Hundreds of organizations from across the country are staging a nationwide economic shutdown on Friday to protest the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement policies and demand an end to ICE operations.
Activists are calling for a day of “no work, no school [and] no shopping” in response to the fatal shootings of at least four people by federal immigration officials in the past two months — including the high-profile shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis this month.
“The people of the Twin Cities have shown the way for the whole country,” organizers of the ICE Out Nationwide Shutdown said in a press release. “To stop ICE’s reign of terror, we need to SHUT IT DOWN.”
Participants in at least 46 states are expected to take part in the general strike — a “blackout day” modeled after last week’s “ICE Out” protest in Minneapolis, when hundreds of businesses closed their doors in a statewide general strike, which was followed by a protest march and rally despite a wind chill of 30 below zero.
In the Jan. 23 demonstration, protesters were calling for justice for Good, a mother of three fatally shot by an ICE agent earlier this month. Less than 24 hours after the protest, federal agents shot and killed Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care nurse at a VA hospital.
“Enough is enough,” organizers of the national shutdown said. “Every day, ICE, Border Patrol and other enforcers of Trump’s racist agenda are going into our communities to kidnap our neighbors and sow fear. It is time for us to all stand up together in a nationwide shutdown.”
The shutdown is endorsed by grassroots groups including the Minnesota Immigrant Movement, the Defend Immigrant Families Campaign, the Palestinian Youth Movement, and the Black Student Union at the University of Minnesota.
Several famous faces — including “The Last of Us” actor Pedro Pascal, Oscar-winning actress Jamie Lee Curtis, and “Hacks” star Hannah Einbinder — also took to social media to encourage participation.
“Pretti Good reason for a national strike,” read a graphic shared by both Pascal and Curtis on their Instagram page.
“Truth is a line of demarcation between a democratic government and authoritarian regime,” Pascal, a Chilean-American actor, captioned the post.
