Hi Resistance Readers,
Welcome to The Resistance Roundup, your go-to source about major events that affect books and libraries, taking action to support libraries and fight censorship, updates on Action Alerts and other calls to action, and highlights of the American Resistance movement against the cheeto-in-chief and his red hat regime. The first news story in today’s newsletter is disturbing and difficult to read, but there is good news this week, too. Let’s dive in.
La Lucha: The Fight to Protect Immigrants and Latinos from Human Rights Violations
Dead-of-Night, Military-Style ICE Raid on Chicago Apartment Building Terrifies Residents
At around 1:00 AM on 9/30/2025, agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the FBI surrounded an apartment building in Chicago, Illinois. Agents rappelled out of Blackhawk helicopters onto the roof of the building and began descending to the lower floors. A camera crew from NewsNation cable news was on the scene to film the raid. Agents worked their way through the apartment building and kicked down doors, threw flash-bang grenades into apartments, dragged sleeping people inside the apartments from their beds, and rounded them up outside in the street. Agents forced their way into nearly every apartment in the five-story building and dragged men, women, and even children outside. People’s hands were zip-tied together, including the children, and they were forced to wait for hours while agents rounded up their neighbors and investigated each one for proof of their citizenship or immigration status. Residents and witnesses who spoke to multiple media outlets after the raid reported that US citizens were among those treated this way. Several people dragged into the street had little or no clothing on. After all the chaos, 37 people were taken away by ICE, who claimed that they do not have documentation to be in the United States legally. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which ICE is part of, confirmed that four children who are US citizens were taken by ICE that night after ICE detained their parents, and they are now in federal custody until the government locates an approved guardian for them or decides to put them in the care of the state.
People who were dragged out of their apartments and other witnesses spoke to multiple media outlets after the raid. Darrell Ballard told ABC7 Chicago, “They brought a baby out completely naked and wouldn’t allow the mother the chance to clothe her child, it’s, it’s distressing.” Pertissue Fisher, a U.S. citizen who lives in the apartment building, was detained by the agents during the raid. She told ABC7 Chicago, “”No shoes, the kids didn’t had no shoes, no pants on. They just treated us like we were nothing. …He said he had warrants for five people, so I said, ‘So why you detaining the whole building?’ He said it’s for the safety of our people.” Ms. Fisher said a gun was held to her face for the first time in her life, and she was handcuffed and held for hours. She was released around 3:00 AM.
Eboni Watson, who lives across the street and witnessed the raid, told ABC7 Chicago that residents, including children, were zip-tied when they were taken out of the building by federal agents and loaded into UHaul vans, and some had no clothes on. “They was terrified. The kids was crying. People was screaming. They looked very distraught. I was out there crying when I seen the little girl come around the corner, because they was bringing the kids down, too, had them zip tied to each other.” She said that children were separated from their mothers: “It was heartbreaking to watch. Even if you’re not a mother, seeing kids coming out buck naked and taken from their mothers, it was horrible.” Ms. Watson said she went into the building to help one of the residents and was shocked by what she saw. “Stuff was everywhere. You could see people’s birth certificates, and papers thrown all over. Water was leaking into the hallway. It was wicked crazy.”
Rodrick Johnson, who is 67 years old and a US citizen, lives in the building and was detained by federal agents during the raid. He said agents broke through his door and dragged him out in zip ties. He was left tied up outside the building for nearly three hours before agents finally let him go. “I asked [agents] why they were holding me if I was an American citizen, and they said I had to wait until they looked me up,” Mr. Johnson said. “I asked if they had a warrant, and I asked for a lawyer. They never brought one.”
The ICE and FBI agents who carried out this raid left heavy damage to the building and to residents’ property. One resident took CBS News crews inside the building; federal agents had left holes in the walls and destroyed apartment doors as they broke them down to grab the people living inside; some of the apartment doors had to be boarded up after this. Photos taken in the building after the raid show toys, shoes, debris, and plastic bags littering the apartment hallways. Photos also show shattered windows and piles of clothing, wall decor and lamps that had been tossed around during the raid lying on apartment floors.
