Last Friday, Marsha Kamish gathered up her posters and banners and headed to the Social Security office on Westheimer. This wasn’t the first time the 68-year-old Katy resident has staked out a spot on the sidewalk to let the government know what she thinks about the latest actions of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and it won’t be the last.
Kamish and her fellow protesters — people of all ages and races — have been posting up at the federal government office every Friday for years, long before ICE agents began detaining American citizens and shooting law-abiding people who questioned the presence of masked men in their communities.
The widow and retired technical writer says she’s come to expect violence and lawlessness from President Donald Trump’s administration. And although the recent shootings occurred in Minneapolis, they could just as easily have happened in Houston, she said.
“First they come for this, then they come for that, and pretty soon they’re coming for you,” she said. “There’s no discrimination. That’s what you can tell by these middle-class white folks getting killed. It could happen to any of us. There are some people who are Latino who don’t think it’s their problem because they’re here legally. It’s got nothing to do with that. It blows my mind that people don’t get that. They will shoot you just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Several Harris County and Houston elected officials from both sides of the aisle issued statements condemning senseless violence, with some referring to “heavy-handed ICE operations” and “Trump’s reign of terror.” But there are feelings of helplessness and hopelessness beneath the calls to action. Few believe the President is listening to anyone but himself.
Even Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said on a conservative talk radio show last week that the White House needs to recalibrate ICE’s mission so the federal agency can rebuild trust and “get back to what they wanted to do to begin with, and that is to remove people from the country who are here illegally.”
Marsha Kamish protests Immigration and Customs Enforcement near Katy Freeway on January 10. Credit: April Towery
Senate Republicans earlier this week called for Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to resign as Democrats threatened to launch impeachment proceedings against her. Trump’s immediate response was to tell White House reporters on Tuesday, “I think she’s doing a very good job. The border is totally secure.”
Kamish isn’t buying the GOP change of heart. “They’re seeing the handwriting on the wall,” she said. “Believe me, it’s not coming out of the kindness of their hearts. I accept what they say but I question their motives. [Trump] is losing support left, right and center, and I don’t see him finishing his term.”
Kamish says she supports action over rhetoric. She’s just not sure how effective the pushback will be when the country’s leader appears to have gone rogue.
“He’s clearly losing his mind,” she said. “It’s going to take the 2026 midterms to get the majority back and impeach him and get him out of office. I don’t think anyone is going to rein him in. He needs to be put out. There’s no reining in someone who has no conscience.”
An Occupying Force?
Houston residents advocated for police accountability long before Trump began his second term last year, with interest ramping up significantly after George Floyd, a Black man who grew up in Houston, was killed in 2020 by a white police officer in Minneapolis.
The Black Lives Matter movement was polarizing; the ICE occupation of American cities is a whole new ballgame. While pervasive fear existed only among undocumented immigrants early last year, it’s become clear that anyone can be targeted, said Brittany Francis, executive director of Peoples’ Counsel, a Houston-based nonprofit that supports police accountability and survivors of law enforcement misconduct.
“I think it could happen in Houston. I think it could happen anywhere,” Francis said. “That’s the scary consequence of any law enforcement receiving the message that they are above accountability and above consequence for how they treat people. I think the mask-wearing makes it worse because people aren’t contemplating even being known for their cruelty.”
Houston City Council Member Edward Pollard sent a letter to the local ICE field office asking that agents remove face coverings and identify themselves when interacting with the public. He got no response.
“I think this is a win-win,” Pollard said in a video message posted January 5. “It helps for residents to know who’s a legit agent and for agents to know that they can engage with the public without someone thinking they are [impersonating a law enforcement officer]. I’m a strong advocate for a secure border and a reasonable pathway to citizenship but we as Houstonians have to ensure that all of our neighbors, regardless of background, are treated with dignity and respect.”
Members of the Peoples’ Counsel, Texas Civil Rights Project and Pure Justice pose with Houston City Councilman Edward Pollard, second from right, at a recent event. Credit: Alfredo Dominguez
Francis said that the strategy of Governor Abbott and Houston Mayor John Whitmire to stay off Trump’s radar to avoid being targeted has not been successful.
The New York Times reported in January that the Greater Houston area saw more ICE arrests than any other U.S. city or region, based on federal data. The newspaper later clarified that the statistics came from a broad multi-county area, not just the City of Houston. The report stated that between January and October 2025, ICE made about 5,200 “at-large” community arrests and roughly 9,300 arrests via jails and prisons in the Greater Houston area.
