On July 10 at noon in New York City, there was an action in support of immigrants and Amazon employees fighting for better conditions. Organized by Movimiento Cosecha, a national movement mobilizing for undocumented immigrants, activists and members of the community marched on Columbus Circle to protest in front of the Amazon bookstore. The reason? Amazon has been supplying ICE with technology and gear that is subsequently used to harm immigrants. In May, the American Civil Liberties Union revealed that Amazon had been working with law enforcement agencies in providing, among other things, facial recognition technology that would make it easier to track immigrants.
Blocking the entrance to their store and organizing a speak out, activists looked to disrupt and agitate in NYC to show that action had to be taken everywhere. “When we say ‘Abolish ICE’ it also starts with our actions… it starts in our cities and starts where we buy and where we work,” one organizer said. Attempting to have everyday people hold corporations like Amazon accountable for profiting from detentions and family separations, along with acting in solidarity with immigrants criminalized by ICE, this action also showed solidarity with over 1,000 Amazon workers in Spain who called for a strike against Amazon’s cruel working conditions.
Earlier that morning, there was another demonstration in front of the Sheraton in Times Square where Mayor Bill De Blasio was the keynote speaker for a Department of Homeland Security conference. Activists came out with signs and banners with slogans such as “Abolish ICE,” showing that the immigrant rights movement will accept nothing short of an end to deportations, ending family detention, ending the criminalization of immigrants and full rights for all.
This day of solidarity with immigrants demonstrates that the movement is making concrete demands beyond reuniting families, truly exposing politicians and corporations for their collusion with ICE. Solidarity and support know no borders, whether in Latin America or Europe, we must stand with workers everywhere!
