{"id":93716,"date":"2026-01-08T14:55:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T14:55:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/93716\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T14:55:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T14:55:08","slug":"staten-island-protesters-hang-ice-kills-sign-over-expressway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/93716\/","title":{"rendered":"Staten Island protesters hang \u2018ICE kills\u2019 sign over expressway"},"content":{"rendered":"

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. \u2014 Protesters gathered on an overpass above the Staten Island Expressway on Thursday morning to oppose enforcement efforts by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.<\/p>\n

The individuals hung a protest sign that said \u201cICE KILLS\u201d on the Woolley Avenue overpass of the expressway. ICE is a common abbreviation for the agency.<\/p>\n

Diane Velletri of the Staten Island Action Coalition was among the protesters standing on the overpass. Velletri is opposed to what she believes are illegal tactics used by the agency against immigrants. <\/p>\n

Velletri described the effort as part of a nationwide \u201cvisibility brigade\u201d prompted by the fatal shooting of Renee Good, 37, during an encounter with enforcement agents in Minneapolis.<\/p>\n

Velletri said the shooting was \u201cbeyond anything that has already happened. The reason that she was out there and those other people were out there is because what is happening is illegal. It\u2019s cruel beyond words.\u201d <\/p>\n

Referring to the agency, she said \u201cthey are just ruining this country.\u201d<\/p>\n

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem described the incident as an \u201cact of domestic terrorism\u201d<\/a> carried out against ICE officers by a woman who \u201cattempted to run them over and rammed them with her vehicle. An officer of ours acted quickly and defensively, shot, to protect himself and the people around him.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a social media post, President Donald Trump made similar accusations against the woman and defended ICE\u2019s work.<\/p>\n

But Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey blasted Noem\u2019s version of what happened as \u201cgarbage\u201d and criticized the federal deployment of more than 2,000 officers to the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul as part of the immigration crackdown.<\/p>\n

Velletri believes that the fatal shooting in Minneapolis was intended to make people afraid to exercise their right to free speech. The freedom to protest is part of \u201cwhat makes America great\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Supportive honks, tossed soda<\/p>\n

Drivers had mixed reactions to the protesters, ranging from supportive honks to shouted curses. Someone hurled a cup of soda at the group, Velletri said.<\/p>\n

The group will be removing and reposting the sign as needed to avoid being targeted, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe word\u2019s getting out, people have to wake up,\u201d Velletri said about the enforcement actions.<\/p>\n

\"ProtestProtesters gather on the Woolley Avenue overpass of the Staten Island Expressway to oppose enforcement actions by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.(Advance\/SILive.com | Jan Somma-Hammel)\"ProtestProtesters gather on the Woolley Avenue overpass of the Staten Island Expressway to oppose enforcement actions by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.(Advance\/SILive.com | Jan Somma-Hammel)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. \u2014 Protesters gathered on an overpass above the Staten Island Expressway on Thursday morning to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":93717,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[9,24,63,134,136,135],"class_list":{"0":"post-93716","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-staten-island","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-new-york-city","10":"tag-nyc","11":"tag-staten-island","12":"tag-staten-island-headlines","13":"tag-staten-island-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93716"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93716\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}