Hundreds of actions in all fifty states on Friday January 30 sent a message to the Trump administration against its deployment of ICE agents into American cities.
The coordinated action was considered a national strike, encouraging students and workers to not attend school or work, to not shop or engage in any retail activity. Small business owners and non profit organizations shut down offices for the day, and marched and protested.
In Los Angeles, where ICE raids have become a near-daily occurrence, thousands of people convened outside City Hall at 1 pm, including high school students and union members. By 6 pm, the protest ended in eight arrests.
Sonali Kolhatkar attended the gathering in the earlier part of the day and spoke with several people including high school students, workers, and lawyers about why they were on strike in this latest edition of the series Rising Up In the Streets.
ROUGH TRANSCRIPT:
[Chants]: ICE out, Trump out, ICE out, Trump out, ICE out, Trump out, ICE out. Trump out.
Wolfgang: My name is Wolfgang [unintelligible]. Call me Wolfy G, or whatever you like. I’m 16, proud to be 16. And I'm a proud supporter of hating ICE and hating Trump in any way.
Sonali Kolhatkar: You're supposed to be at school today, but you're not.
Wolfgang: Yeah. Who wouldn't, who wouldn't not skip this? This is incredible. And absolutely it is necessary that we skip school to go do this. No work, no school, no shopping. You just gotta do it.
