PRINCE GEORGE COUNTY, Maryland, September 8 — Over 50 residents gathered outside the Prince George’s County government building to demand “ICE out of Hyattsville.”. The racist and fascist moves of the Donald Trump administration have come into our neighborhood and we are fighting back. Progressive Labor Party (PLP) members have been involved in this struggle for over six months, marching, organizing, and strategizing the best way to fight back with both our longstanding base and our new friends. Building a larger, more multiracial movement among our neighbors is more important than talking with politicians. We know that organized workers have tremendous potential power to stymie the bosses and that bringing in workers from the Metro transit union Local 689 can build power. If Local 689 took a political stand and struck against ICE, imagine the advances that could be made! We also encourage residents to call out capitalism and take the road to communist revolution to smash this wellspring of fascism, racism, and ICE stormtroopers.
Putting the bosses’ stooges on the spot
Today’s protest came on the heels of the Greenbelt Labor Day Parade at which Greenbelt Resistance Network (GRN) organized an Anti-ICE float and leafleting. GRN members and other angry activists brought militant energy as we entered the council chambers. We presented our petition with 1000 signatures to the County Council and 17 speakers, including three PLP members, testified that the council must fight to revoke the permit that allows ICE to expand its offices at 6505 Belcrest Road in Hyattsville (see CHALLENGE 8/26/26). One speaker attacked the idea that the building will only be used for ICE administrators and lawyers. ICE lawyers are just as much a part of the fascist ICE machine as the goons/thugs on the street. Several others declared that “ICE does what they want” so “who is to say this will not be used for detentions”. A student told the council “If you don’t get sued for revoking this permit then you haven’t done your job.”Others said there should be no borders and attacked Trump’s racism.
The permit was issued in late July despite six months of weekly protests at the building and multiple appeals to the council people and county executives. The building serves community college students, provides SNAP benefits and medical offices and sits next to a day care center. The immigration court is two blocks away – convenient for ICE to pick up immigrants, grab the ICE lawyers, and endanger our community.
Cowardly politicians side with the ruling class
The politicians on the County Council voiced sympathy with the cause and thanked us for organizing around this issue but quickly pointed out that they could do nothing themselves. The County Executive, Aisha Braveboy, occupies the same building so we headed to her office to hand over a copy of the petition and demand that she revoke the permit. At this point, the cops and security guards blocked us and refused to let us go up to the fourth floor. Some of the speakers who had walked outside were blocked from coming back into the building. But 12 of us continued to demand that Braveboy come down to receive the petitions and listen to us. In the next hour we were herded around the building to be out of sight but we returned to the lobby and began singing. The security guards went upstairs and finally several staffers came down to meet with us and accept the petitions and set up a meeting in the future. A staffer from Puerto Rico tried to explain that the lease had been signed by Braveboy’s predecessor, Angela Alsobrooks (now a U.S. Senator), so unfortunately she could not change it. The lying and cowardice of these politicians was visible to all of us and will hopefully help us win our friends to keep building the movement rather than wasting time talking to these liberal defenders of a brutal racist system.
PLP members and close friends have guaranteed ongoing activity in this fight and have written about this in CHALLENGE, which has been appreciated by several of the GRN and Hyattsville Resistance members. We struggle to expose the politicians and urge outreach into neighborhoods and the labor movement to build the anti-ICE movement and move in a deeper multiracial direction. Talking to politicians is useless without building a larger and more diverse movement that has some punch. While there are supporters of voting among the protesters and a desire to shift to “mutual aid” activities rather than movement building, this action exposed the system as a whole and demonstrated the need to intensify the confrontation with authorities, not retreat. This rally was a step up in numbers but more is needed. More regular strategic one-on-one discussions with the activists are necessary to recruit to the Party and develop revolutionary class consciousness, and we are doing more of this as the struggle continues. We will continue to write about this fight in CHALLENGE to show the communist role of the Party and our leadership in advancing the class struggle against ICE.
