The Far Right Think Tank Action Institute is celebrating this year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner, but why are the Democrats celebrating?
On a recent social media post, the Grand Rapids-based Far Right Think Tank, the Acton Institute, celebrated the Nobel Peace Prize going to Maria Corina Machado, a Venezuelan who they say, “has shown that the tools of democracy are also the tools of peace.”
Democrats were celebrating the fact that the Nobel committee gave the award to Machado and not US President Donald Trump. However, Democrats were also celebrating the fact that Machado won the award because they too have had nothing but contempt for the Venezuelan government that embraced Socialism when Hugo Chavez became President in 1999. Not only did Chavez embrace Socialism, he spent the rest of his life attempting to fulfill Simon Bolivar’s vision of an independent and autonomous Latin America. Like Bolivar, Chavez was opposed to US Imperialism in Latin America.
What is interesting about Maria Corina Machado is that last year by a number of Florida Republicans, including then-Senator Marco Rubio, who’s now President Trump’s secretary of state. In fact, Machado attempted to run for president against incumbent Nicolás Maduro in the 2024 race, but was barred from running after the government accused her of corruption and cited her support for U.S. sanctions against Venezuela.
In a recent interview on Democracy Now, Greg Grandin, the author of the America, América: A New History of the New World, said the following of Machado winning the Nobel Peace Prize:
It’s a — it’s a perplexing choice on a number of levels and, it seems, inevitably will bring about the opposite of peace. You know, Machado is not a unifier, as the committee said. She represents the most intransigent face of the opposition, and not just — as you mentioned in your introduction, not just against Maduro, but against, you know, a democratically elected Hugo Chávez. She was a supporter of the 2002 coup. She has constantly divided the opposition and handicapped the opposition, frankly, when the opposition was trying to come up with a more moderate position that could challenge the social — the socialism of — 21st-century socialism that Chávez represented. She constantly represented a more hard line in terms of economics, in terms of U.S. relations, you know, and that intransigence has led her to rely on outside powers, notably the United States.
In another recent online post, Michelle Ellner, a Venezuelan who works with the anti-war group CodePink wrote:
Machado isn’t a symbol of peace or progress. She is part of a global alliance between fascism, Zionism, and neoliberalism, an axis that justifies domination in the language of democracy and peace. In Venezuela, that alliance has meant coups, sanctions, and privatization. In Gaza, it means genocide and the erasure of a people. The ideology is the same: a belief that some lives are disposable, that sovereignty is negotiable, and that violence can be sold as order.
Michelle Ellner then listed some of Machado’s history:
- She helped lead the 2002 coup that briefly overthrew a democratically elected president, and signed the Carmona Decree that erased the Constitution and dissolved every public institution overnight.
- She worked hand in hand with Washington to justify regime change, using her platform to demand foreign military intervention to “liberate” Venezuela through force.
- She cheered on Donald Trump’s threats of invasion and his naval deployments in the Caribbean, a show of force that risks igniting regional war under the pretext of “combating narcotrafficking.” While Trump sent warships and froze assets, Machado stood ready to serve as his local proxy, promising to deliver Venezuela’s sovereignty on a silver platter.
- She pushed for the US sanctions that strangled the economy, knowing exactly who would pay the price: the poor, the sick, the working class.
- She helped construct the so-called “interim government,” a Washington-backed puppet show run by a self-appointed “president” who looted Venezuela’s resources abroad while children at home went hungry.
- She vows to reopen Venezuela’s embassy in Jerusalem, aligning herself openly with the same apartheid state that bombs hospitals and calls it self-defense.
- Now she wants to hand over the country’s oil, water, and infrastructure to private corporations. This is the same recipe that made Latin America the laboratory of neoliberal misery in the 1990s.
Writer Ben Norton also posted an article talking about how Machado has been a strong supporter of Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians. Norton states:
In January 2025, Machado held a call with Israel’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Gideon Sa’ar. She expressed her “gratitude to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel”, adding that she “immensely values the support of the government of Israel”.
