Statement from the organizers of the New Year's Eve Wyatt prison protest

"...the Wyatt is a significant site of struggle in Central Falls, a majority immigrant city that has been forced to keep the detention center operational after being sued by investors."

A press release from AMOR:

On December 31st, a group of activists held a noise demonstration outside the Donald W. Wyatt Detention Center in Central Falls, Rhode Island, “demanding an end to all cages from Palestine to the U.S. border to Central Falls.”

The Donald W. Wyatt Detention Center, also known as "the Wyatt," is a federal prison that was first developed for use by the U.S. Marshal Service in 1993, and has since entered two contracts with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to hold immigrant detainees. Since the Wyatt entered its second contract with ICE in 2019, the facility has been the site of numerous protests by activists calling for the closure of the prison, a demand that has been echoed by [former] Central Falls Mayor James Diossa and city councilors. 

The organizers of the noise demo called attention to the connections between state violence that impacts undocumented migrants and U.S. military support for Israel. In a statement shared by the AMOR Network, the activists emphasized that "the same funding used for the infrastructure of U.S. war and surveillance all over the world - including in Palestine - is used to militarize the border, militarize the police and increase detention and imprisonment of all kinds. In addition for our call to #ShutDownWyatt we are calling to #DemilitarizeTheBorder and #StopArmingIsrael.”

Escalations in U.S. wars abroad have historically been paired with increased border militarization and policing in the name of protecting national security. In our current moment, these connections are made evident by the $105 billion national security package that Congress has been reviewing for the past two months, which includes $14 billion in primarily military aid to Israel, $13.6 billion to increase militarization of the U.S. southern border, $61.4 billion to Ukraine, and $7.4 billion to strengthen U.S. security interests in Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific region. 

Locally, the Wyatt is a significant site of struggle in Central Falls, a majority immigrant city that has been forced to keep the detention center operational after being sued by investors. In Palestine, the Wyatt, and Central Falls, people's lives are circumscribed by the interests of U.S. capital. For this reason, calls for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza and an end to the occupation of Palestine are deeply intertwined with abolitionist efforts to abolish prisons and borders. These struggles are linked by their resistance to U.S. imperialism, which is responsible for migration by making people's homelands unlivable through economic and military warfare.

The organizers of the noise demo emphasized, “We are here as part of a long tradition of holding noise demos on New Year's Eve to show solidarity with the people inside. We make noise to remind the people inside that they are not forgotten. In the New Year, we will continue to push to dismantle this system and Free them all! To Shut Down the Wyatt!” The organizers continued, “So we stand here today to continue our call to Shut Down the Wyatt and to demand a Ceasefire in Gaza, an end to the Occupation of Palestine, and an end to the U.S. war machine!”