ICE-OUT Protest Coverage

*TRIGGER WARNING* *MENTIONS OF VIOLENCE AND KILLING*

Photo credit Sava Wallaert

On Friday, January 30th, as lunch was wrapping up, many of our middle school students could not be found. Just minutes before, they had marched up the stairs and out the front gate, making for Dolores Park. Here they would join thousands of others who had also chosen to leave work or school early and head there to make history.

Why did this happen? What caused all these people to, on a seemingly random Friday, stop what they were doing and just leave?

The simple answer is that Friday was the day of a national strike. A national strike is when an effort is made, across the entire country, to avoid work and purchases as a way to protest a specific issue. Friday’s national strike, dubbed a “National Shutdown,” saw a large portion of the nation essentially “shut down” to express their disapproval of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), or more specifically, their ongoing actions in the city of Minneapolis.

ICE is a government agency that specializes in detaining and deporting “illegal” immigrants who have not acquired permission to live in the United States, claiming to focus mainly on those who have committed crimes. However, this is not what ICE has been doing. They have turned to racially profiling people and detaining innocent people as well as U.S. citizens. They have spent their time shaming, bullying, and harassing. And now, in Minnesota, they have taken things one step further: they have killed two people, Renee Good and Alex Pretti. These killings have shocked the nation, mostly due to their indefensible nature. Despite President Trump’s initial statement that Good had weaponized her vehicle and “behaved horribly,” numerous eyewitness accounts have proved that she was simply sitting in her car when she was fatally shot by ICE agent Jonathan Ross. Similarly, ICE accused victim Alex Pretti of having a gun when he was brutally murdered, though video evidence later came out that he was only filming ICE agents with his phone. These shootings in Minnesota are only two of eight deaths that have occurred in ICE-related incidents in 2026 alone. I do not attempt to capture the full severity, nor the complexity, that surrounds these issues, but they are a key part of understanding the strike and protests on Friday.

Alex Pretti’s death enraged the nation, proving a crucial tipping point when it comes to anti-ICE sentiment. Organizations began to call for a shutdown on Friday in order to prove to the government that the people stood against ICE, and supported all the people suffering daily in Minneapolis and cities around the country. These organizations called for “no school, no work, and no shopping,” and drew in a remarkable amount of participants. In San Francisco, many people who abstained from work or school gathered at Dolores Park to protest. By 2:00 PM, the park was enshrouded in a sea of people calling for change, fists raised toward the sky. This massive crowd consisted largely of high school students, who had established organized “walk-out” times and locations, and were among the loudest fighters for justice at the park. Signs waved, from the humorous (“the only ICE we want is on our wrists”) to the uplifting (“love wins over hate”) to the grim yet serious (“our country is run by murderers”).

Photo credit Sava Wallaert

At around 3:00 PM, the protesters began to march toward City Hall. By this point, nearly 15,000 people had flocked to the streets, moving from chant to chant as they steadily surged toward their destination. I was lucky enough to be among them, and was awed by the event, as I’m sure many others were. The fact that word of mouth could get this many people to march on such a short notice showed me how strong our country can be if we stand together against the issues that threaten us all. As we marched, I saw many teenagers sitting on statues, mostly those of historical figures. One statue had been graffitied with the words “ICE killed 8 people in one month.” I think these scenes left the most profound impact on me after the protest was over. They showed me that glorifying the past is irrelevant when it is most important to focus on the present. We can’t keep hiding from the truth. But these teenagers also showed me that it was equally important to not lose hope, and to fight until the end.

Photo credit Sava Wallaert

When the protest reached City Hall, the assembled people listened to a speech by a former resident of Minneapolis, before slowly breaking up and going their separate ways. Protests like this one, called ICE-Out protests, happened all over the country and made national headlines.

Photo credit Sava Wallaert

No matter whether you joined the protest, cheered it on from the office window, or participated in New School’s sign-making activities, you have participated in making history.

Also be sure to check out this other NewsCool Chronicle article by our journalists Santino and Reid surrounding the national strike and protests.

Photo credit Sava Wallaert

Photo credit Sava Wallaert

Photo credit Sava Wallaert

Photo credit Sava Wallaert