Dozens of protesters gathered at Romare Bearden Park on Saturday before marching through uptown Charlotte, calling for an end to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and mass deportations.
The Charlotte protest was part of a national day of action that included more than 70 events across the country. Organizers called the demonstrations in response to three deaths during or following encounters with federal immigration agents in one week.
ICE officers fatally shot Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, 52, in Houston on July 7 and Joan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, 25, in Biddeford, Maine, on July 13. A third man, a 28-year-old Mexican national whose name had not been released, was struck and killed by a tractor-trailer while fleeing immigration agents near St. Augustine, Florida.
The Department of Homeland Security said Durán Guerrero attempted to flee in a vehicle and that an officer fired out of concern for public safety. Officials initially said Salgado Araujo used his van as a weapon and struck a law enforcement vehicle. A later account from a federal prosecutor did not mention a collision, and witnesses have disputed the government’s description of the Houston shooting.
H.K. Capps, an organizer with the Party for Socialism and Liberation, said the Charlotte demonstration sought accountability for people killed during immigration enforcement operations.
“We’re out here to demand justice for all victims of ICE terror,” Capps said. “We are out here to demand the end to mass deportation, and we are out here to demand the abolishment of ICE.”
Protesters marched through uptown chanting, “No justice, no peace,” and “We want ICE off our streets.”
The demonstration ended without any reported incidents. Charlotte immigrants have been on edge since last November, when a week-long surge "Operation Charlotte's Web" resulted in hundreds of local immigration arrests by federal agents.
