment to peace, and we risk arrest because our children risk far more."
Once seated on the lobby floor, Alviso began reading the names of Californians killed in Iraq.
