March 31, 2026
This past weekend, thousands of people filled Cal Anderson Park for the No Kings Rally. Sage’s Political Director Aretha Basu and Executive Director Chrissy Shimizu both took the stage and spoke to the urgency of this moment and the power of organized communities to meet it.
Chrissy shared about Puget Sound Sage’s deep roots in the Chinatown International District and what it means to organize the neighborhood to remain a welcoming home to working class immigrant families. “We know from our siblings fighting in Minneapolis, Chicago, Portland, and LA that it is not the politicians and their promises — and not the cops — who keep us safe, but our neighbors and everyday organized people, who are the heartbeat and backbone of community defense. A perfect policy will not save us, only our organized communities will. Block by block we must declare our neighborhoods ICE-Free Zones.”
Aretha called out an urgent threat: Washington State is sharing Department of Licensing (DOL) data including license plate numbers and home addresses with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and ICE, making it easier for federal agents to target our neighbors. She urged the crowd to call on Governor Ferguson to stop the DOL data share and reminded them that the forces we’re up against are not permanent, “While the presence of ICE and detention centers feels enormous and too big to challenge, we have to remember that the Department of Homeland Security wasn’t created until the early 2000s in the aftermath of 9/11. If DHS can be created in our lifetime, it can be abolished in our lifetime.”
They closed with a charge to the crowd: “This march cannot be where your action begins and ends,” and encouraged protesters to plug into the grassroots organizing already happening across the city. “When we say block by block, we mean that every neighbor, every worker, every community member has a duty to keep one another safe by organizing in both the big and small ways.”
✅ What You Can Do Right Now:
- Call Governor Ferguson and demand he stop the DOL data share with DHS and ICE
- Find our ICE Free Zone toolkit here and adapt it for your neighborhood