The genocidal Israeli regime has refused to recognize the government of Venezuela’s constitutional, internationally recognized President Nicolás Maduro, and has instead recognized US-backed coup leader Edmundo González, who lives in Spain and is a proxy for Machado.
In April 2024, Israel attacked Iran in an act of aggression, and Tehran hit back in self-defense. Machado immediately took to Twitter to condemn Iran. She emphasized her “solidarity with the State of Israel amid the direct aggression by the Iranian regime”.
Machado denounced the supposed “risk represented by the alliance of Iran with the Venezuelan regime”, and she vowed that, if the US can successfully put her in power in Caracas, Machado would form a close alliance with the US and Israel against Iran and the Palestinian people.
In 2023, Machado again tweeted support for Israel, expressing hope that it has a “long and happy existence”, adding that the far-right Venezuelan opposition and the genocidal Israeli regime share common “values”.
One of the clearest illustrations of Machado’s extremist politics came in 2018, when she published an open letter to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, asking the genocidal leader to help her overthrow Venezuelan President Maduro.
So why has the Democratic Party so zealously been anti-Venezuelan? The Democratic Party is equally committed to US Imperialism and anti-Socialism as the Republican Party is, especially in matters of foreign policy. This is what US foreign policy critics like Noam Chomsky have been saying for years, which is that the US government, regardless of who sits in the White House, will not tolerate any independent government in Latin America, which is why the CIA engaged in a coup in Guatemalan in 1954, in Chile in 1973, funded counterinsurgency terrorism in Central American in the 1980s, supported narco-terrorist countries like Colombia for decades, and has been punishing Cuba since the 1959 revolution. The US government has also been funneling millions to the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) to support pro-US groups in Venezuela since Chavez became President in 1999.
For those looking for solid, independent analysis of Venezuela, check out this link https://venezuelanalysis.com/ and the Venezuela Solidarity Network.
A video clip of Jane Fonda speaking against the US war in Vietnam at Fountain Street Church in 1972
Editor’s note: I have been working with Fountain Street Church and looking at a substantial amount of archival materials they have. Today’s post is only possible because Fountain Street Church has provided me access to their archives and they want this information to be public and available to the community. I will be hosting the archival material on the Grand Rapids People’s History Project site, but also posting here on GRIID. This is the second in a series of postings from the archival material at Fountain Street Church.
So far I have posted talks by Kwame Ture/Stokely Carmichael, James Meredith, Dick Gregory, Amy Goodman and bell hooks, all of whom spoke at Fountain Street Church.
In today’s post we bring you a short part of a talk that Jane Fonda gave at Fountain Street Church, since most of the video has been corrupted. In the few minutes of this video we hear Fonda talk about how she got involved in the anti-war movement.
Anther great resource about the anti-Vietnam War movement, which Fonda was a part of, is the documentary Sir, No Sir! Jane Fonda is in this documentary, but the bulk of the film is about the GI involvement in the anti-war movement in the 1960s and 70s.
With 24 other Senate Democrats, both Michigan Senators voted for the FY 2026 Military bill, otherwise know as S.2296 – National Defense Authorization Act, to the tune of $914 billion.
The Senate version includes three key provisions targeting LGBTQ+ people: a ban on transgender participation in sports at military academies, extending even to visiting students in intercollegiate competitions; a prohibition on Defense Department funding for gender-affirming surgeries, which could also sweep in defense contractors as well as trans military spouses; and a measure gutting equal opportunity and diversity protections across the armed forces, according to one source.
In addition, there was a provision in the bill to allow the federal government to deploy US troops within the country. According to Senator Slotkin, she “pressed for provisions in this defense budget that put new guardrails on the Trump Administration’s misuse of the military at home, including to require service members deployed domestically to wear identification, and to provide trainings for service members supporting civilian law enforcement to protect against escalation during domestic operations.” Great, so Slotkin didn’t object to US soldiers repressing US residents, just make sure that people know they are US soldiers. Sweet Jesus, this is the same shit that Slotkin pushed for ICE, when she wanted them to not wear masks, but arresting, detaining and deporting immigrants is fine.
