Diabolical Records owner Adam Tye already had a trans flag, a pride banner and a flyer supporting Gazans affected by the Israel-Hamas war hanging in his shop’s windows when a community organizer came by with a sign saying “No I.C.E. Allowed,” referring to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
He took it and put it up after getting training from the organizer on his rights as a business owner if federal agents came in. While Tye doesn’t have any employees, he wants patrons and people working in the area to know his downtown Salt Lake City store could be a temporary place of refuge if the need arises.
“There’s restaurants around and if any people working there have any problems,” he said, “I want them to know that they can make it over here.”
(Bethany Baker | The Salt Lake Tribune) Adam Tye speaks at his business, Diabolical Records, on Tuesday, Dec. 30, 2025.
The signs say, “I.C.E. out of Utah” and, in smaller print, “I.C.E. cannot enter private areas of this business without a judicial warrant signed by a judge.” They also include a QR code that takes users to a webpage informing them of their rights if they encounter ICE agents.
ICE did not reply to a request for comment on the signs.
The Fourth Amendment generally protects everyone, no matter their legal status in the United States, from warrantless law enforcement searches in private spaces like bathrooms or offices. ICE agents can search areas open to the public without a warrant.
Comunidades Unidas and Salt Lake Indivisible handed out the signs as a part of a joint campaign last month.
“We just want people to know their rights,” Salt Lake Indivisible co-leader Sarah Buck said. “And employers are in a unique position, not only to protect their employees when they’re at work by knowing their rights, but to also pass along information about knowing your rights to their employees.”
Buck said volunteers with the two groups gave out more than 400 signs to businesses in Salt Lake City and West Valley City. On the day she passed out the posters in West Valley City, she said every business took a sign.
Buck suspects some employees without legal status might not be showing up to work regularly, so increased immigration enforcement may already be hitting business owners’ bottom line even if agents haven’t shown up at their front door. The signs, she said, offer those employees better information and a reassurance that their employer knows what to do if ICE does come.
New state Rep. John Arthur, D-Holladay, volunteered to pass out signs during one of the canvases organized by the two groups. He said the signs help inform U.S. citizens as well.
“While we are trying to remind everybody of their rights,” he said, “this is also an opportunity for us to remind them of their humanity and to humanize the people who are, in a very real way, under attack right now.”
The downtown location of Taqueria 27 has one of the signs up in its front window. The manager, Alexis Vasquez, said she liked that the organizer who stopped by with the poster also gave a quick lesson on the different types of warrants ICE agents use and handed out example copies.
“I sent them (the warrant examples) out to all the staff,” Vasquez said. “So, they know what to look for.”
(Bethany Baker | The Salt Lake Tribune) Adam Tye, owner of Diabolical Records, stands outside his record store in Salt Lake City on Tuesday, Dec. 30, 2025.
Tye, the record store owner, said so far, he’s only received positive feedback from patrons about the sign. When asked if he feared that putting up the sign would make Diabolical Records a target, he said he could bear that weight.
“I can be able to have that target on my back,” Tye said. “That’s where it’s my responsibility to stand up and protect people that have actual targets on their back and [may] actually be harmed by insane laws that make no sense.”
Note to readers • This story is available to Salt Lake Tribune subscribers only. Thank you for supporting local journalism.