Detroit—Southwest Detroit is a community of Latine, Southern white, and Arabic working-class inhabitants. Many Detroiters who don’t live there hold the illusion that not much ICE enforcement happens elsewhere in the city, that Black folks are not targeted. In reality, ICE has been steadily traumatizing those in the Southwest, they have also targeted far Northwest Detroiters including several African-owned small businesses and a population of African-American and Black African immigrants.

‘MINNESOTA CALLED; DETROIT ANSWERED!’

On Jan. 30 as many as 500 activists rallied and marched in far Northwest Detroit in single-digit temperatures. For the past several months, ICE has attacked this African and African-American neighborhood. Business owners, members of left organizations, Black Lives Matter and immigrant residents had long organized for this day of “NO WORK, NO SCHOOL, NO SHOPPING!”

It was heartwarming to see the wide range of Detroit and suburban supporters, youth and elders. Speakers gave voice to a deep understanding of the connection between all our struggles against capitalism and racism, in global manifestations.

Mama Myrtle Curtis, almost five feet tall and a long-time activist and co-founder of “Freedom Freedom,” a farm and cultural hub in a neighborhood plagued by relentless flooding thanks to broken infrastructure, inspired the crowd. “The police have been following me and calling me an extremist. ‘Oh, I’m sorry. Did my civil rights get in the way of your bigotry?’ ICE out of our community! I’m from Detroit, East Side, and I want to talk to my New Afrikan, my Black, my Brown, my brothers and sisters. We must unify! Don’t let nobody tell you this ain’t your fight. It’s been your fight since you were dropped off here. I didn’t come out of my house in the cold to play with you, and I hope I get home safely because I know, when you put this mic in your hand, you put your face out here, you become a target. So we’re gonna fight because we want to live and not die. We want to live with integrity and we know we are on the right side of history, because they create these laws to control us. We will be ungovernable!”

A Senegalese woman reminded the crowd: “If the U.S. was not aggregating all the wealth, nobody would leave their country and brave so many things to come here. Let’s be honest: our way of life, our comfort—we are also responsible for driving migration.”

The moderator thanked the 75 business owners in the surrounding area who had shut down for the day. As the rally moved to march down the busy thoroughfare of Telegraph Avenue, chanting, “We will fight; Day and night; Strike, strike, strike, strike!” he called upon us to “Put these whistle kits to work; let’s take the truth spoken here today back to our families, our friends, and our co-workers. Let’s put our will into action until we win a liberated Detroit where all of our people will be allowed to live in peace. Will we unite to get ICE out of our city?” “Yes!” the people responded.

—Northwest Detroit Warrior Women