Local business owners and community members announce pledge to defend immigrants

“Let’s be clear: deportation doesn’t happen in a vacuum," said business owner Trent Manning. "It’s one of the many tools of the racist capitalist system. It tears working-class families apart..."

“Since February, the Rhode Island Deportation Defense Coalition has been organizing and mobilizing hundreds of people to say no to ICE terror,” said Kate, an organizer with the group. “Our coalition has achieved this by creating a deportation defense phone line and a community alert channel so that anyone, any regular person who sees ICE or thinks they see ICE, can call the Defense Line, which is staffed by volunteer operators from 5:00 am to 9:00 pm seven days a week. After we get a call, volunteer verifiers are sent out to check the location to see whether ICE or other officials are present and if there is an active ICE abduction. Then, the broader network of over a thousand people in our community alerts channel is notified and mobilized to come out and protect our community members.

Kate spoke at a press conference outside Crown Fried Chicken on Broad Street on Friday, announcing new Immigrant Defense Zones: Businesses pledging to protect immigrant community members by refusing entry to immigration officials without a judicial warrant.

Here’s the video:

“Let’s step back for a minute and ask why it is necessary to have a volunteer-run deportation defense line, and why our communities needed to come together to get organized and show our strength?” continued Kate. “The answer is that our government, and not just the current administration, but many administrations on the federal, state, and local levels, have long tried to use immigration as a racist tool to divide us, the working people of this country, not just for years, not just for decades, but for generations.”

The creation of Immigrant Defense Zones comes in response to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) terrorizing local communities and abducting several community members in Providence, Pawtucket, and Central Falls, including Paul Dama, manager of the award-winning restaurant Suya Joint on Westminster Street, writes the Deportation Defense Coalition. “When Dama, a Nigerian immigrant, was on his way to church on June 15th, he was stopped and taken into custody without explanation. He is currently being held at Strafford County Jail in Dover, New Hampshire. Dama came from Nigeria in 2019 as a refugee after surviving kidnapping. He is married to a U.S. citizen, is applying for a green card, and has no outstanding warrants or charges. As such, his abduction by officials is considered illegal by the Deportation Defense Coalition.”

Since February, the Deportation Defense Coalition, which includes AMOR (Alliance to Mobilize Our Resistance), ONA (Olneyville Neighborhood Association), and PSL-RI (Party for Socialism & Liberation Rhode Island), has organized and mobilized the community by creating a Deportation Defense Line [401-675-1414] and a Community Alert Channel. Anyone who sees possible ICE or other immigration agents is encouraged to call the Defense Line, which is staffed by volunteer operators from 5 am to 9 pm, seven days a week. Volunteer verifiers are dispatched to verify whether ICE or other officials are present. If an active ICE abduction is verified, the wider community is mobilized through the Alert Channel to protect the community member.

“Politicians and their wealthy donors have spread lies to scapegoat our immigrant community members as if they are to blame for the problems we face in our daily lives,” continued Kate. “But we know the truth: Immigrants are woven into the fabric of our communities. They contribute to our neighborhoods’ economic growth, safety, and cultural vitality. Politicians and their rich supporters have created the systems that bring suffering into our lives and communities. In these past few months, this racist campaign of misinformation and persecution, which has long had severe and even deadly consequences, has been raised to a new level of crisis. ICE agents, along with other federal agents, fully assisted by local police departments, are waging terror on our communities.

“Earlier this week, we saw this happening to our neighbors in Silver Lake, where Providence Police were working side by side with ICE agents to violently arrest our neighbor, Ivan. The police can deny it all they want, but we know that ICE, DHS, and PPD are all the same. They’re working together to rip our families and our workplaces apart because they are scared of the strength that we’d have if we united as a community to protect ourselves against those who are really to blame for our hardships. This is the reason that we are building the deportation defense line, and this is the reason why today we are excited to announce the launch of new Immigrant Defense Zones, a network of local businesses who have pledged to protect immigrant community members, including by closing their doors and refusing entry to immigration officials who do not have a judicial warrant.”

The first wave of businesses taking the Defense Zone Pledge is primarily located in the Southside of Providence, but all of them, including those in the Westminster Street area, stand in full solidarity with Suya Joint in demanding the immediate release of Suya Joint manager Paul Dama.

Trent Manning of Down the Road Movers is one of the business owners who has embraced Immigrant Defense Zones and signed the pledge.

“I’m the founder and owner of Down the Road Movers, a company rooted in the values of second chance, dignity, and collective strength. We’re a crew made up of working-class, formerly incarcerated Black and brown people who have been counted out numerous times, locked up, and pushed to the margins. We came together to build something real, something that’s ours.

“But enough about my business. I’m here today for something much more serious, as someone who understands that survival under this system is not just about working hard and pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. It’s about protecting each other. That’s what deportation defense is. It’s protection, resistance, and love in the form of action,” said Manning. “Let’s be clear: deportation doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It’s one of the many tools of the racist capitalist system. It tears working-class families apart. It explicitly targets Black and brown immigrants. It disappears people in the middle of the night, in front of their children, off their job sites, and out of the courtrooms, and it sends a clear message that our lives are disposable.

“We reject that message at Down the Road Movers. We’ve seen how systems try to make us disappear through prisons, poverty, and silence, and that’s why we stand with our undocumented neighbors, coworkers, and comrades, because their fight is our fight. Because none of us is free unless all of us are free,” continued Manning. “We support deportation defense because it’s not just about keeping someone in the country, it’s about keeping someone in their home with their family and their community, with their people. It’s about building a future where our worth isn’t determined by papers or background checks, but by our humanity.

