Anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement protesters want to “scrape ICE” out of Home Depot.
Hundreds of demonstrators took to the home improvement store over the weekend to buy $0.17 ice scrapers, only to return them right after. The goal was to clutter store operations while workers dealt with mass returns.
The action aims to harass the store over its alleged involvement with ICE, which has targeted the stores for immigration enforcement during the Trump administration’s mass deportation operation. Border Patrol has been conducting these operations.
Protesters were seen in long lines at Home Depot stores in Monrovia and Burbank, California, as well as Charlotte, North Carolina. Many demonstrators held signs that said, “ICE out of The Home Depot, Protect Our Communities.”
BREAKING – Liberals in California are now standing in line at Home Depot to purchase a single 17-cent scraper, only to return it and get back in line to purchase another, aiming to freeze sales in protest of Home Depot allowing ICE to conduct operations in their stores. pic.twitter.com/LaoDbsjOUv
— Right Angle News Network (@Rightanglenews) November 23, 2025
Erika Andiola, political director for the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, told the Los Angeles Times that the Monrovia protest aimed to pressure the company to “scrape ICE out of their stores.”
Monrovia has been particularly active in protesting the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, after a Guatemalan man was struck by a car and killed there as he fled an immigration raid at the home improvement store in August. The man, Carlos Roberto Montoya Valdez, was allegedly not being pursued by immigration law enforcement, the Department of Homeland Security told the outlet.
Demonstrators set up two altars with 24 white crosses each to represent people who have died during immigration raids or while detained, like Montoya Valdez.
At least a dozen Home Depot stores in Southern California have been targeted by immigration enforcement since the immigration crackdown began. Organizers called the store “ground zero” for immigration enforcement.
“Whether the corporation wants to admit it or not, Home Depot has become ground zero for this cruel, vicious immigration enforcement that’s taking place in our country,” Pablo Alvarado, NDLON’s co-executive director, said.
Andiola said the so-called “buy-in” was supposed to show the company that often-targeted day laborers are beneficial and contribute to the business. “This was the way for us to still impact their business and at the same time, give the message that they need to get ICE out of their stores,” he said.
The company said it does not “coordinate with ICE or Border Patrol,” and is “not involved in the operations.”
“We aren’t notified that immigration enforcement activities are going to happen, and often, we don’t know operations have taken place until they’re over. We’re required to follow all federal and local rules and regulations in every market where we operate,” Home Depot’s manager of corporate communications, George Lane, added.
Immigration enforcement agencies including ICE has received renewed funding during the Trump administration as a result of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. With that funding, the agency has aimed to hire thousands of new officers to enforce immigration law in Chicago, Los Angeles, Charlotte, and elsewhere.
DHS Secretary Kristi Noem’s newest immigration efforts center on “Deportation Judges,” a nickname for immigration judges. The secretary recently led a new hiring push in a post on X.
ICE OFFICERS PLANNING TO INCREASE PRESENCE IN NEW YORK CITY, HOMAN SAYS
“If you are a legal professional, the Trump Administration is calling on YOU to join @TheJusticeDept as a Deportation Judge to restore integrity and honor to our Nation’s Immigration Court system,” she wrote.
The administration said last month that more than 2 million illegal immigrants have left the country via deportation or self-deportation since the Trump administration began.
