DURHAM, N.C. — Sheriff’s deputies in this predominantly liberal city on Tuesday began arresting protesters they said tore down a statue honoring pro-slavery secessionists, while the state’s Democratic governor pledged to repeal a state law that had prevented such monuments from being removed through legal means.

Protesters had gathered in Durham on Monday evening to support victims of the weekend’s deadly white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., which had been called in opposition to the removal of a statue of the Confederate general Robert E. Lee. Before they were through, the Durham demonstrators ripped down the statue, which had stood since 1924 and was protected by a special state law, while law enforcement officers stood by.

But on Tuesday, a clearly irate Sheriff Michael D. Andrews of Durham County, responding to apparent criticism that his officers had not done enough, announced that he would use “every legal option available to us” to find and arrest those who had torn down the statue — including videos of the protest that had been posted on social media and widely shared. “Let me be clear,” he said at a news conference. “No one is getting away with what happened. We will find the people responsible.”

Hours later, word that deputies were raiding the houses of people suspected of being involved in the demonstration reached activists holding a news conference about the protest at North Carolina Central University, a historically black institution in Durham. One of the speakers, Takiya Thompson, a student at the university and a member of the Workers World Party who said she had climbed the statue on Monday and put on one of the straps used to pull it down, was arrested by two uniformed sheriff’s deputies as she left the communications building.