Rice students wear ICE outfits to a Halloween party, Outrage insues

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“We disregarded how fellow students would react, and did not consider the safety and wellbeing of others,” they wrote. “Furthermore, we acknowledge that our actions led to the creation of a Twitter thread where hate-speech was incited. While we did not start or participate in the online discussion, we understand our actions opened the gates for further negative discourse.

Additionally, we are resigning from our leadership positions at McMurtry because we failed to promote inclusivity for which our roles serve to facilitate.”

In a statement to the Thresher, President David Leebron criticized the students’ decisions and urged students to express concern and support for members of the community and their families who are threatened by current immigration policy, “especially our students of Latinx heritage.”

“These ‘costumes’ were simply not funny and in fact were remarkably insensitive given the present environment,” Leebron wrote. “Many of our students, including [Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Act] students and others, are uncertain about their safety in this country. Many more students have relatives or friends who face deportation or separation from their families, even if they grew up and lived here as productive citizens for decades.”

McMurtry College senior Daniel Pham, who posted the original tweet, said that he initially wanted to make people aware of the situation and wanted them to get kicked out of Pub.

“As the tweet started getting more traction, I started thinking about the conversation I wanted to start on campus about this type of behavior,” Pham said. “Rice needs to remember that this happens on our campus too, no matter how much we talk about Culture of Care.”

Pub’s management team released a statement to the Thresher and on their Facebook, stating that one of the students who was a Pub employee was dismissed from staff.

In a tweet, Martel College junior Christina Stoner called for outraged students to attend the Día de los Muertos event honoring children who have died in ICE custody. The event will take place at Rayzor Hall from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.

Pham’s tweet of the photos of the students received over 800 likes and 200 retweets at the time of publication. Some students, such as Duncan College senior Pedro Regino, said that they confronted the sophomores in question at Willy’s Pub.

“I saw one of the dudes ... and walked up to him [and asked], ‘Why the frick are you wearing that here? What’s wrong with you?’ [He replied], ‘It’s okay, I’m an immigrant,’” Regino said.

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“What makes it even worse, is that I was at Pub and saw many other students talking and laughing with them — it wasn’t just the three students on their own who did this, but everyone who was their friend and didn’t say anything to them about the costume was complicit in this disgusting and offensive event,” Vargas, a Sid Richardson College senior, wrote.

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