SILVER SPRING, Md. – A chorus of demonstrators filled Gene Lynch Park with song on Monday evening, to recognize Renee Nicole Good, who was shot and killed by an ICE agent in Minneapolis last week.
As the sun set, 16 members of the Rapid Response Choir, a volunteer group of singers who perform at protests against the current administration, led the crowd of about 70 people in singing folk songs from “This Little Light of Mine” to “We Shall Overcome.”
“Our next song is called ‘Singing for Our Lives,’” one of the performers said. “Because that is what we’re doing.”
Members of the Rapid Response Choir gather to lead the crowd in song to remember Good. (Isabel Papp/MNS)
The vigil joined a long string of spontaneous protests against ICE in the week following Good’s murder. The protest gave communities around the country an opportunity to voice their disapproval of ICE actions and mourn Good.
The Maryland event was led by Carrie Kisicki who, according to attendees, independently organized the event by reaching out to community members over the weekend.
“On Wednesday evening, I got home sad, angry, and sick to my stomach,” Kisicki said. “And what I wanted most of all was to be with other people who were feeling the same way.”
Community members arrived with stuffed animals, which organizers gave to children in need through A Wider Circle, a social service organization in Silver Spring. According to speakers, they wanted to evoke the photographs of stuffed animals found in Good’s glove compartment, which belonged to her six-year-old son. Attendees were also encouraged to leave notes on heart-shaped paper.
Amid the grief was a strong disapproval of the Trump administration’s immigration policy, as well as its reaction to the incident. Many arrived with signs with messages including “No ICE, Kings, or Fascists” and “The Trump Fascist Regime MUST GO NOW.”
The vigil also offered an opportunity for community members to voice their opposition to the Trump administration and ICE. (Isabel Papp/ MNS)
When asked in a Tuesday CBS interview if he had any message for Good’s father, President Donald Trump said that her “actions were pretty tough,” and defended the ICE agents.
Just hours after the shooting, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem blamed Good at a press conference, saying she “weaponize(d) her vehicle and she attempted to run a law enforcement officer over. This appears as an attempt to kill or to cause bodily harm to agents, an act of domestic terrorism.”
At the protest, Montgomery County Executive Mark Eldridge voiced his ardent disapproval of the Trump administration’s reaction to the violence. “They say ICE was threatened,” he said. “Threatened by what? Someone’s words? Someone sitting in their car?”
Eldridge expressed alarm at the ICE’s response to demonstrators opposing them. Mentioning that the vigil was a good way to build solidarity and community in the wake of the tragedy, he was reminded of similar protests he had attended in the 70s against then-President Richard Nixon.
“This is the most dangerous place the country has ever been in,” he added. “And I grew up with Nixon.”
Elridge and other speakers focused on the importance of community action. Attendees passed around sheets of QR codes that linked to resources, ICE trackers, and GoFundMes of families affected by deportation.
Graphic video of the Minneapolis shooting has exacerbated political divisions on the already tense issue of immigration. Protestors have decried ICE agents’ methods for detaining undocumented immigrants as well as US citizens and their violence during these operations since the raids increased last January.
“It’s just another step in the steady escalation of assaults on American rights and particularly on the status of undocumented people,” said David Reid, president of Takoma Park Mobilization, who spoke about ICE detaining students from nearby Montgomery Blair High School. He organizes the group to track ICE movements in the area, take photos, and connect families with mutual aid networks.
“We are not powerless,” Kisicki told attendees. “We have power when we’re together.”