Arizona AFL-CIO Stands in Solidarity with Immigrant and Indigenous Workers, Condemns Escalating ICE Enforcement

Arizona AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Fred Yamashita issued the following statement on the escalation of ICE enforcement that puts working people and entire communities at risk.

ARIZONA –  In wake of the senseless killing of A.F.G.E. brother, Alex Jeffery Pretti, AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler stated, “...the Trump administration’s horrific operation—and their actions aimed at stoking violence and chaos—must end. America’s unions join the call for ICE to immediately leave Minnesota before anyone else is hurt or killed.”

This call reflects a fundamental labor principle: no worker should live in fear simply for going to work or standing up for their rights.

That same principle guides the Arizona AFL-CIO’s solidarity with immigrant workers across our state. Immigrants are an essential part of Arizona’s workforce, unions, and communities–their rights are our rights. Escalating ICE activity in Arizona threatens worker safety, harms key industries, and breaks down trust in our communities.

We are also deeply concerned by the increasing arrests of Native Americans by ICE. Indigenous people are being targeted through racial profiling and flawed enforcement practices — an injustice that violates tribal sovereignty and is an assault on human dignity. Indigenous workers are part of our labor family, and attacks on them are attacks on the entire labor movement.

From Minnesota to Arizona, we demand an end to the violence created by escalating ICE enforcement, and these operations leave our communities and workplaces immediately. 

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The Arizona AFL-CIO is an organization that works on behalf of more than 185,000 union members through over 200 local union affiliates. We represent the interests of working people at the state and local level.