A news press photograph showing Protestors outside St. Petersburg Police Headquarters in St. Petersburg, Florida on Jan. 11, 2026. Captured in an eye-level medium shot during an outdoor demonstration, anti-ICE demonstrators hold homemade protest signs aloft above the crowd. In the foreground, a prominent cardboard sign held up by two hands reads "STOP ICE KIDNAPPINGS" in bold black lettering, while another demonstrator to the left holds a bright yellow sign reading "ICE OUT OF OUR COMMUNITIES", set against a blurred crowd of rally participants and a modern multi-story police headquarters building under diffused daylight. — Protestors outside St. Petersburg Police Headquarters in St. Petersburg, Florida on Jan. 11, 2026. Credit: Dave Decker / Creative Loafing Tampa Bay

The Bay area, especially Tampa, was built on the backs of immigrants. And politicians love to talk about them.

On the campaign trail, Republicans talk about deporting them, regardless of whether they’ve violated a criminal statute. Some Democrats toe the line, trying to convince moderates that they believe in borders while also pandering to progressives. Just last Tuesday, the City of Tampa unveiled a new life-sized statue of First Lt. Baldomero López, a local U.S. Marine who died in the Korean War more than 75 years ago.

This weekend, activists led by the Tampa Immigrant Rights Committee will speak out about them, too, as they “Remember the Dead, Fight for the Living” as part of a protest where they’ll call for justice for all victims of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, aka ICE (at least 61 people have died in the agency’s custody over the last two years, according to the National Immigration Project).

Tampa’s Día de los Muertos—Remember the Dead, Fight for the Living protest happens at 6 p.m. inside Centennial Park in Ybor City on Sunday, Nov. 1.