Dan Jones spoke to the Chicago Sun-Times; he said he was woken up at around 1:00 AM as federal agents tried to break down his apartment door. They couldn’t get past his double lock, so he went back to bed. When he woke up hours later for work, he found broken doors littering the hallway and his neighbors missing. When he got home from work, he found that all of his electronics and furniture were missing, and all of his clothes and shoes were thrown on the floor. Mr. Jones said he had no idea who took his belongings and hadn’t received answers from Chicago police. “I’m pissed off. I feel defeated because the authorities aren’t doing anything.” Mr. Jones said most of his neighbors were Venezuelan and often took turns cleaning the hallway because the property owners did little to maintain it. “They were cool people. They didn’t speak a lick of English, but we used translator apps to talk to each other.” During his interview, Mr. Jones wondered aloud what would happen to his neighbor’s young children.
See the “Action Alerts” section for action steps to take on this issue
Sources
Time magazine / Chicago Sun-Times / CNN / CBS Chicago
Watching Big Brother: The Fight Against Censorship
Representative Jamie Raskin Introduces Bill to End DOD Book Ban
On 9/19/2025, Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland introduced a bill in the US House of Representatives that, if passed, would end the Department of Defense’s attempts to ban books in its schools. The bill would require the DOD to immediately restore access to every book that was available in DOD Education Activity (DODEA) schools and libraries before Donald Trump took office for his second term. The books removed from the shelves in the DOD’s book ban include classics like 1984 by George Orwell, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, and The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison. The bill would also require the DOD to stop removing or restricting books and curriculum materials through the end of the 2026–2027 school year. It would also reinstate notification and advisory processes for military-connected school communities, and it would stop the implementation of recent executive orders that have been used to justify book bans.
Contact your members of Congress and urge them to vote to pass Rep. Raskin’s bill (H.R.5527). See the “Action Alerts” section for resources to help you contact your members of Congress.
Texas School Administrators Use AI to Decide on Books to Ban
In mid-September 2025, administrators with the Leander Independent School District (LISD) in Texas sent an email to teachers advising them to “pause” using 40 books which contain topics they associated with “DEI.” In the email, administrators told teachers their instructions were “in response to new legislation outlined in Senate Bill 12” in the Texas legislature. The email instructed teachers to stop using the listed books “until further notice.” School board members were not made aware of the administration’s plans to “pause” book use prior to the email teachers received. Among other things, the senate bill the administrators referenced bans schools from “developing or implementing policies, procedures, trainings, activities, or programs that reference race, color, ethnicity, gender identity, or sexual orientation,” with extremely limited exceptions. While it may sound temporary and therefore less scary, “pause” is the same language the district has used in previous attempts to ban books. During the “pause,” students cannot access the books, and per the district, there is no timeframe for when or if those titles will return. No matter the language used, the effect is the same, and students will be unable to access these books.
One interesting development in this incident is that the district administrators used AI to help them decide which books to pull off the shelves. A local Fox news outlet reported that the administrators used A.I. to identify books to ban from a larger list, then did a “manual review” and came up with the final list of 40 books. The list includes well-known targets of book bans, but it also included some startling choices, including several literary classics. Some of the books on the list were Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi (a YA fantasy novel), I am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter by Erica L Sánchez (another YA novel and finalist for the National Book Award), Les Misérables by Victor Hugo (the classic novel that inspired the Broadway musical of the same name), Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor (a classic children’s book), The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin (one of America’s most iconic Black authors and a leading voice of the Civil Rights movement), The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas (an award-winning YA novel about police brutality), The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros (a classic of Latine-American literature), The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave (Frederick Douglass’s autobiography), and To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, an American classic that needs no introduction.
If you live in the LISD school district or another district in the state of Texas, contact your local school board and state legislators and urge them to stop book bans and protect students’ access to books. The Texas Freedom to Read Project has resources to help you advocate for freedom to read in your state. Check out their website for more information and for ways to get connected to their work.
If you live in another state, you can and should advocate for your local and state governments to protect freedom to read, and for Congress to protect our First Amendment right to read the books we choose. See the “Action Alerts” section for resources to help you contact Congress and urge them to take action.
