Following last week’s anti-ICE economic blackout in Minnesota and national Free America Walkout, organizers are once again urging Americans to stop working, attending school, and spending money to protest the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement crackdown surging across the country. The fatal shootings of Minneapolis residents Renee Good and Alexi Pretti by federal officers only increased the public outcry against the Trump administration’s hardline immigration and border policies and aggressive tactics used by swarms of masked agents. Here’s what to know.
What is National Shutdown Day?
National Shutdown Day on January 30 is a call to strike—to disrupt business as usual—as a way for Americans to register their mounting anger at the Trump administration’s deployment of ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis and other cities nationwide. (Some 69% of Americans say President Trump is trying to exert more power than previous presidents, according to a recent survey from the Pew Research Center.)
With the tagline “No work. No school. No shopping. Stop funding ICE,” the nationalshutdown.org website reads, “The people of the Twin Cities have shown the way for the whole country—to stop ICE’s reign of terror, we need to SHUT IT DOWN. The entire country is shocked and outraged at the brutal killings of Alex Pretti, Renee Good, Silverio Villegas González, and Keith Porter Jr. by federal agents. . . . It is time for us to all stand up together in a nationwide shutdown and say enough is enough!”
Organizers are also calling on Congress to cut funding to the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE, when it votes on the current funding package ahead of a possible federal government shutdown.
Walkouts, events, vigils, and protests are set to take place in all 50 states, including in New York City, Boston, Seattle, Los Angeles, Cleveland, Atlanta, Chicago, and Philadelphia—from state capitals (Honolulu) to federal buildings and courthouses (Tucson, Arizona, and Cincinnati), universities (Stanford, Santa Clara University, the University of Washington, Northeastern University), and even some high schools (in Miami).
On Friday, a number of student groups at the University of Minnesota—including the Somali Student Association, Black Student Union, and Graduate Labor Union—will lead a walkout on campus. “Students are always at the heart of movements for justice across the world,” they said in a statement. “Students are encouraged to participate in [the] protests after walking out.”
Businesses nationwide to close for general strike
Following Minnesota’s recent statewide strike, local businesses in the Twin Cities and across the nation are planning to close on Friday. They include 50 businesses and shops in Portland, Maine; several restaurants in Denver; bookstores, coffeeshops, and retailers in Rochester, New York; businesses in Omaha, Nebraska; a Las Vegas pizza shop; and numerous Los Angeles restaurants, to name just a few, according to local news reports.
“It has been increasingly difficult to watch what is unfolding in our country,” the owners of Denver restaurant Sắp Sửa told television station KDVR. “We have felt so helpless and alone, and it’s abundantly clear that no one will come to save us, so it is our civic duty to unite as a community in support of the most vulnerable.”
Grassroots organizers 50501 are calling for additional “ICE Out of Everywhere” protests on Saturday, January 31, at ICE detention centers and offices; at airports to target airlines that are transporting ICE detainees, including Global Crossing Airlines and World Atlantic Airlines; and at some Congressional offices, according to The Guardian.
Who is organizing the National Shutdown?
National Shutdown Day, like many of the previous national walkouts and protests over the past year, lists a broad coalition of grassroots partners, including: 50501, local chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union, Defend Immigrant Families Campaign, Council on American-Islamic Relations, North Carolina Poor People’s Campaign, student groups, labor unions, and immigrant rights organizations.
In addition, the strike has garnered the attention of a number of Hollywood celebrities, including Pedro Pascal, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Edward Norton.
“We cannot act like this is not happening,” Norton, a longtime political activist, said at a recent Sundance Film Festival panel discussion. “What they’re doing in Minnesota with the strike needs to expand. I think we should be talking about a national, general economic strike until this is over.”
New York University professor Scott Galloway has also called for a prolonged general economic strike.