Protesters gather at Axne office to denounce detention camps on border

About 150 protesters gathered outside U.S. Rep. Cindy Axne’s office on Tuesday to demand that detention camps on the border be closed. 

At noon, the crowd hoisted their signs and streamed into Axne’s office building, crowding the stairwell and small elevators. Staffers led them into a conference room on the third floor. The room, which was meant to seat 10, held at least 100. Stragglers listened at the door.   

The protest was one of nearly 200 "Close the Camps" rallies around the nation on Tuesday. There were four in Iowa alone: one outside the Cedar Rapids courthouse, one at the office of U.S. Rep. Steve King in Ames, and a letter-writing event in Davenport.

Axne was not in the local office, but her staff provided water bottles to the protesters and listened. Meeting attendees shared stories of their personal encounters with ICE and detention centers. 

"We had the story of one person who is a transgender woman who was detained and is an asylum seeker, and then the story of a family where the husband and father was detained by ICE here in Iowa," said pastor and protest organizer Emily Ewing.

The protesters then read the names of eight children and two transgender women who have died in ICE custody. Rather than observe a moment of silence, they recognized these individuals with a minute "of clapping, of yelling, of whatever you feel like doing to honor their courage," pastor and co-organizer Alejandro Alfaro-Santiz said. 

Ewing and Alfaro-Santiz, both pastors at the Trinity Las Americas United Methodist Church, partnered with the nationwide "Close the Camps" initiative to organize the Axne protest. They began planning on Sunday, just three days before the event.

Axne voted last week in favor of the $4.6 billion aid package to border camps, many of which lack basic necessities like soap or diapers.

Axne said the aid package will "provide vital humanitarian assistance to vulnerable children and families at the border," according to a statement responding to the protest. “While we must protect our borders, we must always treat people with dignity and respect, and I will continue to hold government accountable to doing both.”

Protesters maintained that funneling more money toward the camps and border security was not an acceptable long-term solution.

"Representative Axne hasn't been very clear on her message. She's been very much in favor of supporting 'border security' which is usually code for more funding for ICE and CBP," Ewing said. "That money would be much better off closing the camps and reunifying the families."