Committee for the First Amendment Re-Launched by Over 550 Celebrities
On 10/1/2025, a group of celebrities announced that they are re-launching a Cold War-era committee dedicated to protecting First Amendment rights for the entertainment industry. The original Committee for the First Amendment was launched during the Cold War’s Red Scare in America, when Joseph McCarthy, a Republican US Senator, capitalized on fears of communism to investigate and persecute left-leaning individuals, including entertainers, in the name of protecting America from communism. In a letter announcing the decision to re-launch the committee, its members stated, “This Committee was initially created during the McCarthy Era, a dark time when the federal government repressed and persecuted American citizens for their political beliefs. They targeted elected officials, government employees, academics, and artists. They were blacklisted, harassed, silenced, and even imprisoned. The McCarthy Era ended when Americans from across the political spectrum finally came together and stood up for the principles in the Constitution against the forces of repression.” The new members of the re-launched committee include Jane Fonda (daughter of actor and original committee member Henry Fonda), Ben Stiller, Barbra Streisand, John Legend, Janelle Monáe, Gracie Abrams, Billie Eilish, Tiffany Haddish, Mark Ruffalo, Anne Hathaway, Kerry Washington, Pedro Pascal, Natalie Portman, and Viola Davis. Prominent celebrities who have platforms to speak on social issues can help bring attention to those issues and push for positive changes. The re-launch of this committee is a sign that there is a growing movement to oppose the red hat regime and its activities across American society.
Library Lovers Unite!
Banned Books Week 2025 Has Begun!
Banned Books Week 2025 started Sunday 10/5/2025 and will continue through Saturday 10/11/2025! With censorship on the rise and the red hat regime threatening people who dare to make statements and share information that the regime doesn’t like, supporting banned books and their authors is more important than ever. According to the official website for the Banned Books Week Coalition, Banned Books Week was launched in 1982 in response to a sudden surge in the number of challenges to books in libraries, bookstores, and schools. Held in the last week of September or first week of October, the annual event highlights the value of free and open access to information and brings together the entire book community—librarians, educators, authors, publishers, booksellers, and readers of all types—in support of the freedom to seek and to express ideas. Bookstores, libraries, and book-lovers across the nation and around the world will hold events throughout the week to celebrate banned books, the stories they tell, and the people who write them and fight to protect them. Visit BannedBooksWeek.org to learn more about Banned Books Week, the organizations that help organize and promote it, and how you can join the celebration and the fight against censorship.
The Best of Bookish News
Reading Rainbow Returns!
Book lovers all over the country were ecstatic to learn that the beloved classic children’s show, Reading Rainbow, will return for a new season with a new host. Each episode of Reading Rainbow focuses on a children’s book, then further explores the topics in the book through on-location segments or stories. The show also recommends additional books for children to borrow from their local library. The new host will be Mychal Threets, a librarian from Solano County California who became a social media star and now works to promote libraries and the services they offer to children and families. The new season will be available on YouTube with a total of four episodes. A representative of Buffalo Toronto Public Media, which produced the original show and co-produced the new season, reported that they have high hopes the show will continue with more new seasons in the future.
The original Reading Rainbow show, which ran for 26 years on PBS with host LeVar Burton, won more than 250 awards, including 26 Emmys and a Peabody Award. According to Reading Rainbow’s official website, the program reached more than two million viewers each week and for many years was the most watched PBS program in elementary school classrooms across the country. The show’s original goal was to combat “summer loss phenomena,” where a child loses some of their reading abilities and progress in school because they tend not to read during the summer. While Reading Rainbow began as a summer program, it quickly grew into a broadcast blockbuster, a classroom staple, and an American cultural icon. The program was partially supported by a grant from the US Department of Education, and its goals were to motivate children in grades K-3 to become avid readers, to help all children succeed as readers, to encourage a strong home literacy environment, and to enrich classroom literacy environments. The show was also known for featuring diverse guests and books that introduced children to different cultures and people with life experiences that differed from the norm, in a way that encouraged children’s curiosity and built bridges between people. Fans of the original show are overjoyed that the show is returning to enrich the lives of a new generation of children, and they are eagerly introducing their own children to the show to carry on its mission of fostering children’s love of reading, learning, and curiosity.
