On Thursday, Feb. 26, a crowd of around sixty chanted “No ICE, no KKK, no fascist USA,” and “El pueblo unido jamás será vencido (the people united will never be defeated).” People in attendance frequented tables handing out stickers, zines, flyers and petitions. Several campus organizations came together to host a “Protecting Migrants” rally in response to the surge of immigrants targeted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) under Trump’s current presidency.
The groups involved included ASUSF Senate, the Latina Undergraduate Network of Activists (LUNA), the Palestinian Student Association, UNICEF, Latinas Unidas, the Supporting Immigrants & Refugees Club and Kasamahan.
One speaker at the rally was Father Donal Godfrey S.J., the University’s chaplain who emphasized the importance of religious presence at demonstrations. “It’s important that people know that the Catholic Jesuit mission is supportive of the solidarity with migrants and immigrants at this time in history, and is going to be a voice that’s gonna speak out increasingly for and with migrants, many of whom cannot speak for themselves” he said.
Father Godfrey also emphasized the interfaith solidarity of religious presence. “I was so happy the imam also spoke,” Godfrey said in reference to Iman Sundiata Rashad. Rashad spoke to the importance of solidarity in the face of oppression, likening our current political circumstances to the Reagan-era war on drugs.
Ani De Lira Lopez, a senior history major who opened the event speaking on behalf of the Palestinian Student Association, said, “there is a deeper, more intentional connection between [these] two struggles.We cannot separate American imperialism and domestic militarization and fascism.” they said. “The inhumane carceral system attacking and enslaving Black and brown communities, ICE and Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) murderous policies, genocide and apartheid abroad are all intimately connected.”
De Lira Lopez continued, “That’s why it isn’t enough to just reform or defund ICE, just like it isn’t enough to just reform or defund the IDF. These settler colonial institutions need to be abolished entirely for our people to be free. And as my beloved activist Fannie Lou Hamer said, ‘None of us are free until all of us are free.’”
LUNA tabled at the event promoting ribbons for resistance and greater awareness about the plight of immigrants. LUNA events coordinator and sophomore critical diversity studies major Jesus Martines said, “We’ve been thinking about, how can we get what has been going on around the Bay Area and overall in the nation, in the world, actually on campus…So partnering with ASUSF Senate,… working with them, collaborating with other organizations, even outside organizations, I think it was beautiful to have the opportunity to work with them and, you know, basically execute what we’ve been trying to do for the past year.”
Students held signs with slogans like “No human is illegal on stolen land” and “If I am an alien where is my spaceship?” Hive Minders sold honey and the Graphics Center drew caricatures, with profits dedicated to La Raza, a San Francisco organization providing legal and social services for Latino, immigrant and low-income families.
Vice President of the Palestinian Student Association Noor Abdullah emphasized the importance of raising awareness to this cause. She said “When ICE was first ramping up its attacks, arrests, detainment, amongst the first people they detained were actually student activists for Palestine. So again, our two causes are more intertwined than it’s possible.”
Godfrey ended his speech saying, “Resistance is an act of love at the moment…that includes civil disobedience…we do need civil disobedience, and we do need it prophetically done on a large scale, as Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi, Dorothy Day, Cesar Chavez.”
A returning theme in the speeches was a call to action for students to support one another. De Lira Lopez said “If this is your first demonstration, please let it not be your last.”