“Everyone organizing court support, showing up for ICE check-ins, raising bail, and doing outreach so our community knows their rights to fight back against these criminals - you are building a world where no one gets thrown away behind a billionaire’s agenda. And if you’re still on the sidelines, understand this: If you’re waiting until it’s your family member, coworker, or neighbor, you’ve waited too long. Our people are being targeted yesterday, today, and tomorrow. The time to act is now, because down the road, no one will remember the jobs or the money. We’ll remember whether we had the guts to help lift and protect our people when it counted.”

Kate announced a community meeting for July 16th:

“The organization needed to expand our people’s power at this moment doesn’t happen by accident,” said Kate. “It takes time, effort, and commitment. What you have heard here today reflects the beginnings of this work, which builds on the work of generations before us. We have a long way to go and need everyone here to be a part of it, so on Saturday, July 26th, at noon, the Deportation Defense Coalition is hosting an open community meeting for the South Side neighborhood. The entire south side community, including everyone here, is invited to come and build with us, get organized with us, and help us secure the safety and wellbeing of our neighbors that we all want and deserve. When we are organized, there is nothing we can’t accomplish.”

More speakers:

Rew: I’m a volunteer with the Deportation Network. As we know, there have been increased attacks on immigrants across the country, and here in Rhode Island. The people of Providence and Rhode Island will not accept this. The community, from neighbors to small business owners and everyday working people, is coming together to protect our immigrant families . We have dozens and dozens of volunteers outreaching every week and every day to connect with people and protect our community from racist ICE terror.

We have had hundreds and thousands of conversations with people across the neighborhoods in Providence. I, in particular, have been connecting with neighbors in the West End of Providence, and we have found that the people overwhelmingly support the movement to protect our immigrant communities and want to join us. We cannot wait for politicians to protect our community. We have to do it ourselves. Please reach out if you see these attacks and want to fight back. If we’re going to see an end to deportation, we have to continue to build a strong movement to protect our people. We invite you to join us.

Jair: I’m an organizer with the Party for Socialism and Liberation and a member of the Deportation Defense Line, Rhode Island. I’m proud and honored that we’re launching the Small Business Pledge and the Immigrant Defense Zones. Small business owners are excited to join the fight to protect immigrants who live under the fear of deportation and ICE terror. We understand that we live by a few understandings for these small businesses to stand up. If there’s no warrant, there’s no detention. Not on our watch. That is the basis of the pledge. ICE cannot break the law and barge into businesses to detain people so that the people will enforce this law. It demonstrates how much everyday people stand with immigrants and against ICE.

Even the idea of this pledge came from the community—it came from the people. A small business owner here on the South Side asked what more they could do. They suggested that they make their small business a defense zone. So we’re turning the entire south side into a defense zone and not stopping at the south side. More and more businesses are signing the pledge on the east side, in the west end, and soon, in Olneyville.

This isn’t just citizens standing up for immigrants. This is the people standing up for the people because now we have on video the smoking gun. We knew all along that the Providence Police are collaborating with ICE. This past Sunday at Alverson Ave, we have on video police doing ICE’s job for them. And later, the body cams revealed the same truth. Police officers stood at the doorway of a house without a warrant, coercing a community member to surrender himself before handing him over to ICE. This not only violates the Community Service Act, but also confirms that the police do not have our backs. They have ICE’s backs. Providence Police are complicit in the deportation machine, and they have failed to protect us, so we must protect ourselves.

But that’s always been true. We saw on Friendship Street two weeks ago where police brutalized community members over a noise complaint. The department that is supposedly here to protect us is here to brutalize us and hand us over to ICE, so we need to step up. We need to defend our communities from ICE, the police, gentrification, rent and utility hikes, and every threat to our communities.

Now, the police, ICE, the Trump Administration, the billionaires, and the far right want to convince us that immigrants are our biggest threat. But that’s like the wolf warning us about sheep. The biggest threat to the people today is the police, ICE, the Trump Administration, the billionaires, and the far right.

The biggest threat today is capitalism and imperialism, the war machine that is currently committing genocide against Palestine. It’s capitalism and imperialism that cause the rich to get richer every day and the poor to get poorer. We cannot let them confuse us any longer. Every day, we stay confused, and they stay in power. We want to stop ICE. We need to get organized. We need to get organized if we want to stop the far right. If we want to stop this administration, we need to get organized. And if we want to end capitalism and imperialism once and for all, we need to get organized and stay organized.

Everyone has a role in the struggle. If you’re a small business, sign the pledge. Make your business a defense zone. If you’re a wage worker or a salaried person, get involved with the defense line. If you have the money but not the time, make donations. Make donations to our printing process. Make the defense line as popular as possible. We need people to stand up and get involved to protect our community.

Kate: Thank you, Jair, for reminding us how federal and local authorities try to divide us. They can try to terrorize us, but there’s one fact that they can never escape: When the people come together and get organized, there is no stronger force than us. We cannot be stopped, and we demand our rights, our dignity, and the safety of our people. To guarantee this, we demand that ICE and DHS leave our communities.

So far, 25 businesses have signed up, and we are getting more signatures daily. This initiative has only grown from this point on.