Funding US Imperialism
It’s bad enough that the 2026 US military funding bill has anti-trans provisions in it, along with granting the federal government powers to deploy US soldiers within the US. However, even more outrageous and deplorable is the fact that once again there is bi-partisan support to spend $914 billion on the military. Here are some reasons why we should collectively oppose such a massive US military budget:
- The US has the largest military budget globally and is as big as the next 9 largest military budgets combined.
- The US Military has roughly 800 bases around the world so it can play the global cop and make sure that US political and economic interests are not threatened. If we are upset and opposed to US soldiers being used domestically to repress the public, we should be equally opposed to the US military that has a long track record of suppressing public dissent and killing civilians on a massive scale.
- The US military burns more fossil fuels than most countries in the world. If we care about Climate Justice we have to oppose the US military.
- The US Military budget is also a massive subsidy for the hundreds of US military contractors, thus a form of welfare for corporations like Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, L3Harris and General Dynamics, just to name a few.
- Spending $914 Billion on militarism means that the US prioritizes US imperialism abroad over funding health care, housing, education or mass transit. The issue is never is there enough money, it is a matter of priorities.
Lastly, it is worth noting that Senator Peters essentially bragged about voting for the US military budget, especially how his vote will guarantee millions for Michigan military contractors and provide improvement at Selfridge Air National Guard Base. The Selfridge Air National Guard Base is important to note, since Peters and Slotkin both met with Trump to make sure funds would be going to that base.
Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE kickoff a Boycott Mayor LaGrand campaign over his refusal to adopt sanctuary policies in Grand Rapids
Nearly 30 people gathered today outside of the West Leonard bar known as Long Road Distillers to kickoff a campaign to pressure Grand Rapids Mayor David LaGrand who is a co-owner of the business.
Since January Movimiento Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE have been pressuring the City of Grand Rapids to adopt several sanctuary policies, policies that would solidify the city’s commitment to not cooperate with ICE and the businesses that profit from ICE arrests, detentions and deportations.
Here are the sanctuary policies:
- Policies restricting the ability of state and local police to make arrests for federal immigration violations, or to detain individuals on civil immigration warrants.
- Policies restricting the police or other city workers from asking about immigration status.
- Policies prohibiting “287(g)” agreements through which ICE deputizes local law enforcement officers to enforce federal immigration law.
- Policies that prevent local governments from entering into a contract with the federal government to hold immigrants in detention;
- Policies preventing immigration detention centers from being established in Grand Rapids.
- A policy that will not allow the GRPD to share Flock camera images or any other information gathered by the city of Grand Rapids with ICE or any other law enforcement agency seeking to arrest, detain and deport immigrants.
The City of Grand Rapids has chosen to ignore these demands, despite the fact that there have been dozens of immigrant families impacted by ICE violence. Grand Rapids Mayor David LaGrand has repeatedly said that he doesn’t want to give immigrants a false sense of hope, plus the Mayor has even referred to the sanctuary policy demands as “silly” and “bizarre.”
Two weeks ago, Cosecha invited Mayor LaGrand, the other City Commissioners, along with all 21 Kent County Commissioners to a community forum to hear from immigrants directly affected by ICE. Mayor LaGrand chose to not attend, as did most of the other commissioners.
During the Boycott Campaign kickoff held on Saturday, someone read the following statement:
Since Mayor LaGrand has chosen to ignore these sanctuary policy demands, Movimiento Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE are calling for a boycott of all the businesses and properties that Mayor LaGrand has ownership in.
We stand here in front of Long Road Distillers today, which Mayor LaGrand partially owns and call on people to not spend their money here or purchase Long Road Distillers products, which are sold in many retail stores. We also call on people to Boycott the Long Road Distillers at 959 Cherry St in Grand Rapids, which is called the Less Traveled, and the Long Road Distillers in Grand Haven.
