On May 30, I went to the ICE Offices (9495 Delegates Drive Orlando Florida) to sketch the Anything but ICE Job Fair. I did a drive by and found a few people gathered outside the heavily fortified warehouse facility. Finding parking was a challenge but I found what looked like legal parking on a side street nearby. I had a thought that officers would most certainly be scouting around the area looking for any infraction to ticket protestors.
A friend had informed me of these protests. The goal of the Job Fair was to convince any ICE officers within ear shot to stop working for an administration that believes it is above the law and for any ice staff to “Leave by example.”
Orlando citizens who are detained are taken to this facility and then transferred to other facilities. There is a time limit on how long a person can be held without legal representation at the Orlando Sub-Field Office. According to a report, between July 17, 2025, and Jan. 18, 2026, the facility confined 79 detainees in the small metal enclosures. They were held for periods of time ranging from several minutes to just shy of two hours. It was “a practice unlike any U.S. Department of Health and Human Services team has observed in ICE facilities.” Detainees in immigrant detention facilities in Orlando are living in extremely overcrowded cells, using bathrooms overflowing with waste, and sleeping chained on the floor, according to a whistleblower report first reported by the Miami Herald.
In the parking lot of the ICE facility behind the there was a blue SUV with ICE emblazoned on it’s side. A STOP sign stood before the loading bay door.
Protestors used megaphones to shout out job listings that might appeal to the ICE staff inside. One woman kept shouting that mom would not be pleased. There were also kind offers for food and drink should any staff want to come outside to talk. No officer ever appeared. The folks in the loading bay could certainly hear the job listings being offered. Some jobs offered a little less pay but it would be a small compensation to work for a company that doesn’t present endless guilt.
These protests are ongoing and I will likely return to see if reason can be presented to people who sanction hate and profiling in a well-funded organization that is being treated like the personal militia of a dictator. The end goal isn’t to make America great, but to stay in office with force if necessary.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) offered up to $50,000 in signing bonuses split over three years, plus up to $60,000 in student loan repayment and forgiveness, on top of a base salary ranging from $49,739 to $89,528 a year DHS placed an asterisk on the $50,000 figure in its own recruitment materials without clearly explaining the terms. Only retired employees returning to the job are eligible for the full $50,000 bonus, and that it comes in $10,000 installments rather than a lump sum.
More than 20,600 people were arrested by ICE in Florida from Jan. 20 to Oct 15, 2025, with 24% having no criminal record. Government data was provided by ICE in response to a Freedom of Information Act request to the Deportation Data Project and analyzed by WUSF Public Media, an NPR station in Tampa Florida.
“Uncle Lou”, a longtime Orlando music venue owner and community figure behind Uncle Lou’s Entertainment Hall was arrested and detained in May 2026. Uncle Lou’s Entertainment Hall was a venue that supported and helped launch the music careers of many local musicians. The news shocked Orlando’s music and arts community, which rallied around him during his detention. A Go Fund me raised over $60,000 to help Lou in his move to Jamaca.
Uncle Lou was charged with serving alcohol to a minor agent. He was booked into Orange County jail under an ICE detainer and held for nearly 10 days before being transferred to the Baker County Detention Center in Macclenny, north of Orlando. The case was ultimately a misdemeanor, but the deportation was the result of the ICE hold, a denied bond, and his own decision to self-deport to Jamaica. The popular music venue now sits silent.