Councilmember Kendra Brooks has held “Know Your Rights” trainings for community members to understand how to interact with officers of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE, since last summer.
But the importance and tone of the “ICE Out” training Tuesday was different.
Following the fatal shooting last week of Renee Good in Minneapolis by an ICE officer, Philadelphia City Councilmember Rue Landau said such events are more important than ever.
“It is so painful to know what happened to Renee, but we need to say that that will not happen again,” she said, a day before a nonfatal shooting set Minneapolis off on another round of unrest. “We all need to lend our voices to showing ICE and the federal government that this is absolutely not acceptable in Philadelphia or anywhere around the country.”
ICE has been at the forefront of President Trump’s immigration policy, which has targeted non-citizens since his inauguration in January 2025. Good’s death sparked a huge response. At a protest in Philadelphia last week, protestors united in “grief and anger,” and pushed back against ICE’s activity in the city.
Erika Guadalupe Núñez, executive director of immigrants’ rights nonprofit Juntos, called the actions of ICE officers toward Philadelphians “intimidating and brutal.”
Landau was critical of the recent actions of the ICE officers.
“What we’re seeing ICE do when they come into cities and into towns across America is they’re instilling so much fear,” she said. “They are breaking laws. They are acting with a reckless abandonment of any rule of law and in an authoritarian way, and they are really just trying to take over cities, scaring people and rounding them up.”
Training focused on bystanders
Tuesday’s training, for about 100 attendees, focused primarily on how bystanders who may not necessarily be in fear of detainment can provide support to their at-risk neighbors during a raid.
It included simulations on how to address ICE officers, advice for how to interact legally, and instruction on addressing ICE in the workplace.
Early on, those who attended shared their reasons for being there.
Some said it made them “more hopeful,” while others said that they wanted to feel more informed.
One participant, who lives in Queen Village, said they attended the training to figure out how they can be most helpful during an ICE raid.
“I don’t know who’s going to let me know when ICE is in the Italian Market or down along Washington Avenue, where all the Asian businesses are,” she said. “I’m not plugged into getting notice of the need to come out.”
Rachie Weisberg, a trainer from Working Families Power, began the training with statistics.
“The arrest quota for ICE per day has risen dramatically,” she said. “It used to be around 1,000 per day. Now, it’s around 3,000 per day.”
According to recent ICE data, ICE arrests have increased 37.6% from 2016. The administration maintains it is “protecting the American people against invasion” by removing illegal immigrants who “present significant threats to national security and public safety.”
But critics of the administration’s policies and actions have been vocal. State and city officials in Minnesota and Illinois have filed lawsuits following ICE activity, saying the deployment of agents in these states violates the U.S. Constitution and states’ rights.
Advocates have been calling for Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro to end the state’s collaboration with ICE since last year. While Shapiro said he is “mourning the tragic loss of life in Minneapolis” in an X post days after the attack, the state has not yet moved to end its collaborations with ICE. However, many local leaders across the state have taken action.
In a joint statement on Wednesday, 18 Pennsylvania state senators and representatives serving legislative districts across Philadelphia called for the state and all local governments to “renounce collaboration with ICE.”
In Philadelphia, Sheriff Rochelle Bilal got national attention last week for saying she would “bring the smoke” against ICE. In a press conference on Wednesday, District Attorney Larry Krasner and some local leaders doubled down on this sentiment.
“We will arrest you,” Krasner warned.
And in the suburbs, Bucks County Sheriff Danny Ceisler officially ended the county’s agreement with ICE on Wednesday.
Following the fatal shooting of Good, Pittsburgh Mayor Corey O’Connor said the city will continue to not assist with ICE operations. Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker has not indicated any changes in the city’s collaborations with ICE, but DA Krasner and Chief Public Defender Keisha Hudson have emphasized that they want to have further conversations with Parker’s administration on the matter.
Additionally, recent research shows that many Americans do not approve of the way ICE is enforcing immigration laws. A poll from Quinnipiac University shows that 40% of respondents approve of the way ICE is enforcing immigration laws, while 57% disapprove.
Despite this “bleak picture,” Weisberg explained the organization feels now is the time to mobilize in helping to keep ICE interactions minimal and cordial.
“We are in this opportunity moment,” she said. “We’re in this moment where the tides are shifting, and we need to be really steadfast in protecting our neighbors.”
The “five Ds”
Weisberg followed with a presentation of the “Five Ds” for resisting ICE. The first is documenting.
“So document, film, photograph, and take note of what you see,” she said. “Make sure to gather as much information as possible.”
She used Good’s shooting as an example, emphasizing how videos from different perspectives helped to provide context and counter arguments she had tried to run down the agent.
The next is disseminating, which can include giving information to “rapid response networks” to help the community be aware of raids, and then directing, which can involve actively engaging with the situation.
Trainers emphasized it is important to use your best judgment and do what feels comfortable in each individual situation. This included making sure to walk, not run, from ICE officers if they say you’re free to go, understanding risk when creating physical barriers, and ensuring that others are around to help document if these strategies are employed.
