One of the downsides of social media is so much of our real time history, analysis, and evidence is being shared in silos. These sites have shitty search, often make getting back to something you saw in a feed impossible, promote more and more temporary or disappearing forms of content. Choosing to shut down your account, or getting banned for your content immediately erases your history. It’s one of the factors in why I write here, something that will live on in people’s Inboxes and in a regular, web, crawlable, searchable archive.

It’s in this context that we largely have 2 sources for what’s happening outside Delaney Hall. First hand livestreams, FB posts, Bluesky skeets, Instagram photos. On the other side we have the government shamelessly lying to a podium full of microphones. Usually “A Lie Is Halfway Round the World Before the Truth Has Got Its Boots On.” But outside of Delaney Hall, we see the truth in real time, and the lies come later.

By the time Sherrill has put on a non-livestreamed, pre-recorded press conference, her constituents have seen hundreds of photos and videos of her State Police force brutalizing peaceful protestors. Her Attorney General claims protestors launched fireworks and smoke grenades at officers, while livestreams exist in the universe and we all saw that the police were launching smoke into and behind a peaceful crowd, and then detonating flashbang grenades in the front, setting the stage for a dangerous stampede. The general public doesn’t have chemical weapons, AG Davenport, your storm troopers do.

We live in 2026. Why would the Governor not livestream her statements about one of two concentration camps the Federal Government is operating in her state? The State Police could livestream a feed from outside Delaney Hall, so why must we rely on their statements(read lies)? Because if they did, it would expose their words as lies and propaganda.

Earlier in the day, Sherril had spoken about how she was calling in the State Police to protect our right to protest. She then described everything the State Police would do to restrict our right to protest, things that conveniently also supported everything that ICE wanted. Removing protestors from the public roads, with ICE having already pushed them off the public sidewalk and into active truck traffic on the road, would allow ICE to operate as normal. Shift changes, deportations, illegal detentions, allowed to continue, but now all under the watchful and supportive eye of the New Jersey State Police and by extension our Democratic Governor Mikie Sherrill.

Despite these very real and urgent testimonials, in a brief press conference in another part of the state Friday afternoon, Governor Sherrill didn’t seem to have any concrete plans for how she plans to address the strikers’ demands. Instead, she announced a number of measures being implemented to control and contain protesters’ movements, like establishing a "peaceful protected protest zone” located “very close” to Delaney Hall. 

Sherrill and other statewide officials at the press conference confirmed a "roadway diversion" has been set up, limiting traffic on the road where the facility is located "to protect those assembled." Sherrill specifically referenced the protester whose leg was run over on Wednesday by oncoming traffic as a reason for limiting traffic, but didn’t acknowledge how that person ended up under the truck’s wheel.

As independent reporter Talia Ben-Ora pointed out, “the ‘protest’ is a direct blockade of the ICE entrance. Establishing a separate ‘zone’ negates the protest, helping clear the path for ICE. Sherrill is assisting ICE operations.”

Starved, smashed and bloodied: The violence at ICE’s Delaney Hal by Marisa Kabas

So what are we to do? I’m not sure what will work, but I think there’s some things to consider. One thing I want to make absolutely clear, you have a clear, First Amendment right to protest at Delaney Hall. But doing so will continue to mean your are at a high risk of being arrested, assaulted, or even potentially killed by law enforcement, despite you not breaking any laws or doing anything wrong. I’m not going to distinguish between federal, state, and local forces, because those forces have demonstrated they’re all working together, and they’re not on our side, nor the side of the US or state Constitutions, nor our laws.

This list is not intended to be alternatives to those willing to take on those risks. It’s intended to reflect that there are many different things to do, and no one can do all of them, no one is in a position to do all of them.

1. Birddog the Governor. Anywhere the Governor is, she should hear questions about the behavior of NJSP outside Delaney. She should hear questions about how she’s going to shut down Delaney. She shouldn’t be able to give a speech, cut a ribbon, or take a photo without hearing those questions and seeing signs calling our her complicity. The media follows power, so the media will be wherever she goes, and any protests or disruptions that impact her events will garner coverage.
2. Hound our Congressional Reps. Our Representatives don’t have direct control over ICE nor the State Police, so they need a different message. They need to be at Delaney, demanding inspections, every day. They need to be onsite at night, using their privilege to document and livestream, when protestors and press are being cleared out by fascist forces. Call them, ask them at events, email their offices, use your access as donors, or super volunteers. Make the hard asks.
3. Protest elsewhere. Immigrants are taken to Federal Court in Newark to face deportation hearings. They’re taken to airports to be disappeared elsewhere within the country or flown out of the country. There are County Commissioner and Newark Council meetings where you can push for enforcement of existing laws, health codes, land usage, etc.
4. Educate. Speak at your Town Council public comment about what’s happening at Delaney. Host/Sponsor a know your rights Zoom call. Talk about the mutual aid fundraisers. Share on local Facebook groups and on your Facebook page. Email or text friends, neighbors, relatives.
5. Divest. When fucking “Cory Booker” texts you asking for a donation, reply and tell their staffer or volunteer you’re not sending a single cent until Delaney is shuttered and we’re not dropping US bombs on Palestinians, Lebanese, and Iranians. When your friend invites you to a Mikie Fundraiser, or a Gottheimer, Pallone, Norcross Fundraiser, tell them, sorry, I can’t support them until they’re making shutting down Delaney Hall a daily priority.
6. Solidarity. Think you saw a friend or neighbor outside Delaney, no you didn’t. Someone wants to know about your social media connections, keep your mouth shut.

Somehow there is no dispute that the conditions inside of Delaney Hall are inhumane, disgusting, and unnecessary. It’s outside the gates that the Democrats we’ve elected are lying to our faces.