The Resistance Lives!
No Kings 2.0 is Coming Up!
The next No Kings mass protest is coming up soon! On Saturday October 18th, millions of Americans will take to the streets again to remind everyone that this is America, and we have no king. More information about the upcoming event, including a map of currently scheduled events around the country, can be found at the No Kings website. There are over 2,000 No Kings events scheduled so far, nearly the same number as the original No Kings protests in June.
If you are planning to attend a No Kings event, make sure to attend a safety training to learn how to deescalate during the event and keep it nonviolent. The ACLU is holding a virtual training session on knowing your rights when you protest and deescalating tense interactions. You can sign up to attend the virtual training here.
Ongoing Boycotts
Economic power, and the ability to choose when, where, and how we spend money is a powerful tool for the Resistance. Boycotts are underway to target companies and their owners that have financially supported the regime, benefit from its policies, or have obeyed in advance by rolling back DEI programs and making other attempts to appease the regime.
Ongoing major boycotts are currently in effect for Amazon, Walmart, Target, and Tesla. These boycotts have shown progress—Tesla’s sales and stock prices have plunged notably since the boycotts began. During a boycott of Target during Lent season initiated by spiritual leaders in the Black community, Target saw its in-store foot traffic fall for 10 weeks in a row. These numbers speak to the powerful potential that boycotts have to impact and influence businesses that cave to or support the regime.
The Latest in Laughtivism
Portland Defies Federal Intrusion with Costumes and Tea Parties
Photo credit: REUTERS/Carlos Barria
As Donald Trump has threatened to send the military to Portland, Oregon to quell sporadic protests against ICE activity (the protests have largely been limited to one city block), the city has responded with its trademark sense of humor and love of all things weird. One popular photograph taken by Reuters photographer Carlos Barria at a protest on 10/3/2025 shows a protestor wearing an inflatable frog costume and standing in front of federal agents outside an ICE facility. The frog has gone viral on social media and has appeared in several videos of protests at this facility; its activity has been notably peaceful and has given many viewers a good chuckle. Other videos and photos have gone viral on social media of peaceful protests in Portland. One video shows a woman in a Victorian-style dress and hat having a tea party outside a federal building as heavily-armored and masked agents march by her in a line. Another costumed protester who has appeared in many posts is a man in a chicken costume, wearing an American flag as a cape, walking back and forth outside a federal building, often carrying a sign. Other videos show protestors dancing to keep the atmosphere lighthearted, or to taunt agents watching from the building. Several are seen wearing silly costumes and lots of bright colors. The videos have made viewers laugh and sparked conversations about silly things other people can come up with to peacefully protest against the regime’s policies.
ACTION ALERTS- Tracking Our Progress
Demand Accountability for ICE and End Human Rights Violations Against Immigrants and Latinos
As opposition to its agenda grows stronger by the day, the regime has escalated its harassment and arrests of immigrants, including those who have legal documents allowing them to reside in the US and those who are following the legal process to obtain residency. The regime’s efforts have included blatant racial profiling of Latino people as ICE agents descend en masse on workplaces, businesses, parks, and other community hotspots and detain, question, and arrest anyone who might potentially be an immigrant they can deport. Latino US citizens have been caught up in these ICE raids and forced to prove their right to be in the country where they were born. Horrific reports have emerged about conditions inside a detention facility in Los Angeles where people have been held for days without access to adequate food or water, and about conditions at a prison camp in Florida for people arrested by ICE. These abuses of people’s human rights cannot be allowed to continue, and we must make our calls for justice and the protection of our neighbors louder and clearer than ever.
Contact your members of Congress and urge them to protect civil rights for immigrants and Latinos, stop the inhumane treatment of people detained by ICE, shut down the Florida prison camp. You should also urge them to protect immigrants’ and citizens’ rights to due process and end deportations to the CECOT torture prison. Here is a link to a sample call script from 5 Calls you can use as a starting point when you contact your MOCs. Download their app to make calling from your smartphone faster and easier.
Know your own rights and use them. The ACLU has a Know Your Rights page on their website about your legal rights related to immigration and immigration law enforcement. Every person has rights in the United States, including immigrants with or without legal permission to be in the country. Know what your rights are and how to exercise them if you are contacted by law enforcement or immigration authorities.
The Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC) has free “know your rights” Red Cards that you can carry with you at all times to help you remember and exercise your rights, whether you are a US citizen or an immigrant (regardless of immigration status). Red Cards are completely free to download, print, or order in bulk. You can find the link to obtain Red Cards for yourself and your neighbors at the ILRC’s website. You can pass out red cards in your community and to people you know to help remind everyone of their rights and how to exercise them.
Talk to your family, friends, and neighbors about their rights and how they can exercise them. Make sure that you are providing clear and accurate information by sharing information only from trustworthy resources, such as the ACLU and the ILRC. Here is an additional guide from the ACLU on talking to other people about their rights and your own rights when sharing truthful, lawfully-obtained information about law enforcement.
If you are considering accompanying your immigrant neighbors to immigration court and ICE appointments, or on other errands when they may be vulnerable, make sure you attend an accompaniment training session with a reputable organization first, so that you understand your rights, your neighbors’ rights, and how to lawfully advocate for them. Find a local immigrant rights/ advocacy organization with a good reputation in your community, and ask if they have training sessions on accompaniment or can help you find a training session. If you are part of another organization that is standing up for democracy in your area, you can also ask leaders in your group if they know about organizations that hold these training sessions.
Support Factual Journalism and Public Media
The White House has launched a series of attacks on news outlets, including public media outlets like PBS and NPR, and accused them of being biased against the regime and its agenda. These attacks are often launched against outlets that report accurate information on the regime or refuse to use the regime’s propaganda and preferred language in their reporting. For example, the White House has made several attempts to bar AP News from presidential events after AP News refused to call the Gulf of Mexico “the Gulf of America,” to due their wide international readership which does not recognize the regime’s attempts to rename the gulf. The regime has also attacked PBS and NPR as being biased and promoting their favorite boogeyman: “woke ideology.” As a result, the regime demanded, and the Republican-controlled Congress passed, legislation that clawed back over $1 billion in funding for PBS and NPR that had previously been approved by Congress.
Support AP News and other independent news outlets by reading and sharing their articles, watching their videos, and sharing other content from these outlets. If you can contribute, consider donating to AP News or other journalism nonprofits or purchasing a paid subscription to independent media.
Support public media outlets like PBS and NPR by donating to your local PBS and NPR stations. To find your local PBS station and donate, visit PBS.org and click the Donate button. To find your local NPR station and donate, visit NPR.org and click the Donate button.
Demand the Protection of Immigrants From Being Detained Over Political Views
On 3/8/2025, activist Mahmoud Khalil was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and put into immigration detention. Mr. Khalil and his family were informed that ICE intended to revoke his legal permanent residency, commonly known as a “green card,” and deport him from the United States. The reason given for his arrest and the regime’s attempt to deport him was his role in organizing protests against the war in Gaza at Columbia University in New York, where he was a student and lives with his wife. Mr. Khalil was never charged with any crime in connection to these protests. The regime has not produced any evidence that he has personally expressed antisemitic views or promoted violent activity. On 6/21/2025, the court ordered that Mr. Khalil must be released from federal custody; he was released that day and returned home to New York to be with his family the next day.
Mahmoud Khalil and several other immigrants detained over their political views have been released, but the fight to protect everyone’s right to free speech is not over. Contact your members of Congress and urge them to protect the right to free speech for all, including immigrants. Continue to follow news and reliable reporting on Mr. Khalil’s case to stay up to date on this key issue that affects your right to free speech.
Save IMLS
On 3/14/2025, Donald Trump signed an executive order in an attempt to shut down several government agencies that he has decided are unnecessary. The order, titled "Continuing the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy" labels several agencies as “elements of the federal bureaucracy that the President has determined are unnecessary.” One of the agencies targeted in his executive order is the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). The IMLS is a key source of funding for museums, libraries, and educational institutions, and it distributes thousands of grants nationwide totaling over $200 million annually. The order demands that non-statutory components and programs of this agency “shall be eliminated to the maximum extent” that the law allows. The order also requires that any funding requests for these agencies must be rejected, unless they are needed to shut these agencies down.
