By Brett Dunlap
The Parkersburg News and Sentinel
VIENNA – Demonstrators over the weekend in Vienna and Marietta protested what they felt were the illegal actions under the administration of President Donald Trump and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.
Events organized by Indivisible MOV were held on Saturday on Grand Central Avenue in Vienna and on Sunday at Ohio Route 7 and Acme Street near Kroger in Marietta. Ninety-three protesters were in Vienna and 115 in Marietta, organizer Meryl Clark said.
The two emergency protests were in response to both overreach by the Trump administration’s recent actions in Venezuela and the death of Renee Good, a Minneapolis, Minn., mother who was killed at the hands of an ICE agent, according to Indivisible MOV.
Lori Flis of Vienna, an organizer with Indivisible MOV, said the initial protest was organized over what was happening in Venezuela and grew to include recent actions in Minneapolis with Good’s shooting by a federal officer.
“Our concern about that started with the murder of people in their boats without any due process, without any evidence that they were running drugs or are narcoterrorists,” she was quoted in the release. “We expanded (Saturday’s) message because we were all so distraught over the murder of that 37-year-old woman. We realize that ICE is not in our area but that doesn’t mean that they won’t be.”
As motorists passed by the protestors in Marietta on Sunday, many honked their car horns in support while others shouted their disagreement with protestors with profanity and insults. Others tried to engage with the protestors about how illegal immigrants are costing lawful U.S. citizens money and jobs.
In response to the signs memorializing Good, one man in a truck asked where was the concern was for Ashli Babbitt, the woman shot and killed by the U.S. Capitol police on Jan. 6, 2021, after entering the Capitol during the protests to overturn the 2020 presidential election when Trump lost.
According to the release for the Vienna protest, some people were concerned about law enforcement officers wearing masks and not having to present identification or warrants to detain people.
“This is what happens in Iran, not the United States,” John Apgar of Parkersburg, quoted in the release, said. “(In regard to the federal agent shooting Renee Good), everything he did would be illegal by any standards that the normal police would have.”
In Marietta, signs held by protesters called for ICE to be abolished and said remember Good, stop war crimes, ICE kills, “History is screaming, are you listening” and “We all bleed the same,” among others.
Sally Salega, who attended the Marietta protest, held a sign saying she was there for Good, the deceased, the missing and the injured as a result of the actions of ICE.
“How cruel they are, they throw people down,” she said. “The cruelty and the violence are horrible.”
Salega said she has been involved in protests since March when ICE began its current tactics and she has a history of protesting since the early 1970s on a variety of things, including the Vietnam War, of which her husband served.
“This isn’t what they fought for,” she said. “There is so much hatred. We need to stop the hatred and start accepting each other.”
A woman at the Marietta protest who identified herself as “Renee” said she was there as a result of outrage over the injustice as she feels ICE is violating people’s rights with a presidential administration that allows it. She attended both the Vienna and Marietta protests.
“I’m tired of it,” she said. “There is no due process and there is no rule of law.
“There is no democracy if we don’t have those things. I think we are saying goodbye to democracy.”
She said the Trump administration has no accountability in anything.
“There is no civility, no decency and this administration has no morality in anything they do,” she said.
Don Gillette and Judy Lewis of Marietta felt they had to do something to have their voices heard.
“We had to show some resistance toward this corruption and tyranny,” Gillette said. “We have a president that is dividing us and not uniting us.”
Most presidents in the past have been uniters and presidents for all the people, he said, adding Trump is the president for a small percentage of the people in the country and that is the real problem.
Lewis said people are having trouble believing what the government is saying.
“You cannot believe a word that comes out. It has left us essentially leaderless,” she said.
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