Eleven activists in Chicago were arrested yesterday after an act of civil disobedience outside Broadview Detention Center, where they sat in the street with linked arms and blocked traffic in order to protest deportations.
The arrests were part of a two-day march beginning on Monday night from ICE’s downtown Chicago field office to Broadview, stopping along the way for a prayer vigil and other actions. The event was part of the #Not1More campaign that mobilized activists in more than 62 cities across the US last weekend.
As Reyna Wences with Undocumented Illinois told Progress Illinois, the activists were protesting President Obama’s record-high rate of deportations, which is separating families and targeting those who would qualify for legislative immigration reform:
He has the record of two million deportations. More than any other president in the history of the United States. In only six years, we’ve seen families torn apart. We’ve seen the pain that places like Broadview represent for our families, and so we’re also here to tell the community, ‘Hey this is in your backyard. This is happening right here, and we came to shut it down.’
View the amazing pictures here:
