No Fear, Not Hate, No ICE In Our State

June 11, 2025

On Tuesday evening, I walked over the hill into a wall of heat — not just the kind that clings to your skin, but the kind born of heartbreak, fury, and an unshakable will to stand up.

Below me, at 32nd & L Street, a crowd had already gathered. The signs were handmade. The chants were loud. “No fear, no hate, no ICE in our state!” Hours earlier, ICE agents raided meatpacking plants and businesses in South Omaha. Dozens of individuals are estimated to have been detained and transported away. Fathers. Mothers. Workers who clocked in every day to support their families. By evening, their absence was already being felt — not just at dinner tables, but across entire neighborhoods.

As the hot sun dipped behind the rooftops, more people arrived. They held large signs. Their voices continued to shout: “No fear, no hate, no ICE in our state.” Car horns joined in. Semi-trucks groaned down the road toward the same meatpacking houses now short-handed. Garbage trucks rolled through the alleys. The city of Omaha moves, because immigrants keep it moving.

By Tuesday night, some children may have been sleeping in beds with no parents to tuck them in. Lives have been upended. Families torn apart. And for what? These are people, human beings, targeted for trying to build a life in a country that runs on their labor but questions their worth.

This is not just about immigration. This is about who we are. And we must say it clearly: No human is illegal. Immigrants belong here. This is our home, too.