 "Trump's San Diego rally draws over 1,000 chanting protesters")
Donald Trump brought his message of walls and deportations to the doorstep of America's busiest border crossing on Friday as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee greeted supporters in San Diego, amid one of the largest counter-protests organised against him.
The scene inside the San Diego Convention Center during Trump's speech was relatively placid, while outside demonstrators opposed to his controversy-ridden White House bid marched and chanted, carrying signs criticising his rhetoric against illegal immigration.
Waving US and Mexican flags, more than 1,000 people turned out for anti-trump rallies in San Diego, a city on the US-Mexico border whose San Ysidro port of entry sees nearly 300,000 people a day cross legally between the countries.
San Diego is considered a binational city by many who live on opposite sides of the border, and about a third of the city's population is Latino.
During Trump's speech on Friday, some protesters outside the convention center scaled a barrier and lobbed water bottles at police. One man was pulled off the wall and arrested as others were surrounded by fellow protesters and backed away from the confrontation.
After the convention centre emptied, clusters of Trump supporters and anti-Trump demonstrators began to mix in the streets, many exchanging shouted epithets and some throwing water bottles at one another.
Police in riot gear declared the gathering an unlawful assembly and ordered the crowd to disperse, herding the crowd out of the city's restaurant-filled Gaslamp Quarter.
San Diego police said on Twitter that 35 arrests were made during the protest.
"Fantastic job on handling the thugs who tried to disrupt our very peaceful and well attended rally," Trump tweeted to police afterwards.
Trump has weathered months of blowback from all ends of the political spectrum for his immigration policy, which calls for the building of a wall along the US-Mexico border and deporting the nearly 11 million undocumented immigrants who reside in the US.
The scene inside the San Diego Convention Center during Trump's speech was relatively placid, while outside demonstrators opposed to his controversy-ridden White House bid marched and chanted, carrying signs criticising his rhetoric against illegal immigration.
Waving US and Mexican flags, more than 1,000 people turned out for anti-trump rallies in San Diego, a city on the US-Mexico border whose San Ysidro port of entry sees nearly 300,000 people a day cross legally between the countries.
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During Trump's speech on Friday, some protesters outside the convention center scaled a barrier and lobbed water bottles at police. One man was pulled off the wall and arrested as others were surrounded by fellow protesters and backed away from the confrontation.
After the convention centre emptied, clusters of Trump supporters and anti-Trump demonstrators began to mix in the streets, many exchanging shouted epithets and some throwing water bottles at one another.
Police in riot gear declared the gathering an unlawful assembly and ordered the crowd to disperse, herding the crowd out of the city's restaurant-filled Gaslamp Quarter.
San Diego police said on Twitter that 35 arrests were made during the protest.
"Fantastic job on handling the thugs who tried to disrupt our very peaceful and well attended rally," Trump tweeted to police afterwards.
Trump has weathered months of blowback from all ends of the political spectrum for his immigration policy, which calls for the building of a wall along the US-Mexico border and deporting the nearly 11 million undocumented immigrants who reside in the US.