“I get the sense that Abbott and Whitmire are playing this game of, maybe if they’re not openly anti-Trump, Texas and Houston won’t be targeted, but that’s not necessarily the case,” Francis said. “Already we’re seeing a lot of cooperation between HPD and ICE.”
“Each of those interactions, each of those traffic stops leading to ICE being called, is a potential death, especially because we’re seeing that ICE recruitment is suffering,” she added. “They’re bringing in volunteers. They’re sending out people on the streets who aren’t trained. It’s a recipe for disaster.”
Scores of advocates have headed to City Hall to call for an end to “non-safety traffic stops,” interactions with police over broken taillights or tinted windows that have, in the recent past, led to undocumented people being referred to ICE because they have an outstanding warrant.
Kamish said it’s concerning that so many ICE arrests are made in the Houston area and yet “we hear very little about it.”
“We’re keeping our eyes open but we don’t see the ICE agents,” she said. “Where are they going and who are they getting? Why do we not hear about it?”
As a Democratic Party precinct chair, Kamish joined 185 of her peers in voting to admonish Whitmire in December, meaning the party will not endorse him in any future elections.
“I don’t think he shares my values as a Democrat. If he did, he’d be standing up, saying, Not in my city,” she said.
More than 100 people showed up at a public comment session at Houston City Hall on Tuesday evening to protest ICE. Social media posts declared that Whitmire and several council members walked out during the meeting, before half of the registered speakers could share their comments. They took their protest to Bagby Street outside City Hall, chanting, “ICE out of Houston now!”
Pollard wrote on social media after the meeting that there was confusion about the start time and some speakers were delayed by long security lines.
“I felt it was important that these community members, who made the effort to sign up and attend, had the opportunity to speak,” the councilman said. “As a result, I stayed afterward and facilitated a session in the Legacy Room to ensure all remaining speakers were heard.”
Taking it to the Streets
Houstonians mobilized to protest ICE, among other things, at two local No Kings demonstrations at City Hall in June and October 2025. Kamish says ICE agents haven’t shown up at the protests she attends, but if they did, she wouldn’t be afraid of them.
“I don’t have any dependents, except for my puppy and he will be taken care of if something happens to me,” Kamish said. “Sometimes you just have to take a stand. You can’t let fear rule your life. That’s what they want. Then you sit there and do nothing and they take all the power. There’s also safety in numbers. If you want to come and stand behind me, I’ll take the bullet for you.”
Protesters take to the streets on a weekly basis in Houston with the message that they want ICE out of the community. Credit: April Towery
Critics of the Trump administration have not only questioned why the Minneapolis shootings occurred in the first place, but why the officers who fired their weapons appear to be protected from scrutiny and punishment.
Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old woman who was a U.S. citizen born in Colorado, was shot in the head three times by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent while driving her vehicle in an area where several agents were stationed. Trump defended ICE Agent Jonathan Ross’ actions, claiming on social media after the incident that Good “violently, willfully and viciously ran over the ICE officer, who seems to have shot her in self-defense.”
The incident that got the attention of gun rights activists was the January 24 shooting by a border patrol agent of ICU nurse Alex Pretti. Pretti was armed — he had a gun in a holster and a permit to carry it — but video from the incident reveals that Pretti did not appear to be approaching the federal agents but rather was helping a woman who had been knocked to the ground by officers. He was a U.S. citizen born in Illinois with no criminal record.
Within hours of Pretti’s death and little information to go on, Trump called the man a “domestic terrorist.” Bill Essayli, who was appointed by Trump to temporarily serve as a U.S. attorney in California last year, posted on social media, “If you approach law enforcement with a gun, there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you.”
But video of Pretti’s death shows that the Minnesota man wasn’t holding the gun. It shows an officer reaching to Pretti’s lower back and stepping away with “what appeared to be a pistol — and Pretti subsequently being shot to death,” The Guardian reported.
The National Rifle Association and lobbying group Gun Owners of America, two organizations that have traditionally aligned with Trump, criticized Essayli’s comments, suggesting that the narrative is “dangerous and wrong.”
“Responsible public voices should be awaiting a full investigation, not making generalizations and demonizing law-abiding citizens,” the NRA posted.
The discussion about Second Amendment rights and aggressive policing has also caught the attention of unlikely, typically apolitical commentators, such as an 800,000-member Reddit group devoted to videos of people playing their cats like drums, the Washington Post reported earlier this week.
A coffee shop employee in Dallas quit her job because she was required to give ICE agents a first responder discount, and group chats previously devoted to golf have evolved into discussions on border patrol.
Kamish says that’s because people are scared and uncomfortable with the direction the country is going. “Signing petitions does nothing,” she said. “We have to talk about it. We have to show up. We can’t just sit around and wait for someone to tell us what to do.”
