Weekly Member Update - December 1, 2025
Photo Credit - Michael Nigro - On Saturday, November 29, hundreds of New York City residents spontaneously foiled a large-scale immigration raid by ICE and DHS near Chinatown in Manhattan, leading to multiple arrests of protestors by the NYPD and federal authorities.
We are bringing you an abbreviated Weekly Update this week in light of the Holiday but, as is often the case, we’re starting off with Avelo Airlines: The Bargain-Basement Air Carrier That Tears Families Apart. Dozens of Capital Region residents braved the cold wind and showed up early on Sunday morning at Albany International Airport to do what we’ve been doing for seven months now; to shine a spotlight on Avelo and its collusion with ICE in the deprivation of human rights, and to call upon our local officials to take action to help remove Avelo from our community.
Avelo has been conducting deportation flights on behalf of ICE since May and, make no mistake, these are no ordinary charter flights. The people being trafficked by Avelo — children and the elderly included — are shackled with handcuffs, waist chains and leg irons for the entirety of the flight and they frequently soil themselves due to lack of access to a bathroom. Avelo’s flight attendants are instructed to avoid eye contact or even basic gestures of kindness with their human cargo and, due to the fact that these souls have their hands chained to their waists, they would be unable to help themselves in the event of a loss of cabin pressure or other emergency. Not that it matters, of course, as ICE has instructed Avelo’s flight attendants to not assist deportees in the event of emergency and should instead save themselves first.
In addition to ferrying people that ICE has captured off of our streets — nearly 75% of which have no criminal records — from cities like Seattle, Denver and Newark to ICE’s main deportation center at Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport, Avelo’s jets also routinely traffick detainees to El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala. Notably, those nations have entered into agreements with the Trump Administration to accept and process “protection requests” by migrants seeking asylum from their home countries. As a result, Avelo’s flights to those countries are likely populated by asylum seekers from Asia, Europe or Africa who have no connection whatsoever with the Central American nations they are being sent to. Many of these folks have also undoubtedly found themselves in foreign gulags like El Salvador’s notorious CECOT facility.
For as long as Avelo has been flying its despicable ICE Air flights, we’ve been protesting Avelo’s presence at Albany International Airport. We’ve also asked for answers from Albany County Executive Dan McCoy and County Legislature Chair Joanne Cunningham, and we even had you all write letters about Avelo to your own individual Albany County Legislators. We’ve also repeatedly tried to obtain a copy of the Albany County Airport Authority’s operating agreement with Avelo in an attempt to see just what taxpayer benefits are being provided to Avelo. Nonetheless, despite all of these efforts, with the exception of a tepid letter of condemnation signed by eight Albany County Legislators in early November, our County-level elected officials have been conspicuously silent on the issue of Avelo’s continuing presence in our community.
Next Monday, December 8, we’re stepping it up a notch and taking our protest against Avelo to the Chambers of the Albany County Legislature. Join us at the Albany County Courthouse at 6:30 in your anti-Avelo gear; a representative of Indivisible Albany will address the Legislature directly, along with other members of the local activist community. It’s long past time that our local elected representatives take a stand against Avelo Airlines and, this coming Monday, our Albany County Legislature will here from us directly as we demand accountability and action!
A few other things on our calendar deserve your attention. First, we’re taking a brief break from protesting and rabble rousing to have a little fun on Thursday, December 4; join us for our Brews & Board Games event at the fabulous Lost & Found in Albany’s Warehouse District beginning at six o’clock.
If you needed a reminder that the political election cycle never really ends, there are three things on our calendar to remind you: On December 4, Devin Lander is launching his campaign for NYS Senate in Troy and, the following night, Chloe Pierce is holding an event in Castleton to lead off her campaign for NYS Assembly. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Governor Antonio Delgado is holding online organizing events on both December 2 and December 9.
Finally, don’t forget that we are still accepting donations on behalf of the Regional Food Bank of Northeastern New York!