Sunrise Movement Guide Urges K–12 Student Disruptions and Anti‑ICE Actions
Fox News reports that a 25‑page internal training guide from the Sunrise Movement lays out a plan for K–12 and college students to stage coordinated monthly disruptions, walkouts and boycotts as part of what it calls a 'political revolution' against a 'regime' and a 'system captured by billionaires.' The document, obtained by Defending Education, urges students to target Immigration and Customs Enforcement—described in the text as an 'occupying army' and the Trump administration’s 'personal gestapo'—and ties directly into the group’s 2026 'ICE Out For Good' campaign and a planned nationwide May 1 'May Day' mobilization to 'disrupt business as usual.' It encourages actions every first Friday, from symbolic steps like wearing red to 'bigger, more creative' disruptions, and offers specific organizing tactics on recruiting classmates, leveraging homerooms and sports teams, and using 'trigger moments' such as local tragedies to rapidly expand membership. Slides cited from a January 18, 2026 Twin Cities student coordination call frame Minnesota as a testing ground for 'how far' Trump can take an 'authoritarian agenda' and list goals such as 'kick ICE out of Minnesota' and 'build long‑term student power' nationwide. The materials also list established groups—including Higher Education Labor United, the American Association of University Professors, Jewish Voice for Peace and Socialist Alternative—as supporting organizations, underscoring how a youth‑branded network is being plugged into a broader left activist infrastructure at a moment when ICE tactics and student walkouts are already volatile flashpoints.
📌 Key Facts
- The Sunrise Movement’s 25‑page guidebook calls on K–12 and college students to pursue 'mass non‑cooperation' and a 'political revolution,' including classroom walkouts and business boycotts.
- The guide heavily targets ICE, labeling it an 'occupying army' and 'personal gestapo' and ties into a 2026 'ICE Out For Good' campaign centered on noisy 'Wide Awake' demonstrations at hotels housing agents, especially in Minneapolis.
- A Jan. 18, 2026 'TC Students ICE Response Coordination Call' slide deck, cited in the report, urges students to 'flex our power now to kick ICE out of Minnesota' and lays out options for a 'Day of Action' and a large May 1, 2026 'May Day' mobilization.
- The manual offers detailed recruitment and escalation tactics and lists allied organizations such as Higher Education Labor United, AAUP, Jewish Voice for Peace and Socialist Alternative as part of the effort.
📊 Analysis & Commentary (1)
"A conservative critique arguing that nationwide K–12 walkouts against ICE are adult‑orchestrated (not organic student activism), driven by teachers’ unions and activist networks (like Sunrise), and that these tactics harm education while serving a partisan political agenda."
📰 Source Timeline (1)
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