Minnesota protests Trump administration’s immigration crackdown
Large crowds flooded downtown Minneapolis Friday afternoon, despite subzero temperatures, as part of a march and rally to protest the largest and most aggressive immigration enforcement operation brought by the federal government so far.
In coordination with the protests, businesses across Minnesota – restaurants, museums, book stores, coffee shops – also shut their doors for the day. Labor unions, faith leaders and community activists organized the economic blackout, called “ICE Out of Minnesota: A Day of Truth and Freedom.” They are encouraging people in the state to stay home from work and school, and to refrain from shopping or dining out.
At the downtown rally, protesters – heavily bundled against the extreme cold – chanted “ICE out” and held signs that read “The North is stronger” and “Immigrants make America great.”
Organizers of the protests and economic blackout are demanding that immigration officers leave the state; that Congress gives no additional funding to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE; that companies cease business relations with ICE; and that Jonathan Ross, the ICE officer who killed Renee Macklin Good more than two weeks ago, be held legally accountable.
Beyond the actions today, thousands of people across the state have for weeks been coordinating a massive network of community resistance against the federal immigration enforcement campaign.
Neighbors are delivering food to people too fearful to leave their homes; parents and community members are standing guard outside schools, daycares and immigrant-owned businesses, and hundreds of everyday people are joining neighborhood chats to track the movements of immigration officers. They often then show up in protest — honking, whistling, yelling and filming — when federal agents make arrests.
“We are in total crisis here in Minnesota with this ICE surge. Thousands of agents are terrorizing our communities, not just Minneapolis, but across the state,” says Martha Bardwell, the lead pastor at Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church in South Minneapolis, who is participating in the day’s events. “They are tearing apart families. They say that they’re here to round up the worst of the worst, but we know with our own eyes that is absolutely not true.”
Last week, a family trying to drive around a tense protest was tear gassed, and their 6-month-old was hospitalized. This week, federal officers detained a 5-year-old boy and his father in the northern suburb of Columbia Heights.
Officials with the school district there say federal agents used the child as “bait” to draw family members out of the home. DHS officials confirmed the boy and his father are now at a detention center in Texas, though they claim the father fled and “abandoned” his child during his apprehension. The family’s lawyer and witnesses have denied the government’s account.
Some U.S. Citizens are also speaking out about being stopped or detained by immigration agents. Nasra Ahmed, a U.S. citizen and a Somali-American, was detained for two days, she told reporters at a press conference Wednesday.
“They were just using a lot of force to arrest me, and I was screaming, I was crying, I was so scared, I’ve never been arrested in my life,” Ahmed says.
Ahmed said the federal officers arresting her made racist remarks during her arrest. Vice President JD Vance visited Minneapolis to show support for ICE on Thursday, and told reporters the government takes allegations of racial profiling seriously. But Ahmed is hardly the only person with a story like that. This week, police leaders from three local agencies told reporters their own off-duty officers were racially profiled by federal agents, who demanded to see their IDs. One of the officers said the federal agents had their guns drawn.
Trump administration officials also seem to be taking a harder stance on some protesters. Federal officials arrested three people Thursday who were involved in a protest that disrupted a church service in St. Paul last Sunday, where one of the pastors is also a local ICE official.
“If you go and storm a church, if you go to assault a federal law enforcement officer, we’re going to try very hard, we’re going to use every resource of the federal government to put you in prison,” Vice President Vance said at a press conference Thursday.
Federal officials said the three protesters were arrested on charges related to a conspiracy to deprive other people of their rights. Vance drew a distinction between violent and nonviolent protests, but videos of the church protest show people marching and chanting and do not appear violent.
The Pentagon has also put several hundred military troops on standby, in case President Trump invokes the Insurrection Act, which would give the president sweeping powers to deploy the military here without the state’s consent.
This is a developing story and may be updated.