{"id":127618,"date":"2026-01-22T10:15:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T10:15:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/127618\/"},"modified":"2026-01-22T10:15:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T10:15:08","slug":"usf-students-join-tampa-protest-against-trump-administration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/127618\/","title":{"rendered":"USF students join Tampa protest against Trump administration"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/a>USF students and locals gathered outside the Tampa City Hall on Tuesday, Jan. 20, for an anti-Trump protest. ORACLE PHOTO\/THOMAS MARRS<\/p>\n

Nearly 150 Tampa residents, including USF students, gathered outside Tampa City Hall on Tuesday to protest the Donald Trump presidential administration.<\/p>\n

Protests against the Trump administration erupted across the U.S. on Jan. 20 \u2014 the one-year anniversary of Trump\u2019s inauguration \u2014 as part of the Free America<\/a> walkouts, a series of events hosted by the Women\u2019s March<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Women\u2019s March is a feminist social justice group that aims to fight for the power of the people and democracy according to their website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Tampa protest was held from 5 to 7 p.m. outside the Tampa City Hall, which is about a 20-minute drive from the USF Tampa campus.<\/p>\n

USF students and Tampa locals stood outside the building with signs to showcase their dissatisfaction with federal policies in the U.S.<\/p>\n

Some USF students said they attended the event in the hopes that attendance numbers would pressure the administration to change.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Related: USF students protest university ties to immigration enforcement<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

Tess Miller, a senior English major who attended the event, said people showed up to support their causes and exercise their right to protest freely.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s not a lot that students feel like they can do, but I think going to protests, attending rallies, making your voice heard is super important and does a lot more than you think,\u201d Miller said.<\/p>\n

Miller said this was her first time at a protest, but said she believes \u201ceveryone\u201d should condemn U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement after Renee Good\u2019s death earlier this month.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A federal immigration officer shot and killed Good, 37, on Jan. 7 while she was driving her car in Minneapolis, Minnesota, after she and her wife stopped to support her neighbors, according to the Associated Press<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Some protestors held signs that read, \u201cStop ICE\u201d and \u201cThe Trump Administration is toxic to the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Miller said enforcement agencies and police are using their power in \u201csuper abusive\u201d ways \u2014 showing a shift in how they approach and handle situations since Trump\u2019s inauguration.<\/p>\n

Miller, like others at the protest, said recent actions from ICE \u2014 including Good\u2019s death \u2014 are brutal examples of this abuse.<\/p>\n

\u201cDeportation isn\u2019t something completely alien to our beliefs and our thoughts and what the government has been doing in the past,\u201d Miller said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While Miller focused on protesting ICE, other demonstrators focused their attention on Trump \u2014 saying he is using his leadership power to benefit his own political interests.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Related: USF Faculty Senate opposes UP, ICE partnership<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mackenzie Queen, a junior digital communications and multimedia journalism major, said she believes representing a cause is an important part of protecting personal rights.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s part of your civil duty,\u201d Queen said. \u201cMost of what a person can do is vote and then come out and use their voice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Queen said she was satisfied with the turnout for the event and hopes it will have an impact on the broader Tampa community and the country.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s somewhat of an idea that people with hope or people with goals are in the minority, but when people come out like this, it shows that their strength with numbers that we\u2019re not alone,\u201d Queen said.<\/p>\n

Allie Enriquez, a senior psychology major, said she has seen \u201ca lot of fear\u201d about ICE involvement<\/a> on campus. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhat USF could do is make our campus a sanctuary campus, especially when we have so many international students, especially graduate assistants,\u201d Enriquez said.<\/p>\n

A sanctuary school is an educational institution that lacks the legal authority or resources to engage in federal immigration enforcement and therefore limits its cooperation with such agencies, according to Immigrants Rising<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Still, Enriquez said she was \u201creally happy\u201d to see such a large turnout for the event.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI know that a lot of people have been viewing this lately as like very bleak, but I think there is hope for this country and for goodness to prevail,\u201d Enriquez said.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"USF students and locals gathered outside the Tampa City Hall on Tuesday, Jan. 20, for an anti-Trump protest.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":127619,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-127618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127618","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=127618"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127618\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/127619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=127618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=127618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=127618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}