“We don’t expect [Senate Democratic Caucus Leader Chuck] Schumer up in New York to tell us what to do and to lead us into freedom,” she added. “It’s just not going to happen. We have to get out on the streets and do it ourselves.”
ICE agents took 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his father from their Minneapolis home on January 20 to a detention facility in Dilley, south of San Antonio. A photo of the boy in a blue knit bunny hat and Spiderman backpack circulated around the country as people questioned why a child was taken into custody in his own driveway.
CNN reported that Liam’s father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, does not appear to have a criminal record, which flies in the face of Trump’s assertion that the ICE immigration sweeps are targeting violent criminals and the “worst of the worst.”
At-Large Houston Council Member Julian Ramirez, a Republican, has hosted community roundtable discussions to address the unrest and public safety concerns of having ICE agents in the community. Ramirez said after Pretti’s shooting in Minneapolis, he was deeply troubled and heartbroken.
“This loss of life is unacceptable and only deepens the fear and mistrust already felt in our neighborhoods,” the councilman wrote on social media. “Reckless, heavy-handed ICE operations put everyone at risk and must stop now. We cannot — and will not — accept a reality where people being killed in our streets becomes routine or excusable.”
Kamish said the Republican scrutiny is welcome but the sentiment among protesters, however, is that a tersely-worded Facebook post from a Texas city council member isn’t going to amount to change in the Trump administration.
“I think it’s going to take a march on Washington, and I’m ready to go,” Kamish said. “I’ve got a dog-sitter ready. My car is filled with gas. I’ve got signs in the car. This is crazy. People need to know that we’re about to lose our America. Whatever you think it was, we’re not going to have it anymore. I’m not going to sit around and put up with it. Just like the people in the 1930s, I’m ready to be part of the resistance.”
Court Battles
Harris County Attorney Jonathan Fombonne announced last week that the county joined a lawsuit against the federal government’s “Operation Metro Surge,” arguing that the current approach amounts to an authoritarian overreach that threatens local authority and community safety.
The Trump administration confirmed earlier this week that ICE Chief Greg Bovino and some federal agents were leaving Minnesota. Bovino has reportedly been removed from his position and is expected to retire soon. Other high-ranking officials could also be fired.
Trump said this week that he’d talked to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and is deploying Border Czar Tom Homan to the Twin Cities.
“I told Governor Walz that I would have Tom Homan call him, and that what we are looking for are any and all criminals that they have in their possession,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social site Monday afternoon. “The governor, very respectfully, understood that, and I will be speaking to him in the near future.”
Meanwhile, pressure is mounting in Congress to withhold funding from ICE and create a standoff that could lead to another government shutdown.
Enforcing immigration law isn’t new to Texas, but critics say Trump’s aggressive approach is different from what previous administrations did, which was limited to arresting people who were illegally crossing the border into the United States.
The federal Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments earlier this month challenging Texas Senate Bill 4, which makes it a state crime to enter the country without authorization. The law was passed in 2023 but was placed on hold a year later when a federal district judge ruled that it conflicts with federal law. Critics of the bill argue that Texas, a red state operating under Abbott’s leadership, has joined Trump in conducting the largest deportation effort in modern history.
“This is Why We Protest”
When the news broke last week that Governor Abbott said the ICE operation needs to be recalibrated, Dallas attorney Mark Melton posted a link to the news story with the caption, “This is why we protest.”
“It works,” Melton wrote. “But let’s not give these folks a pass for finally coming around after the public pressure boiled over. We told them this would happen. And they didn’t just enable it, they encouraged it. Vote them out of office. Every last one of them.”
Houston protests were more lighthearted prior to the shooting deaths of American citizens in Minnesota by federal agents this month. Credit: April Towery
As for Kamish, she studied history at the University of Nebraska and got a graduate degree at Tulane University. She says she knows what’s at stake.
“Some people were apparently sleeping in history class,” she said. “They don’t recognize what’s going on. It’s scary. Just because we’ve been a democracy for 250 years doesn’t mean we’ll continue to be a democracy. It’s work, every day, to keep our freedoms, and it drives me crazy that people don’t get that.”
She added that she believes each person should “look inside their heart and figure out what’s right.”
“I don’t even have kids and I still think about the future,” she said. “I wouldn’t want anyone to grow up in a world like this. I actually had somebody ask me, ‘Why do you care what’s happening to other people?’ How can you not care what’s happening to other people? I don’t want any fame or glory. I just want people to understand that we are living in strange times and we have to do our part to make it better.”
This article appears in Private: Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2026.
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