Additionally, Mayor LaGrand owns a 3 unit apartment building at 151 Prospect St NE, Grand Rapids, MI and a 6 unit apartment building at 21 Gay St SE, Grand Rapids, MI. Boycott these places by not renting from Mayor LaGrand. Mayor LaGrand also owns Marshall St LLC, Inc: A company owning a warehouse at 1600 Marshall St SE, Grand Rapids, MI, and a warehouse at 1750 Elizabeth Ave NW, Grand Rapids, MI. Boycott these spaces by not renting space there.
Boycotts have been an effective tactic used by countless social movements throughout history, and affecting Mayor LaGrand’s ability to make money is what it will take for him to meet the Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE demands for the City of Grand Rapids to adopt the sanctuary policies presented to them at the beginning of the year.
However, boycotts are only effective if we can get as many people to not only commit to not buying Long Road Distillers products and going to their three locations in West Michigan, we need people to get their friends, neighbors coworkers and anyone else who wants to practice immigrant solidarity right now to join the boycott as well. If you are part of an organization, a church, a community group or a labor union, we encourage those groups to publicly endorse the boycott!
Those participating in the boycott action stood outside of the Long Road Distillers making noise and disrupting business as usual using several chants like:
“Mayor LaGrand where do you stand?
Sanctuary policies Now!”
Movimiento Cosecha live-streamed the action, which you can view here.
We know that ICE will be adding more agents in Grand Rapids, which means ICE terrorism will only increase. We need to collectively resist ICE terrorism and practice immigrant solidarity, and this boycott is one way to get involved!
It has been 2 years since the Israeli government began their most recent assault on Gaza and the West Bank. The retaliation for the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack in Israel, has escalated to what the international community has called genocide, therefore, GRIID will be providing weekly links to information and analysis that we think can better inform us of what is happening, along with the role that the US government is playing. All of this information is to provide people with the capacity of what Noam Chomsky refers to as, intellectual self-defense.
Information
A History of Deception: US-Israeli Pacts and the Gaza Proposal
We Shut Elbit Down!Reflections from the Cambridge, Massachusetts Campaign Against Elbit Systems
Two Years of Genocide in Gaza, Seventy-Seven Years of Denial
US Sending 200 Troops to Israel, Establishing CENTCOM “Coordination Center”
Israel Condemned as Sumud Flotilla Organizers Report ‘Harsh Treatment’ in Detention
Report from Gaza: Israeli Bombardment Enters Third Year Despite Ceasefire Talks in Egypt
Two Years After October 7, the Horrors Are Indescribable
Report: US Spent Over $30B Backing Israel, Regional Wars in 2 Years of Genocide
Analysis & History
A Ceasefire Deal, But Not a Peace Agreement: What Will Happen in Gaza After Hostages Are Released?
Gaza’s Obliteration Has Been Paved by US-Israeli Peace Proposals
Exclusive: Senior Hamas Leader Mousa Abu Marzouk on Trump’s Gaza Plan and the Future of Hamas
Image used in this post is from https://bdsmovement.net/
Monitoring the most powerful family in West MI: The DeVos Family Reader – October 2025 edition
It has been 6 months since I last update the DeVos Family Reader. As always, there has been plenty to report on regarding the most powerful family in West Michigan.
In Howard Zinn’s monumental book, A People’s History of the United States, he constantly juxtaposes the amazing things that people did to fight for liberation and the people behind the systems of oppression that social movements were fighting against.
This is exactly why I have spent years monitoring, investigating and critiquing the DeVos Family. They are the most recognizable and powerful manifestation of the systems of power and oppression in West Michigan. Now, I know there are plenty of people who share the belief that without the DeVos Family, Grand Rapids wouldn’t be where it is today. I fully agree with that belief, but for reasons that are the exact opposite of those who hold the most powerful family in West Michigan in high regard.
