BRATTLEBORO-Christine Scypinski, an organizer for Indivsible Brattleboro, says she has a simple yardstick for determining how many people will show up for a protest: “Take the number of people who sign up, and multiply that by 10.”
She wasn’t far off the mark.
Scypinski said approximately 80 people signed up online to attend the Jan. 11 protest at Pliny Park to honor the life of Renee Nicole Good, who was killed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on Jan. 7. The turnout for the protest turned out to be about 1,000 people, according to an unofficial count by organizers.
It was the second event at Pliny Park since Good’s death.
A peaceful, song-filled evening vigil there on Jan. 8 was attended by about 200 people, according to organizers.
The Jan. 11 protest at the park was one of more than 1,000 vigils and rallies across the nation intended to call attention to “the broader pattern of unchecked violence and abuse leading to all of the deaths caused by ICE and DHS [Department of Homeland Security] over the last year,” the organizers wrote in a news release.
The coalition that organized the vigils includes Indivisible and the American Civil Liberties Union, which said they demand accountability for “the 30-plus lives lost in ICE detention in 2025.”
People filled the park to overflowing, and lined both sides of Main Street.
According to a Jan. 12 news release from 50501 Vermont, which serves as an umbrella organization for Vermont activism, there were 33 vigils, protests, and honk and waves around Vermont in the four days following Good’s death, including in Bellows Falls, Chester, and Jamaica.
This News item by Randolph T. Holhut was written for The Commons.