More than a thousand protests are planned across the US this Saturday and Sunday after ICE agents shot three people, one fatally, in Minneapolis and Portland, Oregon, this week.
“This weekend, people all over are coming together not just to mourn the lives lost to ICE violence, but to confront a pattern of harm that has torn families apart and terrorized our communities,” said Leah Greenberg, co-executive director of Indivisible, an organizer of “ICE Out for Good Weekend of Action”.
Large crowds marched down the streets of Manhattan, New York, many carrying umbrellas amid the rainy winter weather.
In Tucson, Arizona, demonstrators lined up outside Republican representative Juan Ciscomani’s office. In downtown Stuart, Florida, a crowd gathered outside representative Brian Mast’s office. Mast, a Republican who is also chair of the House foreign affairs committee, has defended the actions of the ICE agent who shot and killed Good, saying he acted reasonably.
“We’re thrilled that so many people came out to memorialize Renee Good,” Stuart protest organizer Barbara Turitz told Treasure Coast News.
About 200 people joined a protest in Fairfield, Connecticut, outside a Home Depot store.
“We’re raising awareness of what’s happening in our country,” Meg Doyle, a member of Bridgeport Resists, who organized the protest, told CT Insider. “People can follow their own hearts about how they respond to it, but this is about showing up in the community, our beloved community, and letting people know we care about them, and that we’re angry, and we’re energized and we’re going to make change.”
Protesters in Philadelphia began their march at city hall before arriving at the federal detention center. The crowd could be heard chanting phrases such as “ICE has got to go” and “no fascist USA”, reported 6abc. The protest was one of several demonstrations held in the city in recent days.
Several North Carolina cities, including Durham and Raleigh, also joined the nationwide protests. Demonstrators carried upside-down American flags and signs that said “Stop Looking Away!” and “It’s ICE Cold in America.”
“What justice means to us is for ICE to not be in our streets any more,” Amy Aponte, an organizer with the Party for Socialism and Liberation, told ABC11. “It just made me realize that really, none of us are safe. You know, Renee Good is a white woman. And if they can shoot her, if they kill her, they can kill you. They can kill me for no reason.”
The action comes as tensions escalate in communities where ICE and federal agents have been deployed to crack down on undocumented immigrants, often resulting in threats, attacks and arrests of community members. On 7 January, Minneapolis resident and US citizen Renee Nicole Good was killed by an ICE agent during an immigration sweep. Footage of the shooting taken by community members attempting to disrupt ICE operations – more than 2,000 agents had recently been deployed to the Twin Cities – quickly spread across the internet. By the evening of Good’s death, thousands of people had gathered at the site of the shooting, some Democrats had threatened to withhold funding to the Department of Homeland Security and the Minneapolis mayor, Jacob Frey, had told ICE to “get the fuck out” of the city. From New York to Oakland to Kansas City, thousands more took to the streets.
The following day in Portland, Oregon, ICE agents shot Venezuelan immigrants Yorlenys Betzabeth Zambrano-Contreras and Luis David Nico Moncada outside a hospital. Protests across the country continued to swell – and so did pushback, with six protesters arrested in Portland.
For the ICE Out for Good weekend of action, events are planned in every corner of every state, from Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, to Machias in eastern Maine. Indivisible, one of the groups behind last year’s No Kings protests, is continuously updating its online tracker to note every vigil, rally and protest. Other coordinating groups include the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Day Laborer Organizing Network and the 50501 movement.
“We demand justice for Renee, ICE out of our communities and action from our elected leaders,” said Greenberg. “Enough is enough.”
Steven Eubanks, 51, told the Associated Press that he felt compelled to attend a Saturday protest in Durham, North Carolina, after the “horrifying” killing of Good.
“We can’t allow it,” he said. “We have to stand up.”