At least 21 states have sued the Trump regime to stop the dismantling of IMLS and the cancelling of federal grants to libraries. Democracy Forward has also filed a lawsuit on behalf of the American Library Association to stop the elimination of the agency. In the states’ lawsuit, the court issued an injunction on 5/6/2025 that stops the executive order from being carried out.
Contact your members of Congress and urge them to pass legislation funding the IMLS and keeping it open, and to demand that the regime end its attempts to shut down the agency. Right now funding for IMLS has been included in upcoming budget legislation; urge your members of Congress to make sure it gets passed into law.
Continue to follow news and reliable reporting on the IMLS and DOGE’s efforts to shut down the agency. Share accurate information about the IMLS and its work. You can find more information on the agency at the American Library Association’s FAQ page about the executive order that attempts to shut down IMLS. You can also find more information about the IMLS at their action page set up to promote the IMLS’s work and educate the public. You will also find links there with more tips to take action to defend the IMLS and our libraries.
Tell Congress to Protect Citizens From Book Bans
On 5/23/2025, a federal appeals court issued a ruling in a lawsuit against government officials filed by residents of Llano County, Texas. The court overturned a lower federal court’s ruling that the county had violated citizens’ First Amendment rights by removing books from their library system for politically-motivated reasons. The library officials removed books that dealt with themes of racism and discrimination, sex education materials, and that featured LGBTQ+ characters, real people, or themes. This ruling goes against past interpretations of Supreme Court precedent and could empower government officials to remove books they dislike from public libraries. Elly Brinkley, PEN America’s attorney for U.S. Free Expression Programs, said in a statement, “The court’s embrace of the dangerous argument that the curation of library books constitutes ‘government speech’ immunizes state censorship from First Amendment scrutiny, essentially giving the government free rein to exert ideological control over what citizens can read in their public libraries.”
Contact your members of Congress and let them know you do not support any effort to ban books from public libraries or other points of access. You can use the email script provided by EveryLibrary as a guide when you call or email your member of Congress.
Support the Fight to Stop DOD Book Bans
Since January 2025, the Department of Defense has made significant changes to the curricula used in schools it runs for children of active-duty military members, and it has removed books from the schools that the regime believes promote diversity, equity, inclusion, and ideas about race and gender that the regime disagrees with. The ACLU said that books the DOD has banned discuss topics such as slavery, Native American history, LGBTQ+ history and sexual harassment prevention. ACLU of Virginia’s supervising attorney, Matt Calahan, stated that “The government can’t scrub references to race and gender from public school libraries and classrooms just because the Trump administration doesn’t like certain viewpoints on those topics.” The ACLU, along with a group of students and parents, sued DOD on 4/15/2025 over the book bans and curriculum changes.
Contact your members of Congress and urge them to support H.R.5527, which will protect freedom to read and teaching diverse perspectives in DOD-run schools. You can use the script below as a guide for your calls and/or emails.
Dear [Representative/Senator], my name is [your name here] and I am a constituent from [city, state and zip code]. I am contacting you to urge you to support H.R.5527. The Department of Defense has banned multiple books from its schools, including the US Naval Academy and DODEA schools that children of active-duty service-members attend. The books that DOD has banned include classics like “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” by Maya Angelou, “1984” by George Orwell, and books on topics such as slavery, Native American history, LGBTQ+ history and sexual harassment prevention. These books teach our young people the truth about important issues, and banning them from schools does not make our military stronger or strengthen our national security. This is a political stunt that stifles freedom of speech. It deprives American students of the chance to read books that teach them the value of free expression, the beauty of diverse life experiences, and the importance of fair and equal treatment of all people regardless of their background. Our students need more opportunities to learn these values, not less. Congress must pass H.R.5527 and restore these opportunities to students in DOD schools. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Closing Quote
As always, we end this issue with an inspiring quote from a banned book to remind you to keep up the fight.
There are some days I still feel like the world is an awful, frightening place. Despite that, I want to go out into it and experience everything I possibly can.
~ I am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter, by Erica L. Sánchez
Until next time, Resistance Readers! Go read some good books and cause some good trouble.