Dozens protest 'random, chaotic and cruel' ICE actions at Detroit federal building

Ben Warren, The Detroit News on Jul 24, 2025

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DETROIT — The 90-plus degree heat Thursday didn't deter about 30 protesters from showing up at the Robert V. McNamara Federal Building in downtown Detroit to protest what they called "cruel" and "chaotic" tactics used by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The protest was organized by Western Wayne Indivisible, a "pro-democracy" group based in Wayne County, though members of other local pro-immigrant groups attended.

"I believe this is not what people voted for," said Joan Pence, one of the organizers. "They thought we're gonna arrest all the criminals and really bad guys and instead they're picking up U.S. citizens and people with legal status and mothers of children."

"What we're trying to do is just increase public awareness, and put some pressure on them to do something differently about the way this is handled," she added.

Some protesters held signs with the names and images of individuals who have died in ICE custody.

According to U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement, 13 people have died in ICE custody during this fiscal year dating to Oct. 1, most recently a 75-year-old citizen of Cuba named Isidro Perez, who died on June 26 in a Florida hospital. None of the deceased individuals were held in Michigan.

"We're all immigrants," said Jan Heitmann of Plymouth, a member of Western Wayne Indivisible. Her parents were the first generation in her family born in the United States. "They could have been killed in a camp in Europe," she said. Now, "Look at these people. They're in the same situation our families were in."

"I just want people to have a fair chance," Heitmann said. "If they grab them off the street, they could grab any of us."

Sonia Hernandez, 43, of Farmington came to the United States from Mexico in 2014. She's a naturalized U.S. citizen, but in Latino communities she said, "Everybody's lives are upside down."

She wants to marry her longtime boyfriend, a Michigan native — but doesn't want to risk asking her immigrant friends to leave the United States for a wedding in Mexico or bringing her Mexican family members to visit for a ceremony here.

"The American dream used to be a lot better," Hernandez said.

Shadia Martini, 59, of Bloomfield Township "grew up under a brutal dictatorship" before fleeing the Assad regime in Syria.

When she came to the U.S., Martini said she "loved the country the moment the plane landed." She admired the kindness of the Americans she met. Now, she has a jaded image of her adopted country.

"I don't want that country to resemble the country I fled," she said.

Western Wayne Indivisible was founded after President Donald Trump took office for his second term earlier this year, Pence said. Debbie Rosenmann, one of the chairs of Ferndale's Indivisible chapter, the "Fighting 9," said the organization exists "for the sole purpose of trying to stop the Trump agenda."

Rosenmann has been involved in anti-Trump activism since 2017, after he was first elected. But she has seen an unparalleled wave of support in recent months.

"People are coming out of the woodwork," she said.

Sherri Masson of Milford said many of the new chapters are headed by first-time organizers.

"They're so appalled by what is happening to the families in their community," she said.

ICE's field office in Detroit has arrested more than 2,500 people so far this year, deporting 2,372 of them through late June, according to a Detroit News analysis of public data sets published by the Deportation Data Project.

Detroit City Councilwoman Gabriela Santiago-Romero, whose district includes largely Hispanic areas of southwest Detroit, said “almost every single day” someone reaches out to her about ICE activity.

“Somebody will ask me with help to get a lawyer because they know somebody being deported," she said.

The agency's operations in Michigan have garnered pushback from other organizations like "Strangers No Longer," a Catholic group formed to support local immigrant communities.

In the letter, the group called attention to ICE tactics its members found alarming, such as ICE agents wearing face coverings, carrying out actions without a warrant, and arresting individuals who have not committed felonies. The letter also requested a meeting with ICE Detroit field office director Kevin Raycraft.

Raycraft responded to some of these critiques in an op-ed this week in the News.

He wrote, "ICE is tasked with enforcing the immigration laws in this country, whether through arrests, expedited removals or deportations. The agency is not anti-immigrant."

Raycraft argued that the threat of assault on ICE agents made face coverings necessary and that those in ICE detention "have broken laws in this country" regardless of whether or not they committed a felony.