Other responses include delaying or disrupting, she explained.
“You want to try to figure out ways to buy time,” she said.
A point of emphasis in the training and these strategies was personal risk. Weisberg explained that, in many situations, ICE may not use legal or ethical strategies, meaning Philadelphians could be putting themselves in harm’s way if they use these strategies.
“I think that you are trying to make them really frustrated so that they just kind of give up … and we’ll go over different scales of disruption, because you also have to assess your own risk when you’re doing disruption,” she said.
Weisberg said another important part of de-escalating situations with ICE is refraining from saying or showing anything.
“No one ever has to talk to ICE,” she said. “And in the same way, you don’t have to show ICE anything.”
The trainers from the group went into detail on each strategy. This included videos, legal information and a Q&A session. The presentation continued with workplace strategies for ICE confrontation.
Waiting for ICE to arrive with force
Philly has not been at the center of ICE activity — yet.
“In Philly, we actually haven’t seen as much ICE activity as some of the other metropolitan cities in the country,” Weisberg said. “We don’t really know why that is. But we do expect that Philly is on that list, and that the National Guard is going to come at some point. And I’m sure that’s why you all are here.”
The group then considered some potential Philly-centric situations with ICE engagement.
One practice situation asked what bystanders would do if they encountered ICE agents outside of Pat’s Steaks after finishing a cheesesteak.
Humor prevailed, with responses jabbing at Pat’s Steaks, but trainer Dylan Leahy said exercises like this can be helpful to get real-world practice.
“It’s nice to be here and to kind of act out what this would be like,” he said. “It helps people feel empowered to do so ‘in the wild.’ ”
Leahy has been helping with trainings since last summer through Philly Queer Fundy, an organization focused on activating the LGBTQ+ community for direct action and engagement in the community.
He said that, since last summer, his organization has helped to train over 1,000 participants for the possibility of an ICE raid, and has helped prep several gay bars in the area.
“So we go in, talk to their staff, help them figure out what their plan looks like, and what a good response plan should be,” he said. “And then we’ve got a couple more [response plan sessions] in the lineup for this upcoming year.”
Despite some lighthearted moments, Leahy addressed the real possibility of these situations happening in Philly. He said it is better to be prepared.
“[ICE agents] might just show up and ask kind of simple questions, like, ‘Hey, is this guy Mike here working today? ’” he said. “So as soon as you have the idea in your head that something about this interaction seems a little fishy, that’s when you want to default to that ICE safety plan. Because, let’s say it’s not an ICE officer, you’re at least going to have that kind of protection ready to go.”
Brooks said that the feedback from these trainings have been “overwhelmingly positive” and important.
“We need to make sure that, although we are a welcoming city, how can we protect each other?” she said. “And the best way we can do that is together. These trainings offer the opportunity for us to work together to protect our neighbors.”
The trainings are especially important for their indirect impacts, said Kathleen Melville, the communications director in Brooks’ office.
“Lots of immigrant-serving organizations are at capacity doing direct work, and they don’t have the capacity to train non-immigrants,” she said.
She said some organizations — including Juntos and New Sanctuary Movement — have been leading the response for those directly impacted and may not have time to help educate those who are indirectly impacted by ICE
This event was important, she said, as it allows everyone to be “informed and aware,” even if they are not necessarily facing fears of being deported.
Holding up Rochester
Videos presented during the training featured examples of communities coming together to resist ICE — including one from Rochester, New York.
“It shows a way in which there was a disruption, and there was a directing of some folks who were being bothered by ICE, and it was effective,” said Tess Cruz, a trainer from the office of Councilmember Landau.
Cruz showed the video, which included groups of people in Rochester blocking ICE agents from approaching roofers on a job in the city. They said watching the video helped others prepare for the possibility of facing these situations.
“We’re really starting to think about how you’re going to do this in the real world,” Cruz said. “This is a training, and the purpose of this is to prepare you, so as much as possible, you know how you would show up in this situation.”
Another demonstration engaged audience members to act as if they were restaurant workers encountering ICE workers.
Attendees expressed that they felt more confident about potentially encountering ICE after the information and exercises presented.
Landau said it’s important to continue making the city a place where immigrants feel welcome.
“Fifteen percent of Philadelphia’s population are immigrants, and that number needs to keep growing, so that Philadelphia keeps growing,” she said. “It’s important that we build on that.”
Brooks’ office will continue to host these trainings to help Philadelphians feel more prepared, she said.
“The overarching takeaway is that folks feel like they know what to do,” she said. “I think the fear of not knowing what to do when something happens sometimes has people paralyzed. Offering these trainings has given people the ability to be able to protect their communities, and when people find out about it, that’s why it’s growing.”
The post ‘This is not acceptable in Philadelphia’: ICE raid training aims to prep residents for possible encounters appeared first on Billy Penn at WHYY.
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