DEFIANCE.org, Save America Movement, and Project Saltbox Launch GTFO ICE — A National Network to Block Trump’s ICE Prison Camps
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, April 24, 2026
New coalition invites Americans to “crowd cancel” ICE detention facilities before they open - Launches GTFOice.org
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Save America Movement (SAM), DEFIANCE.org, and Project Saltbox today announced the launch of GTFOICE.org (Get The Facilities Out, ICE), a nationwide rapid-response network designed to mobilize Americans to block ICE prison camps wherever they emerge. The announcement comes ahead of nationwide protests planned this weekend against ICE facilities.
The Trump administration is implementing a nearly $40 billion Department of Homeland Security (DHS) plan to construct a nationwide network of prison camps, including by converting innocuous warehouses around America into locations designed to hold thousands of people in DHS custody. If allowed to proceed unchecked, the DHS detention network would rival or exceed the entire existing federal criminal prison system in size — constructed in secret, without congressional approval, and without the knowledge of the communities forced to host it.
Americans are fighting back. In places like Ashland, Virginia; Merrimack, New Hampshire; and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, communities received no warning and no consultation about facilities being planned in their backyards, but they organized quickly. Through public and political pressure, they won — persuading property owners to walk away from sales, forcing local governments to pass moratoriums, and compelling DHS to abandon plans entirely. A clear playbook is emerging. When Americans find out, they fight. When they fight, they win.
What has been missing is a national network to ensure every community gets that chance before the lease is signed. GTFOICE.org is being launched to help Americans everywhere respond rapidly to “crowd cancel” these prison camps, whether they are being built in their backyards or elsewhere across the country. The effort was unveiled Wednesday night on the DEFIANCE Daily podcast.
“This effort to defy Trump is about uniting people of different political backgrounds,” said Steve Schmidt, co-founder of the Save America Movement. “Republicans and Democrats, small towns and capital cities — they don’t want their government to be operating secret prisons, and certainly not in their communities. The GTFO ICE alert network will allow Americans to support each other and put a stop to this.”
“The administration is betting that secrecy is their greatest asset,” said Miles Taylor, founder of DEFIANCE.org and former Chief of Staff at the Department of Homeland Security. “Ashland didn’t have a national network behind it when it won. Neither did Merrimack. But imagine what communities can do when they have the support of millions of Americans.”
“Residents of Williamsport, MD were blindsided by the sale of a warehouse to be converted into a detention center in their backyards”, said Breyona Gurosko, Co-Founder of Project Salt Box. “After Project Salt Box unearthed the deed, contract records, and infrastructure data, the community was then able to unite around that data to protect their neighbors. A project that would have cost lives and caused generational trauma has been indefinitely halted. What worked in Williamsport is already working across the nation.”
DEFIANCE.org and SAM have already invested resources in two active battlegrounds. In Social Circle, Georgia — a town of 5,400 people — officials first learned of plans to convert a million-square-foot warehouse into a detention center for up to 10,000 migrants from a Washington Post story on Christmas Eve, with the facility sited less than a mile from a new elementary school. In Surprise, Arizona, both organizations have deployed investigative and organizing resources to support local opposition to a planned facility there. In these cases, national attention has proven to be the single most powerful accelerant for local resistance efforts by turning isolated neighbors into organized movements capable of stopping federal action.
How It Works
Americans can sign up at GTFOICE.org to join the network. When a new facility is identified, GTFO ICE will alert network members in the affected area; provide immediate organizing resources, legal guidance, and media support to local residents; mobilize national members for phone and letter-writing campaigns targeting landlords, contractors, and local officials; coordinate crowdfunding for local legal and organizing efforts; and amplify local resistance through partner media and social networks.
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About the Founding Partners
DEFIANCE.org is a “club for courageous Americans” focused on defying Trump, together. Each week, the Member-funded nonprofit announces new actions to fight back against Trump’s abuses of power – lawfully, peacefully, and defiantly. The club also produces DEFIANCE.News, a leading pro-democracy publication. Join today at DEFIANCE.org/join.
Save America Movement (SAM) is a highly agile, fearless political organization with one mission: defend democracy and defeat authoritarianism. We don't do left vs. right. We do right vs. wrong. SAM deploys highly creative, effective tactics that meet the moment. We live in the same reality as American voters and we meet them there - to educate, to activate, to persuade - all the way to the ballot box.
Project Salt Box is a volunteer team of independent researchers and data journalists who believe in data for good. They track how the federal government spends the $190.6 billion Congress handed the Department of Homeland Security in 2025 — the largest immigration enforcement funding surge in American history. Drawing on public records, FOIA requests, and confidential sources, their investigative reporting and data dashboards chronicle ICE's detention and enforcement expansion and its humanitarian, environmental, and fiscal toll on communities across the country — unifying Americans to take informed, data-driven action.
GTFO ICE is also being supported by launch partners – a group of civic leaders and patriotic content creators that are using their reach and influence to expand the GTFO ICE rapid response network. Launch Partners include award-winning actor Mark Ruffalo, social justice organization The Workers Circle, pro-democracy influencers JoJo from Jerz and Robby Roadsteamer, Independent Veterans of America, Blue Amp Media, and more.
Media Contact
Scott Goodstein, DEFIANCE.org
scott@DEFIANCE.org
Https://DEFIANCE.org
SOURCE DEFIANCE.org
