For more than two months, protesters camped in the small border community of Lochiel and occupied a cottonwood tree that stood in the path of border wall construction — an effort that ended abruptly last week after federal agents removed a tree-sitter from the cottonwood and demolished the generations-old tree.
Now, the Lochiel-based camp is no more.
“Camp O:Shad has ended, but what happened here will live far beyond the camp itself … Although we didn’t achieve everything we fought for, history was made,” a coalition of protesters said in a statement posted to Rally for the Valley’s Instagram account Wednesday.
AZPM last visited the camp in the early morning hours of Thursday, Oct. 8. Illuminated by lightstands, contractors were working through the night to place 32-foot-tall panels into dirt trenches — lengthening the planned double border wall, segment by segment. The construction was quickly approaching a flat bed of earth — the site of four cottonwoods that had been demolished.
A press release from the Sonoran Desert Press Office — a coalition involved with the Lochiel protests — notes that activists plan to reconvene next month for a "no borders" protest in the Southwest. A location has not yet been announced.
“We will find another tree,” the group said. “We’ll be back.”
As tensions boiled over in Lochiel last week, a spokesperson for U.S. Customs and Border Protection confirmed with reporters that agents had “conducted enforcement operations” in the area, “in support of authorized border infrastructure activities on federally managed land.”
But the agency declined to answer a number of specific questions from AZPM, including inquiries about allegations that Border Patrol was violent toward activists. In a video livestreamed by protesters on Wednesday, Oct. 7, Border Patrol agents in protective masks could be seen aiming tear gas canisters at protesters, and earlier that day, live video showed a protester had been covered with an emergency blanket in 90º heat.
The camp’s name, the group noted, paid tribute to O:Shad Ñu:kudam, a jaguar discovered in 2023 and named by members of the Tohono O’odham Nation. O:Shad Ñu:kudam translates to “jaguar protector.”
Protesters face criminal charges, court hearings##
As the dust settles from last week’s events, the federal government is pursuing a criminal charge against an individual who sat in a centuries-old cottonwood tree just south of the U.S.-Mexico border last week.
According to protesters, authorities had attempted to remove the woman from the tree on Thursday night — Oct. 8 — but sawed away the wooden platform she'd been sitting on. She remained in the tree through the night with a harness. The following day, she climbed down.
Federal prosecutors are now charging the woman with a Class A misdemeanor for allegedly violating a closure order from the Bureau of Land Management. The tree itself was located along the northern edge of Sonora, Mexico. However, prosecutors allege the woman attached herself to construction equipment, interrupting border wall construction for up to 20 minutes.
Class A misdemeanors can result in prison time ranging from six months to a year.
AZPM has not yet confirmed the individual’s name, as protesters told the Tucson Sentinel the name listed in court documents is not the name, nor the pronouns, the person uses.
Others were arrested and detained during last week’s events, but the exact number of how many people were arrested remains unclear. The Sonoran Desert Press Office said protesters “caught 36 charges, including those both cited and released and those taken into custody,” but some individuals appeared to have been cited more than once.
CBP did not respond to questions last week regarding arrest numbers, nor did it immediately respond to a follow-up question from AZPM requesting the total number of arrests and detainments on Thursday.
In its statement to AZPM, the agency described the activity from protesters as mostly peaceful, adding that, “agents took appropriate enforcement action in response to alleged violations and an alleged assault on a federal officer.” The agency's statement did not provide further details.
