{"id":114222,"date":"2026-02-14T23:02:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T23:02:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/114222\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T23:02:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T23:02:08","slug":"over-1000-take-to-penn-avenue-for-ice-out-protest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/114222\/","title":{"rendered":"Over 1,000 take to Penn Avenue for “ICE Out” protest"},"content":{"rendered":"

Under the looming specter of a surge in Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity around the country, Mark Sewell saw a change in some of his students at Reading High School.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey live in fear,\u201d Sewell said. \u201cWhether ICE is in the city or not. That\u2019s impacting their education in my classroom.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MarkMark Sewell of Reading attended an Immigration and Customs Enforcement protest in Wyomissing Saturday because he knows how the poem by Pastor Martin Niemoller ends. (BILL UHRICH\/READING EAGLE)<\/p>\n

A history and social studies teacher, Sewell wore a sweater with a reference to a World War II-era statement by a German pastor<\/a> who warned of the danger of not speaking up against tyranny.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m here for (my students) and for my neighbors, because I live in the city of Reading,\u201d the history and social studies teacher said. \u201cI just have a lot of friends, some are immigrants\u2026this is a very scary time for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sewell and several thousand others came to Wyomissing Saturday to make clear their issues with ICE and the Trump administration\u2019s approach to immigration policy.<\/p>\n

Chants of \u201cThis is what democracy looks like,\u201d and \u201clove, not hate, makes America great,\u201d captured the mood on the sidewalks near Penn Avenue and Park Road<\/p>\n

The chants and cheers from protesters spilling onto both sides of Penn Avenue were the refrain to a constant chorus of honks from passing cars.<\/p>\n

Those anti-ICE sentiments were punctuated further by hundreds of signs decrying the agency, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and President Donald Trump in seemingly every turn of phrase imaginable.<\/p>\n

\"SeveralSeveral thousand people protested in Wyomissing Saturday against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement\u2019s purchase of a warehouse in Upper Bern Township for use as a processing facility for detainees. (BILL UHRICH\/READING EAGLE)<\/p>\n

Noting a Pennsylvania Dutch tradition of the season, Kurt Reed of Reading bore a sign reading \u201cfasnachts not Fascists.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you\u2019re dragging people out of cars and shooting them in the back, what else does it take (to motivate people to protest),\u201d Reed said.<\/p>\n

Elyse Rosania donned a dinosaur costume that was meant to add levity to heavy topics.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s horrible, what (ICE) is doing,\u201d Rosania said.<\/p>\n

\"AlyseAlyse Rosania collects signatures during a protest against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement purchase of a warehouse in Upper Bern Township for use as a processing facility for detainees. (BILL UHRICH\/READING EAGLE)<\/p>\n

The \u201cICE Out\u201d protest, organized by the Berks County Democratic Committee, was meant as a peaceful display of resistance.<\/p>\n

Providing a soundtrack to the protest was Harry Prutzman of Hamburg, playing guitar and belting lyrics like \u201cit\u2019s not about immigration, it\u2019s all about intimidation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"HarryHarry Prutzman of Hamburg sings protest songs during a protest in Wyomissing Saturday against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement purchase of a warehouse in Upper Bern Township for use as a processing facility for detainees. (BILL UHRICH\/READING EAGLE)<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s music that helps propel the message to a large group of people,\u201d Prutzman said, noting protest songs that inspired him by Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen.<\/p>\n

Amber Kulaga, Oley, and Susan Blakely, Shillington, sought to spread positive vibes with simple signs displaying hearts.<\/p>\n

\"AmberAmber Kulaga, left, and Susan Blakely, both of Shillington, protest in Wyomissing Saturday against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement purchase of a warehouse in Upper Bern Township for use as a processing facility for detainees. (BILL UHRICH\/READING EAGLE)<\/p>\n

\u201cLove trumps hate,\u201d Blakely said. \u201cChoose love. Absolutely.\u201d<\/p>\n

Blakely and Kulaga said they came out to protest ICE\u2019s purchase of a warehouse in Upper Bern Township, which the agency aims to turn into a detention center that can hold up to 1,500 people.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t believe in warehousing people,\u201d Blakely said. \u201cI don\u2019t know how our society got so damaged that we don\u2019t care about human lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

Holding people in warehouses without due process is just draconian, said Charles Corbit, event organizer and Berks County Democratic Committee treasurer.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not only a humanity thing, it\u2019s also a big cost impact to the county,\u201d he said. \u201cFrom an infrastructure perspective, from a services perspective, it\u2019s going to change the whole tenor of the area.\u201d<\/p>\n

Corbit said he was happy seeing so many people united on Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe real difference with us, this is a peaceful crowd,\u201d Corbit said. \u201cWe\u2019re loud, we have our opinion, but we\u2019re respecting the peaceful nature of this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ProtestersProtesters gather along Penn Avenue in Wyomissing for a demonstration in opposition to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. (Bill Uhrich \u2013 Reading Eagle)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Under the looming specter of a surge in Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity around the country, Mark Sewell…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":114223,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[349,182,139,28,128,130,129,706],"class_list":{"0":"post-114222","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-reading","8":"tag-berks-county","9":"tag-local-news","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-pennsylvania","12":"tag-reading-city","13":"tag-reading-city-headlines","14":"tag-reading-city-news","15":"tag-top-stories-reg"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}