Organizing with help from friends and peers, two groups of Williams students fundraised over $3,500 on Jan. 29 and Feb. 6 for Minnesotan communities targeted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
A nationwide rise in protest and increased scrutiny of ICE’s tactics has come after the deaths of protesters Renee Good and Alex Pretti at the hands of federal agents in Minneapolis in January.
Despite the uproar, immigration raids in Minnesota continue to disrupt residents’ lives, keeping them from working and, in some cases, shopping for groceries.
In response to the ongoing ICE operation in Minnesota, Henry Ouellette ’26, a Minneapolis resident, and Marie Brockhoff ’26 gave out baked goods during a fundraiser in the Mission lobby on Jan. 29. They donated the proceeds to organizations supporting affected immigrant communities.
Ouellette told the Record that he was initially overwhelmed by the news of ICE’s actions in Minneapolis. “I have friends whose parents aren’t leaving their houses — it’s really bad there,” Ouellette said. “I had been really distressed, but I just didn’t bring it up very much because what am I supposed to say? What was that actually going to accomplish?”
Ouellette decided to take action when ICE’s activities had a personal impact. “This specifically came up [when] my dad got tear gassed on that Saturday when Alex Pretti was shot, which was also [near] my old middle school.”
When Ouellette reached out to his friends on campus, Brockhoff suggested they raise money for organizations responding to federal presence in Minnesota by selling homemade cookies and turnovers. “We can’t do much, but we can bake,” Brockhoff said.
Organizing through word of mouth, the group of friends faced little trouble finding volunteers to bake, work the table, and research organizations supporting immigrant communities. “We had more people than we knew what to do with,” Ouellette said.
A week later, on Feb. 6, Francesca Castellanos ’26 and her friends hosted a similar fundraiser in Paresky, advertised with the slogan “ICE OUT NOW” on posters throughout campus.
“I’m from Wisconsin, so I feel like a lot of the things happening in Minneapolis feel close to home,” Castellanos said. “And because we’re so far away, [the question is] ‘What can we do as a community at Williams to stand in solidarity with those in Minneapolis?’”
Castellanos said she selected six nonprofit organizations that are making a tangible impact on those detained by ICE and those protesting.
One Minneapolis-based organization that both student groups supported was the Centro De Trabajadores Unidos En La Lucha, which advocates for workers’ rights and racial justice. Recently, the organization has been providing rent relief and other social services for immigrant members who are afraid to leave their homes.
Both fundraisers also supported the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota. “They’re doing a lot of the pro bono legal defense of people who are getting detained and they’re a huge network,” Ouellette said. Organizers of the Mission fundraiser said they wanted to equally support both direct relief and legal defense, according to Ouellette.
Ouellette and Brockhoff said they collected $1,678.90 in donations from their bake sale in Mission, and Castellanos raised $2,006 from the Paresky fundraiser as of Feb. 7.
While the students are planning more fundraising in the future, they want to expand the scope of their efforts as well. “We can’t just have bake sales and expect to raise thousands of dollars every week,” Brockhoff said.
Many on campus are concerned about what’s happening in Minneapolis and want to act, Castellanos said. “It’s just a matter of tapping into that potential energy and getting people to start organizing,” she said.
“All of this started because someone had an idea, they asked their friends for help, and it worked,” Ouellette said. “We do have the power to do things here.”
