by Laura Glesby
High school senior Charlotte Stover joined over 200 people protesting immigration enforcement outside City Hall early Friday afternoon.
Stover wasn’t at school because she wanted to participate in a national “blackout” in solidarity with immigrants and activists — and because she kept thinking of “all the little kids being taken away from their families.”
So Stover wrote “ICE OUT” in backwards bubble letters on her forehead and joined five of her fellow Hamden High School students amongst the crowd.
Protesters march in between cars on Elm Street.
“Violence against families is really jarring, said fellow Hamden High senior Matilda Ryder.
Ryder said that some of her fellow students could be at risk of being targeted or profiled by ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement).
“I find that extremely terrifying, and I just feel disgusted by the actions that are happening, and I need to do what I can,” Ryder said.
“Especially when you look at history,” added Hamden High junior Lyla Banks. “This is such clear foreshadowing. We need to recognize patterns before they get worse.”
The students attend school down the street from a Dixwell Avenue car wash that ICE raided in mid-October.
“We’re so close to where it’s happening,” said Nora McDonough. “We should be doing something about it.”
Hamden High juniors and seniors Nora McDonough, Lucy Reymond, Matilda Ryder, Linnea Post, Charlotte Stover, and Lyla Banks.
With the temperatures outside in the low teens, the protesters gathered for an hour outside City Hall for a rally organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), before marching in a loop around the lower half of the New Haven Green.
They held signs calling for the abolition of ICE and honoring the lives of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, both of whom ICE agents shot dead this month in Minneapolis as they protested in support of immigrant rights.
The gathering was one of many grassroots protests and economic “blackouts” unfolding across the country on Friday, following a similar general strike in Minneapolis the week before. Social media buzzed with reports of businesses closing, students planning walkouts, and employees deciding not to go to work in protest.
“All across the nation, thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of people are coming out to the streets today —withholding their money, withholding their labor,” said Fable Burley of the PSL. “Because we are done with business as usual!”
The strike made its way to New Haven. Inkberry Artshop and MiniPNG closed entirely for the day, while Possible Futures bookstore deferred all non-cash payments to the weekend.
Other local businesses remained open, citing financial necessity, but decided to show support in other ways. Witch Bitch Thrift hosted a protest sign-making session. The Farm Belly and East Rock Breads pledged to donate 50 percent of their proceeds from Friday to immigrant aid organizations, while New Haven Pottery Studio announced it would be donating $10 per student who came.
Speakers at Friday’s protest lambasted not only ICE, but the Israeli government as well as the United States’ foreign interference in Somalia.
Protesters chanted: “No ICE. No KKK. No Fascist USA … Free, free Palestine… No more state execution. We will be the revolution…”
Their voices largely drowned out the sole counter-protester, who chanted pro-ICE messages into a megaphone wearing a “Trump 2028” hat.
After an hour, the group took to the middle of the street to begin marching.
They wove in between cars on Elm Street, bringing traffic to a momentary standstill and spurring a few cars to rapidly honk in support.
One sign quotes Renee Good’s last words to an ICE officer: “I’m not mad at you, dude.”
New Haven Immigrants Coalition organizer Kirill Staklo.