This updated version of the DeVos Family Reader includes information and analysis on a variety of local issues, even some that are not directly focused on the DeVos Family, but there are connections.
DeVos family always looking to expand their wealth, this time with high end bourbon and whiskey
Believe in Our City: Just another iteration of the same old business as usual brand in Grand Rapids
Why is Rep. Scholten celebrating a DeVos created charter school?
These most recent articles further demonstrate the kind of power the DeVos family has, along with the numerous ways they insert themselves into West MI.
The DeVos Family Reader is now up to 830 pages, with more than 3 decades of reporting on the most powerful family in West Michigan.
The Stop the Violence, Keep the Peace, Unity Walk in Grand Rapids normalizes structural violence with the GRPD as a cosponsor
This coming Saturday from 11 – 2pm, a coalition of groups is hosting what they are calling a Stop the Violence, Keep the Peace Unity Walk at Rosa Parks Circle.
The description for this event is as follows:
STOP THE HATE: Grand Rapids, It’s Time to Change the Narrative Grand Rapids and Surrounding Cities: Your Voice is the Catalyst for Change.Tired of the headlines? Ready to move past the ‘new norm’ of division, rising vehicle thefts, violent offenses, and the systemic challenges that pull our youth out of the community? The time for dialogue is over—the time for action and unity is now.
The narrative sounds positive, but how exactly are people going to stop the violence and keep the peace when the Grand Rapids Police Department (GRPD) is a cosponsor of the event?
The GRPD rarely ever prevents crime from happening, since they primarily show up after some form of violence has occurred. From my 12 month local news monitoring project 2024, of the 673 stories that centered around crime, there were only 11 stories about the GRPD actually preventing crime, which means in most of the stories the GRPD showed up after a crime had been committed.
In addition, the GRPD have a long track record of targeting Black and Brown neighborhoods, often engaging in surveillance, intimidation, assault and racial profiling. For those that were paying attention to the trial of the former GRPD cop who, during a routine traffic violation, shot and killed Patrick Lyoya in the back of the head while sitting on top of him. We now know that the former GRPD cop suffered no consequences as there was a mistrial and even the Kent County Prosecutor said he would not re-try the case. How it is that the GRPD can kill a Black man, an unarmed Black man, and still suffer no consequences?
What a great deal of research shows is that when Black and Brown communities have their needs met economically, crime reduces. We know that what actually brings peace and safety is safe, accessible, quality, and stable housing, well-funded public schools and other public institutions like libraries and cultural centers, accessible and quality health care for all, including community-based, non-coercive mental health services, and ending the criminalization of unmet mental health needs and drug use. Additionally, many communities are already relying on non-police intervention and violence prevention programs that we know to be both effective and highly under-resourced compared to police. Interrupting Criminalization produced an excellent report entitled Cops Don’t Stop Violence, which deconstructs the whole notion of crime, how crime data is misused to serve policing interests and how police consistently engage in their own crimes against people they stop, detain and arrest.
The report is well researched and full of data, that is presented in a very readable fashion. The report concludes with the following statement:
It’s time to recognize that decades of pouring more money, resources, and legitimacy into policing in an effort to increase safety have failed — because policing is functioning as it is intended to: to contain, control, and criminalize Black and Brown communities rather than to prevent and reduce violence. It’s time to invest in meeting community needs and building non-police community safety strategies. It’s time to invest in just recovery.
Now if you look at the 2026 Grand Rapids City Budget for FY2026, you see that there is over $70 million allocated for the GRPD. If $70 million of public tax dollars was used to make sure that Black and Brown neighborhoods had all of their needs met, the GRPD would be obsolete. This gets to the issue of structural violence, which the police do not address. For instance if everyone made a living wage, there would be little to no crime.
Instead, the GRPD will have a platform at this march and rally, along with people like Johnny Brann, the founder of Voice for the Badge, which is nothing more than a cheerleader for the GRPD.
