News that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents will be among United States institutions accompanying Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the Winter Olympic Games in Italy in February has sparked indignation across the region.

Since the information was first published, the Left in the European Parliament has called for an EU-wide travel ban, while Milan’s local authorities stated that the US agency is “a militia that kills” and therefore not welcome in the city. Representatives of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s far-right government offered a range of shifting explanations over the following days, largely suggesting they had very limited understanding of what was actually taking place. The most reassuring statement they managed to provide was that “it’s not the SS.”

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Arguments put forward by local left movements, however, went beyond initial reactions of indignation. They pointed to the broader implications of ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations agents traveling to the Winter Olympics. “The mass response we are seeing in the US, with the general strike in Minneapolis and demonstrations across the country, signals the deep crisis the ruling class is facing there, just as it is in Europe,” wrote Marta Collot of Potere al Popolo on social media. “We will continue to mobilize during the Milan-Cortina Olympics: ICE represents the model of militarization that the EU and the government also want to implement, promoting war outside and inside the country.”

Grassroots trade unions also highlighted the shared logic behind the repressive policies unfolding in the US and those currently being expanded in Italy and across Europe. The Unione Sindacale di Base (USB) said that the crackdown on migrant and working-class communities in the US “should give pause for thought in Italy, where we are witnessing the repressive crackdown on protesters from last September and October, and the frightening new security decrees being introduced by the Meloni government, so warmly aligned with President Trump.”

Parallels between developments in the US and Europe also exist in the area of migration. While some progressive groups in Europe have condemned ICE’s dehumanizing assaults on migrants in the US, far fewer have ventured to openly acknowledge their similarities with the actions of Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency. Frontex has been heavily implicated in violent and illegal pushbacks at the borders of “Fortress Europe,” and its mandate and budget are expected to be further expanded this year under Ursula von der Leyen’s Commission.

“The presence of ICE in Milan sends a very serious political message: the normalization of a repressive apparatus that targets migrants, workers and social movements, while the Olympics become a space for legitimizing war, repression, and exploitation,” USB said.

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Aware that ICE violence in the US is closely linked to the broader militarization and shift to the right underway in Europe, left groups in Italy have announced mobilizations in solidarity with movements in the US, while also keeping their focus on the dynamics at home. Students from the Alternative Student Opposition (OSA), as well as USB members, have announced actions in the coming days to denounce anti-people policy trends and the presence of ICE at the Winter Olympics.

“While the Olympics celebrate governments and interests responsible for conflict and devastation, dockworkers reaffirm that strategic infrastructure must not serve the war machine,” USB stated. Dockworkers affiliated with the union will take part in a Mediterranean-wide day of action involving strikes and other mobilizations against war and the arms trade in major ports on February 6. These actions will be preceded by assemblies in solidarity with Venezuela and anti-ICE mobilizations during the first week of February.

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