Protesters surround a house as they demonstrate against an attempted stop by ICE agents in South Burlington in March 2026. File photo by Glenn Russell/VTDigger Marita Canedo had just woken up when the phone started ringing.  It was early morning on March 11, and Canedo was the on-call team m ember for the emergency phone line of Migrant Justice, a statewide immigrant rights organization.  Several calls came in at once, Canedo said, and each caller said the same thing: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were gathered outside of a house on Dorset Street in South Burlington.  Despite the early hour, Canedo was prepared.  “We have talked many times here as a team, like what to do when we get these emergency calls,” she said.   Migrant Justice’s rapid response infrastructure sprang into action. A trained volunteer verified that ICE agents were present, while Canedo talked on the phone with the people inside the house, informing them of their rights and taking down their information in case they were arrested by ICE, she recalled. Around 8:30 a.m., a text went out to Migrant Justice’s network in the surrounding area, alerting people that there were ICE vehicles outside the Dorset Street house. “Get there ASAP to observe/record,” it read. “Spread the word!”  Migrant Justice has spent the last year and a half revamping and expanding its rapid response network. That includes a handful of paid staff, a loose constellation of about 80 volunteers who are trained on how to verify or document immigration enforcement, and more than 3,500 people signed up for alerts on immigration enforcement actions.   As the Trump administration’s aggressive approach to immigration enforcement has made headlines across the country and in Vermont, volunteers across the state have worked to respond in their own communities, often in concert with statewide organizations such as Migrant Justice. From verifying reports of ICE agents to tracking detainees, people are finding ways to document and resist the Trump administration’s push on immigration enforcement, both on the streets and behind the scenes.   While Vermont hasn’t seen a high-profile immigration enforcement surge like those in Minneapolis, Los Angeles and elsewhere, the state has seen some of the impacts of heightened ICE activity in neighboring Massachusetts, and activists said they’ve seen an increase in immigration detentions since Trump returned to office.  Activists across Vermont also said that the Trump administration’s rhetoric and actions around immigration have created an atmosphere of fear for many immigrants in the state, and for people of color who fear they will be racially profiled by ICE.   In a statement attributed to an unnamed spokesperson, ICE said “if you are here legally and have not committed crimes, there is no need to worry,” and said the agency’s enforcement actions are not based on racial profiling. Witnessing detentions and dispelling rumors Migrant Justice has run a rapid response network since Trump’s first term, according to Rachel Elliott, an organizer with the group. The network was largely dormant during the Biden presidency, Elliott said, but when Trump was reelected, organizers chose to revitalize the effort.  “There were situations that we knew having responders on scene could help, and so we decided to reactivate and really dramatically expand the rapid response network,” Elliott said in an interview.  The group runs a statewide emergency hotline, where bilingual staff field calls from immigrants in need of direct assistance and from other community members calling to report potential immigration enforcement sightings. When they get reports of potential ICE or Customs and Border Protection activity, Elliott said, they reach out to a network of about 80 people across the state who’ve been trained in verification.  Those volunteers aim to get on the scene as quickly as possible to determine whether the report is accurate, which helps Migrant Justice determine next steps and avoid spreading incorrect reports.   Community members who call into the rapid response line can sometimes mistake other law enforcement for immigration officers, Elliott said.  “We’re in a time where, because of fear and because of what people are seeing in the news, they’re understandably hyper vigilant,” Elliott said.  “We never want to be in a position to share misinformation,” they added.  Robin Morgan, an activist based in Brattleboro who organizes with Lost River Racial Justice, has done some of that verification work. She and other volunteers in the area have attended Migrant Justice trainings to learn how to verify reports of ICE activity, expanding the network in an area where Elliott said the group has fewer members.  When Morgan gets a report of potential ICE activity in her area, she and other volunteers figure out who in their network is available to respond and work to quickly get someone on the scene. They try to respond in pairs or groups to make the work safer, she said. Volunteers look at uniforms and marked vehicles to identify what agency officers work for, Elliott said, and typically send photos or a description to the Migrant Justice team, too. Migrant Justice members also know some officers’ faces from attending ICE check-ins, and the organization keeps track of license plates associated with undercover ICE vehicles, which they use to help verify sightings, Elliott said.  Morgan said that most reports her local network has responded to have either turned out to be local or state police, or the reported officers have been gone by the time volunteers arrive. But dispelling rumors of immigration enforcement is often as important as identifying ICE activity, she said.“When there are rumors of immigration enforcement, people will be afraid to go out, they’ll keep kids home from school, they’ll skip doctor’s appointments,” Morgan said.  Once reports of ICE or CBP activity are verified –– such as the report on March 11 –– Migrant Justice decides whether a larger mobilization is useful, then contacts people in the area of the report who are signed up to receive their alerts, Elliott said. Statewide, about 3,600 people are now signed up for those alerts.  “Basically, the goal is to be the angel on the officer’s shoulder, right?” they said, adding that having witnesses recording officers’ actions can help deter illegal actions. Often, the group is responding to detentions that have already happened. But community mobilization still plays an important role at that point, Elliott and other activists said. Migrant Justice has organized rallies and packed courtrooms for people detained by ICE, including for the three people detained on March 11.  Tracking detainees and buying time Behind the scenes, activists also work to track the paths of people who are detained in Vermont. Leif Taranta is part of a group of activists who track immigration detainees in Vermont.  The group maintains a public dashboard, based on state and federal data, that tracks how many immigration detainees are incarcerated in Vermont prisons and where they are transferred. But Taranta said the group also aims to track people in real time when they are in ICE custody. That can help detainees stay in touch with their families and legal counsel even when ICE moves them without notifying attorneys, Taranta said.  “Our goal is to play a little part in trying to keep track of someone,” Taranta said, “so the lawyer and the organizations (are) able to work their magic.”  “These are our community members. People are trying to steal them and hide them, and that is not okay,” Taranta added. “So (we’re) trying to prevent that as much as possible.”  Migrant Justice’s emergency line can also help connect people with legal counsel when they are detained.  “The sooner that someone can get legal representation, the sooner they can have a conversation with a lawyer, the more quickly they’re able to understand what’s going on and be able to make informed decisions about how to navigate the process,” Elliott, the Migrant Justice organizer, said. Speedy action from lawyers can also prevent people from being transferred out of the state, keeping them closer to their community and in a jurisdiction that tends to rule more favorably on immigration detention cases, according to immigration attorney Kristen Connors.  Connors represented Johana Patin Patin, one of the people arrested by ICE on March 11.  Connors started working on the case immediately after Patin Patin was detained. The next morning, Connors learned Patin Patin had been released from a Vermont jail into ICE custody. She feared that Patin Patin was being transferred out of state.  “I had to, like, write and file the fastest habeas petition I’ve ever had to file,” Connors said.  The same day, Connors secured an order from a federal judge keeping Patin Patin in Vermont.  The following Monday, at a hearing packed with community members, some of them brought there by Migrant Justice’s rapid response network, a federal judge ordered her release. Read the story on VTDigger here: Across Vermont, networks of volunteers push back on Trump’s immigration enforcement. ...read more read less