I salute the groups like Mothers on a Mission, but we can’t keep inviting cops to peace events, not talk about structural and systemic violence and then expect different results.
What Rep. Hillary Scholten, the recipient of Pro-Israel PAC money, wrote on October 7th, 2025
Rep. Hillary Scholten continues to demonstrate her allegiance to Israel and a Zionist worldview with her comments on social media. Rep. Scholten wrote:
Today, we remember the horrors of the Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel on October 7th. We remember the lives that were lost, we remember the communities that were changed forever by that violence and bloodshed, and we remember the hostages who remain in captivity. We remember so we will not allow the horrors of the past to be repeated. We remember so that we can continue to work towards shared peace in this region for Israelis and Palestinians alike.
There are numerous aspects of Scholten’s comments, which I want to deconstruct.
However, before I get to the comments from Rep. Scholten that were on her Facebook page, it is important to point out a few things. Rep. Hillary Scholten has been the recipient of pro-Israel contributions to the tune of $223,532.00, according to Bought By Zionism. In addition, Rep. Scholten voted in the summer of 2023 to to pass a resolution saying that Israel is not an Apartheid State. In August of 2023, Rep. Scholten went on an AIPAC funded tour of Israel, which is one of the benefits of receiving Pro-Israel lobby money. Lastly, it is worth noting that Rep. Scholten has voted for every piece of legislation that sends the regular annual US military aid to Israel, along with supplemental US military weapons sales that have been significantly larger than the $3.5 billion that the US provides to Israel annually.
Ok, now lets look at what Rep. Scholten said on her Facebook page for October 7. Rep. Scholten writes:
Today, we remember the horrors of the Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel on October 7th. We remember the lives that were lost, we remember the communities that were changed forever by that violence and bloodshed, and we remember the hostages who remain in captivity.
- Rep. Scholten conveniently omits the fact that Israel has been illegal occupying Palestinian land since 1948 and that the October 7, 2023 actions by Hamas are rooted in that historical context.
- Rep. Scholten also omits that the Israeli response has been to punish Palestinians to such a degree that is is widely acknowledged that what is Israel is committing against the Palestinians is Genocide. Even a prominent Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem published a report and calls what the Israeli government is doing as genocide.
- According to Drop Site News, “Over the past two years, since Hamas’s attack on October 7, 2023, Gaza has suffered daily attacks by Israel, according to the Government Media Office, resulting in an average of 92 Palestinians killed every single day, including 27 children and 14 women. An average of 53 families have been attacked each day, four completely wiped out, and eight reduced to a single survivor.”
- Rep. Scholten only refers to the Israeli hostages in her social media post, despite the fact that throughout the past two years, every negotiation between the Israeli government and Hamas it has been widely known that Hamas will release the hostages if Israel releases the roughly 250 Palestinian prisoners held in Israel who are serving life sentences, as well as 1,700 Gaza residents who have been detained since October 7, 2023.
Rep. Scholten goes on to say, “We remember so we will not allow the horrors of the past to be repeated.” The 3rd Congressional Representative only wants to remember what Hamas did on October 7, 2023, but she doesn’t want to talk about the 1948 Nakba, the illegal occupation, the ongoing Israeli murder of Palestinians since 1948, the torture of Palestinians, the Israeli military blockade, the manufactured famine or the violence inflicted by Israeli settlers who brutalize and kill Palestinians, along with taking their land.
Finally, Rep. Scholten says, “We remember so that we can continue to work towards shared peace in this region for Israelis and Palestinians alike.” These are hollow words regarding shared peace, especially since Rep. Schotlen has consistently voted to send billions of dollars worth of US weapons to Israel, weapons that are primarily used against unarmed civilians. It is hypocritical to say you want peace, when you arm the side that has the most powerful military in the region.
Rep. Scholten once again demonstrates her allegiance to Israel and to Zionism. In fact, her votes to fund the ongoing genocide would be considered a crime against humanity and a violation of the Genocide Convention. If the world was just, Rep. Scholten would be tried for her role in supporting and funding genocide. Despite this fact, people will still vote for her.
