Jodi Rymer has lived in Massachusetts for 20 years, but she’s been watching from afar as ICE activity in her home state of Minnesota has resulted in a surge of detentions, major protests and tension with local authorities.
“My loved ones are in Minnesota and I wake up in an anxious sweat every morning because I am fearing for my loved ones lives and their safety,” Rymer said at a rally at the South Bay shopping center in Boston on Friday.
She was one of more than 300 people who attended the protest to show solidarity with demonstrators in Minneapolis, and to encourage local leaders to resist ICE activities in Massachusetts.
“We need to be prepared, we need to organize,” she said.
The rally, organized by labor unions and progressive groups, was held in front of Target and Home Depot, with organizers saying ICE has been conducting raids and stakeouts at those stores in other parts of the country.
The event in Boston coincided with walkouts and protests in Minneapolis, where unions were encouraging people to stay home from work and close businesses.
A number of the speakers pointed to ICE activity over the past year in Massachusetts. Organizers played a recording of an anonymous woman whose husband was detained by ICE in September.
Alicia Lopez, co-director of the New Bedford group Mujeres Victoriosas, said that ICE activity in her city is creating fear.
“We’re brown, Black, white, poor, rich, and they came to our streets to make us feel that we don’t belong there. But we belong there because we make those streets. Those streets belong to us,” she said.
Hector Soares, the child of two Brazilian immigrants, shared that his father had been detained by ICE in June.
“It still impacts us every day. My brothers cry while trying to understand why they can’t have a dad anymore,” he said in front of the crowd. “I have to sit and tell my brothers how this country chose to take him away from us. How this country now has decided that he’s a criminal when he has no criminal record. [The] only crime he’s committed is being here as an immigrant.”
A number of the groups at the rally were teachers unions. Kathryn Anderson, a special education teacher in Chelsea and president of the Chelsea Teachers’ Union, said ICE activity has disrupted many students’ lives.
“Dozens of our students have had family members and loved ones detained. ICE was in our elementary school parking lot for hours this fall,” she said. “Our students and our members show up to school every day in an atmosphere of fear.”
Anderson said that Jessica Tang, president of the American Federation of Teachers Massachusetts, was marching in Minneapolis today.
Some protesters in Boston cited a recent surge in ICE activity in Maine as another reason to get involved. Winthrop resident Cindy Luppi said she has “deep roots” in Maine and wanted to show support.
“I have some dear friends who live in Lewiston who are new Mainers and new Americans who came here. My particular friends came here from the Congo to avoid persecution,” she said. “They are worried about their safety now and the place they had to escape to. So it’s a very important day for me.”
