Last week a comrade witnessed seven Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents right outside the door of his apartment. “¡No abran la puerta! ¡Inmigración está aquí!” (Don’t open the door! Immigration is here!) he yelled at the top of his lungs.
Instead of watching immigration agents remove his neighbors from their home, he saw them leave empty-handed. Nobody opened the door.
Right after the incident, the comrade posted a warning on Facebook that ICE is in south Los Angeles where he shared his experience.
I saw it right away and called him.
“Are you ok, Pablo?” I asked.
“Yeah, but I’m just shaking with adrenaline because I’m the most non-confrontational person I know. But I just couldn’t help but build up the courage in that moment to help my neighbors out,” he explained.
“I’m really proud of you, comrade,” I said. .
Workers defending their neighbors
ICE raids have been scheduled to happen all across the US, as Trump tweeted out, which has brought workers together to battle these attacks. On July 22 in Tennessee, neighbors—black, white and Hispanic—formed a human chain around a family that was in danger of being deported. As ICE agents attempted to deport them, neighbors made sure they were able to safely leave.
“We stuck together like neighbors are supposed to do,” Felishadae Young told the local news channel.
Often times under this capitalist system we are taught individualistic ideas. Other minorities such as the black community are led to believe migrants are taking jobs and they should be for the removal of undocumented workers. In Tennessee and around the country we see that workers, sometimes led by church groups and immigrant rights groups and sometimes spontaneously, are standing up to these attacks.
This resistance meant that ICE couldn’t deport all the workers they had targeted. Instead of the 2000 workers they threatened to take into custody over the weekend of July 20-21, they only got 35 people.
This modest victory shows the potential of organizing those who are willing to defend their neighbors into a force capable of destroying all borders and creating a world where no one is illegal.
As Pablo and I talked more, we knew that this was the right thing to do. But we also often find it hard to know how to start or what to do next after an event like this. As young comrades working alone where we don’t have a concentration, we need to make a plan for what to do next to build the party into the revolutionary army that we need. We’ll be working on that in the days and weeks to come.
—Young comrade in South Los Angeles, USA
Workers Defending Immigrant Neighbors in Tennessee