Local

A Linden-area church offering Spanish-language mass at 7:30 pm on Christmas Eve and 11 am on Christmas Day has asked for a protective presence outside their building. We are recruiting people willing to show up in support of our neighbors. 

If you are or may be able to show up and protect our neighbors celebrating Christmas in this environment of fear, please respond to this email and express that you are able to join Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, or both. 

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In Central Ohio, the federal government has unleashed untrained individuals from outside the community, who think they are unaccountable. But greater Columbus has responded in one voice. From the grassroots, which quickly organized itself in sophisticated ways, to civic leaders and faith-based institutions, Columbus is sending a unified message: Immigrants are welcome, ICE is not. Read on for quotes from leaders; more examples of ICE brutality; and resources keeping the community safe.

Columbus Responds With One Voice

From disrupting ICE agents’ sleep, to documenting abuses and holding them to the Constitution, Central Ohio activists, lawyers, and organizers are mobilized around the clock. 

Tuesday December 23, 2025, 2:00PM
2210 Morse Road, Global Mall
A community event, highlighting how ICE enforcement affects immigrant businesses, workers, and the local economy is happening Tuesday.
 

This is a documented (but incomplete) map of their abductions and the level of escalation throughout the week. Data is from ICEOUT.

The author, Dissent in Bloom, writes at Substack   Please consider supporting her work.  https://substack.com/@dissentinbloom

Columbus is arguing about “public safety” again — but this time, the debate isn’t happening in a City Council chamber or on the courthouse steps. It’s happening in the gap between two artifacts floating around the city like opposing flyers for the same event.

One is a statement on Fraternal Order of Police (Capital City Lodge #9) letterhead, signed by lodge president Brian Steel, insisting that while local law enforcement doesn’t have authority to enforce federal civil immigration laws, they still have an “absolute duty” to respond when federal partners ask for assistance — and that “public safety depends on cooperation.”

The other is a Facebook post from “West Columbus ICE Watch” (also calling itself Westgate ICE Watch), introducing itself as a neighborhood network formed because residents believe ICE activity is spreading, fear is rising, and people need a way to report sightings anonymously and share mutual-aid resources. The post says it plainly: they’re organizing because they don’t want “a repeat of history.”

ICE is on the streets of Columbus arresting people. Supposedly Columbus officials and police are not cooperating with ICE, and if true, this is good news.

But you need to tell your friends and family about what else your “elected” Columbus City Council has recently done. It would make President Trump proud.

In the greatest power-grab in Columbus history your City Council took revenge on the residents of German Village over side-walk improvements by changing the City Charter. Wait a minute… Doesn’t the city already update the City Charter once every ten years with a panel of citizens who make recommendations?

Correct. That’s how the City Charter is supposed to be updated in a rational democracy, but not Columbus.

Monday, December 22, 12-1:30pm
Bethel International Church, 1220 Bethel Road, Columbus 43220
The training will be led by Dr. Dorothy Hassan of the Columbus Ohio Rapid Response Network. Enter by the Family Life Center doors, around back under the awning.

Enter by the Family Life Center doors, around back under the awning.

You may invite others to attend this important training.

There is no need to register in advance.

Our hope is that after folks are trained they will have the opportunity to join a neighborhood ICE watch team.

We will send information out about that as soon as we have it.