Contact: Deana Rutherford, deana@thepeopleslobbyusa.org,
Marie Rowley, mrowley@onenorthside.org,
Unai Montes, u.montes@peoplesaction.org (Bilingual)
The People’s Lobby, ONE People’s Campaign and People’s Action Are Naming and Shaming the Telecom Giant for Greed and Hypocrisy –
Click Here for the Petition
AT&T Helps ICE Terrorize the Very Same Diverse Communities the Corporation Has Used to Build Its Brand and Line Its Pockets
Chicago, Illinois – The People’s Lobby, ONE People’s Campaign and People’s Action have introduced a petition calling on AT&T to end its contract with ICE. With $30.7 billion in revenue in the third quarter of 2025 alone, AT&T does not need its 2024 or 2025 contracts with the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement to remain profitable. Yet, the telecom giant is choosing to both collect money from customers who are in the crosshairs, and line its pockets with public dollars from DHS and ICE, whose agents are masked, unidentifiable, and operating without warrants as they terrorize members of the public in communities like Chicago.
“AT&T has a choice to make: Be a good business, or exploit people. You can’t have it both ways. You can’t put people from every ethnicity in your ads, take TV, internet and cell phone money from customers who live in communities that are being scapegoated, and then contract with ICE while it tracks and pursues our friends, family, and neighbors and turns their homes into war zones. We don’t want Blackhawk helicopters and heavily armed infantrymen kicking down doors in the middle of the night to detain parents and zip tie children. Not in Chicago. Not anywhere,” said The People’s Lobby Executive Director Will Tanzman.
In the wake of President Donald Trump, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, and Senate Majority Leader John Thune passing a 10-year budget that included the unprecedented expansion of ICE resources, the largest transfer of wealth to the rich in history, and devastating cuts to vital programs such as Medicaid, Medicare, and SNAP, more and more Americans have begun to question why the billionaire and corporate beneficiaries of the tax cuts in the Big Ugly Bill are also on Trump donor lists and getting big government contracts funded with public dollars.
“AT&T sells us services that keep our families connected. They do not need to sell us out by doing business with the villain that is tearing our families apart. ICE’s aggressive actions have hurt good people just trying to live our lives. We were dropping our kids off at school when ICE dragged an early education teacher out of her classroom. We were resting after a hard day’s work when innocent families were awoken at 1 a.m. and separated from their loved ones. AT&T’s contract with ICE feels like a gut punch. Ending that contract would make it clear to AT&T’s customers, workers, and everyone in our communities that this corporation knows it’s well past time to put people above profit,” said ONE People’s Campaign Executive Director Jesse Hoyt.
The petition calling on AT&T to end its contract with ICE is part of a growing movement to hold accountable the corporations that put profits over people. Other corporations named in grassroots campaigns launched recently include Home Depot, Amazon, and Target. Organizers expect that these campaigns will intensify in the coming weeks as the Thanksgiving holiday approaches, SNAP benefits are curtailed, and the resolution of the federal government shutdown over the extension of the Affordable Care Act subsidies set to expire in December remains uncertain.
“There is more than enough for all of us to thrive if billionaires, CEOs, and corrupt politicians don’t hoard it. Corporations depend on our labor and earnings. Elected officials work for us. If they refuse to stop themselves from profiting off of our pain and threatening our rights and freedoms, then we have to organize to peacefully stop them. It’s time for AT&T to stop contracting with DHS and ICE, whose agents are separating families. It’s time for AT&T to take away access to communications systems meant to keep us and our neighbors safe from outside agents who seek to terrorize our communities. It’s time for AT&T to end their contracts with DHS and ICE,” said People’s Action Executive Director Sulma Arias.
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About The People’s Lobby:
The People’s Lobby is a membership-driven organization devoted to organizing widespread support for legislation and candidates that put the needs of people and the planet before the interests of big corporations and the very rich.
About ONE People’s Campaign:
ONE People’s Campaign endorses and supports progressive candidates and policies that put the interests of regular people before the profits of corporations and the super rich. OPC organizes people who live on the front lines of the many crises plaguing our society in Chicago and Central Illinois.
About People’s Action:
People’s Action is a proud national network of 38 member-based, power-building organizations in 29 states with more than a million members and tens of thousands of national volunteers. We are from every background, speak many languages, and live in small towns, cities and rural areas. We are all of us!