We need to come to terms with the history of US government repression and stop saying “this is not the US” when the most recent incident happens
Last week, ICE agents stormed an apartment complex in Chicago where witnesses say they broke down residents’ doors, smashed furniture and belongings, and dragged dozens of them, including children, placed in U-Haul vans.
In the days that followed this action by ICE there were lots of articles with headlines like, ‘Surreal Moment for America’: ICE Agents in Chicago Drag Children Out of Their Homes, Ransack Building. There were also social media posts that read – Putting an apartment building under siege and rappelling from Black Hawk helicopters into the apartment building is NOT the United States.
I certainly understand the sentiment, the outrage and the visceral reaction to such brutal repression by a US government agency. However, such actions are part of the very fabric of what the US government has been doing since it was founded. In fact, the US was founded on the genocide of Indigenous people and the enslavement of African people.
Now, I know that good, white liberals know this, but if they know this, then why do they respond to the recent ICE action in Chicago by saying this is NOT the US? I’m not sure of this a lack of awareness, a lack of education about US history, or the possibility that people are in denial about this history. I think it is a combination of these three elements, but being in denial might be the most powerful.
If people believe the narrative created by those in powerful, that the US is the greatest country on the planet or that the US is a shining example of democracy, then to be confronted with the reality that this is simply not true would radically alter how people move forward, particularly in terms of how we view one administration from another. In other words, if political repression was a constant, which it has been, then we have to come to terms with the fact that government repression is a bi-partisan practice.
I’m not sure why we don’t own up to the fact that the US was founded on genocide and slavery, but maybe that is because those are somewhat vague concepts. What follows are some concrete examples of US government repression that makes what ICE did in Chicago last week seem rather tepid.
1838 Trail of Tear – The US Military forcibly removed Indigenous people from 5 different Indigenous nations in order to provide more land to white settlers in the state of Georgia. The forced removal resulted in the deaths of thousands of indigenous people, including children and the elderly.
1864 Sand Creek Massacre – US troops killed 230 people, most of which were women, children, and elders of the Cheyenne and Arapaho nations at sunrise on November 29, 1864 at Big Sandy Creek in southeastern Colorado.
As a result of the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882) – in 1885 and 1886, at least 168 communities carried out Chinese expulsion and self-deportation campaigns. These campaigns resulted in the destruction of Chinese businesses, homes and several massacres.
1919/1920 Palmer Raids – The US Attorney General oversaw the arrest of thousands of people who were speaking out against the US participation in WWI, but mostly because of the labor organizing being done by people who identified as anarchists, socialists and communists. 6,000 people were arrested across 36 cities. with 556 foreign citizens being deported, including a number of prominent leftist leaders.
Japanese internment was the forced incarceration of over 120,000 people of Japanese descent, most of whom were American citizens, during World War II, following the attack on Pearl Harbor. Fueled by prejudice and wartime hysteria, Executive Order 9066 authorized the forced removal of Japanese Americans from the West Coast into government-run “relocation centers” or internment camps.
Forced sterilization has been systematically used against Black, Indigenous, and Latina women in the United States since the early 20th century, rooted in racist eugenics policies that disproportionately targeted poor women of color. These practices were driven by the racist belief that these women were “unfit” to be mothers and that controlling their reproduction would solve social problems and reduce welfare costs.
On May 13, 1985, the streets of Philadelphia shook with such force that some thought a gas main had blown. The quake, as it turned out, was the result of the Philadelphia Police Department dropping a bomb on the headquarters of MOVE, a Black liberation and environmentalist organization located in West Philadelphia. The bomb killed 11 people, including five children, and the resulting fire destroyed an entire city block.
These are only 7 examples of how the US government has engaged in repression against mostly communities of color, but it is important to note that this has been a constant throughout US history.
