More than five months after the nation’s first major federal immigration raid kicked off in Los Angeles, House Democrats from Southern California, led by Rep. Robert Garcia of Long Beach, gathered in downtown L.A. to hear about the impacts of the ongoing immigration enforcement actions, including from people who were personally detained or had loved ones detained.

Similar hearings have been, or will be, held by other congressional committees elsewhere in the country, to document and build a record of what happened, lawmakers said during the Monday, Nov. 24, hearing.

Although Democrats are in the minority in both the U.S. Senate and House, Garcia, the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, said the goal is to start collecting evidence. That way, Garcia said, if Democrats regain control of Washington, they’ll be able to subpoena members of the Trump administration and take actions to prevent future alleged misconduct from happening.

“(President) Donald Trump won’t be in power forever, and certainly Democrats won’t be in the minority forever,” Garcia said in an interview after the hearing. “If we are able to retake the Congress, the power of subpoena power, of passing bills, is real, and it’s not far away.”

Some people who testified on Monday spoke of deplorable conditions in the detention facilities or brought up reports of people not being given due process.

That included Andrea Velez, a U.S. citizen who said she was erroneously detained on her way to work in June.

Velez said she was never compensated for the three days of lost wages while she was detained, during which she said she wasn’t allowed to call her family. When she asked the officers who detained her for their names, she said they replied that she “didn’t need to know.”

Velez said she now carries her passport with her wherever she goes and has been seeing a therapist to deal with the trauma.

“I don’t feel safe at all,” she said.

In addition to receiving testimony from Angelenos who believe they or a family member were unfairly, or even illegally, mistreated by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, House Democrats also announced a new online dashboard that will track reports of alleged misconduct by federal agents during immigration raids or detentions: www.oversightdemocrats.house.gov/immigration-dashboard.

Members of the public will be able to submit incident reports of alleged misconduct for members of Congress to investigate, Garcia said.

“We will hold this administration accountable,” Garcia said.

White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in an emailed statement that ICE officers are seeing a 1,000% increase in assaults against them. She blamed that on “dangerous, untrue smears from elected Democrats.”

“ICE officers act heroically to enforce the law and protect American communities with the utmost professionalism,” Jackson said. “Anyone pointing the finger at law enforcement officers instead of the criminals are simply doing the bidding of criminal illegal aliens.”

Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, in a separate statement, accused Garcia and L.A. Mayor Karen Bass — who also participated in the hearing — of “peddling more lies.” Like Jackson, McLaughlin said DHS officers have seen the number of assaults against them skyrocket, including being shot at, having rocks and Molotov cocktails thrown at them and people attacking them in cars.

“I’m calling on Democrats, like Rep. Garcia and Mayor Bass, to stop spreading this garbage,” McLaughlin said. “Instead of smearing our law enforcement, they should be thanking them this Thanksgiving for removing murderers, pedophiles, rapists, gang members, and terrorists from Los Angeles.”

House Democrats and those who participated in the field hearing at the LA Metropolitan Water District headquarters, meanwhile, were critical of the Trump administration.

Rep. Mark Takano, D-Riverside, who noted that his parents were 2 or 3 years old when Japanese Americans were interned during World War II, called it “shameful that this administration makes citizens feel like they have to carry a passport in their own country.”

Rep. Dave Min, D-Irvine, said Trump campaigned on the idea of going after violent gang members and criminals. “Instead,” he said, the administration “is going after people at kindergartens, at Home Depots, at courthouses, at health care clinics” and called it “an abuse of power.”

David Huerta, president of Service Employees International Union-United Service Workers West, who was arrested by federal agents while at a protest over immigration raids in June, called what was taking place by the Trump administration “an attack on our human dignity.”

Speaking with reporters later, Bass said she was thinking of people with missing family members who were taken away by federal immigration agents.

“We need to keep them in our thoughts and prayers as we go into the holiday season,” she said. “The blanket of fear and terror continues and absolutely must end.”

Monday’s hearing, which was absent of any Republican lawmakers, also included testimony from L.A. county officials and members of the L.A. City Council about how the immigration raids have forced people into hiding, harmed the local economy as a result of people not showing up to work, and other impacts.

Ahead of the hearing, a crowd of clergy leaders and immigrant rights advocates — joined by Bass — marched from L.A. City Hall over to the LA Metropolitan Water District headquarters by Union Station to attend the hearing.