Anti-ICE Activists Are Marching on Jeff Bezos' Home to Protest Amazon's Role in 'Fueling Trump's Deportation Force'

By Chantal Da Silva On 9/12/19 at 9:27 AM EDT

U.S. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Immigration Jeff Bezos

Hundreds of immigration protesters are expected to join a citywide day of action in Washington, D.C., on Thursday that will see demonstrators rally on Capitol Hill and outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency's offices, before marching to the home of Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos.

Organized by the Center for Popular Democracy Action network and the Fair Immigration Reform Movement (FIRM), the protest aims to hold Congress and companies like Amazon "accountable for the role they've played in fueling Trump's deportation force."

"It's going to be a really powerful action," Julio López Varona, co-director of Community Dignity Campaigns at the Center For Popular Democracy Action, told Newsweek in an interview ahead of the rallies.

"We are at a moment when the federal administration is openly moving forward with a racist and xenophobic agenda that has been stamped by Congress and the courts constantly, but at the same time [also by] corporations like Amazon," Varona said.

Amazon's decision to continue to provide technology to help ICE deport and separate thousands of immigrant families across the country "makes no sense," Varona said. As one of the very few tech giants to hit the $1 trillion mark in market value, Amazon, he said, should not have to rely on ICE for profit.

That is why at least 300 protesters will be making their way to Bezos' home, to deliver their message loud and clear Thursday afternoon.

The day-long protest will start on Capitol Hill, with protesters greeting Congress members returning from August recess.

Families affected by the Trump administration's hardline immigration policies are also expected to share their stories at the Hart Senate Office Building, from around 9 a.m. to 3:30 pm ET, according to an itinerary for the march sent to Newsweek in advance.

Then, protesters will gather outside ICE's offices in Washington, D.C., with community groups expected to lay hundreds of flowers outside the facilities before holding a moment of silence "to pay respects to those who suffered or died at the hands of the agency."

At around 4:30 p.m. ET, protesters are expected to march to Bezos' home, where they will rally against Amazon's corporate ties to ICE. The tech giant's Amazon Web Services hosts Department of Homeland Security databases that allow ICE to track and arrest immigrants.

Protesters are expected to show up outside Bezos home with an artistic representation of the tech CEO and members of Congress on top of a mattress in a symbolic portrayal of Amazon's "corporate ties to Congress."

The symbolic display will be a "somber" reminder "of the damage induced by his company," organizers said in their itinerary. "Activists hope to demonstrate the widespread dissent of the role Congress and corporations have played in perpetuating the criminalization of immigrants in this country."