We need to stop romanticizing the US around the issue of government repression and start coming to terms with the fact that this has been an ongoing shit show. Where we can take some comfort or even inspiration, is from the incredible courage, efforts and sacrifices that hundreds of thousands of people have made throughout US history to combat government repression. This is the lesson we can learn from Chicago, to see that people are fighting back in the face of government repression, instead of being shocked by what the US government has been doing since it was founded. Power to the People!
Sources used:
An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States, by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
America for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in the United States, by Erika Lee American Intolerance: Our Dark History of Demonizing Immigrants, by Robert Bartholomew & Anja Reumschussel
A Little Matter of Genocide: Holocaust and Denial in the Americas 1492 to the Present, by Ward Churchill
An Afro-Indigenous History of the United States, by Kyle Mays
American Eugenics: Race, Queer Anatomy, and the Science of Nationalism, by Nancy Ordover
From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation, by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
From the Palmer Raids to the Patriot Act: A History of the Fight for Free Speech in America, by Christopher Finan
WOODTV8 not only takes ICE at their word, they do nothing to find out how ICE terrorism impacts immigrants in West Michigan
On Friday, WOODTV8 ran a 1 minute and 8 seconds story regarding the possibility that ICE might be targeting high school students across the country and in the Grand Rapids area.
The story is framed poorly, since they disproportionately relying on a Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) spokesperson. Early on in the WOODTV8 story that newsreader says:
Asked by News 8 if there is an active operation focusing on undocumented children, an ICE representative said the department offers a voluntary option for those kids to go back to their home country and receive financial support. The agency claims the children were dangerously smuggled into the country by cartels.
A basic principle of journalism would have been to verify the ICE claim that children were smuggled into the country by cartels. This was not the case, which means channel 8 took ICE at their word.
The story then shifts to provide some commentary from a Michigan Immigrant Rights Center (MIRC) spokesperson who was quoted as saying:
“Our advice for individuals and families (is to) remember the basic rights. Those aren’t changing, even in these more pressured circumstances. That’s the right to consult with an attorney before signing any document, the right to choose whether to sign a document, nobody can make that choice for someone else.” “
In contrast, ICE spokesperson Emily Covington was quoted as saying:
“These allegations are categorically false. The anti-ICE activists have made up a ridiculous term, ‘Freaky Friday,’ to instill fear and spread misinformation that drives the increased violence occurring against federal law enforcement. Cartels trafficked countless unaccompanied children into the United States during the Biden Administration, and DHS and HHS have been working diligently to ensure the safety and wellbeing of those children.”
The MIRC spokesperson provides legal advice, but the ICE spokesperson again makes several claims that are not verified, plus they refer to anyone who is critical of ICE as “anti-ICE activists.” In addition, for the ICE spokesperson to make the claim that the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Health and Human Services are working to “ensure the safety and wellbeing of those children,” is simply absurd.
This story by WOODTV8 not only failed to verify claims made by ICE, it demonstrated that they view ICE as a necessary institution within the federal government. Like Most commercial news agencies, ICE, like any other law enforcement agencies are viewed as important for the safety and security of society. In the last two GRIID news studies, one from 2024 and the other from 2025, I demonstrated how overtly pro-police the four major daily news sources are in the Grand Rapids market.
It is also important to note that WOODTV8 did not talk directly to immigrant communities about what MIRC was saying regarding ICE and unaccompanied minors in this community. Channel 8 also did not talk to groups like Movimiento Cosecha, which had conducted patrols on Friday in case ICE was going to target high school age immigrant students.
In the end, WOODTV8 did a very short and poorly reported story on ICE activity in Grand Rapids, despite the fact that groups like Movimiento Cosecha and GR Rapid Response to ICE are aware of dozens of ICE arrests in recent months that has exponentially increased fear and panic in the various immigrant communities in the Grand Rapids area. In fact, WOODTV8 has done very few stories about ICE arrests of immigrants, but they have a whole page devoted to ArtPrize stories, which demonstrates what receives priority from the NBC affiliate.
Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy 