LinkedIn Post #2

I really didn’t want to write another post about ICE in Minneapolis. But this morning I got a front row seat to their lawlessness, their cowardice and their quickness to violence.

At about 8:30, as I was getting ready to go out for a walk, I learned there were agents in the Powderhorn Park parking lot harassing observers, so I headed there. The city and the park board have told them explicitly that they are not allowed to stage in city parking lots: https://www.minneapolisparks.org/ice-response/

Their presence there was illegal, but they told us we needed to leave. We reminded them that our taxes paid for the park and that they were not allowed to be there. When we asked them to leave, the response was “make me”. They continued to approach observers only to say “get away from me” because they are apparently 12 year old bullies. The more people that showed up, the more they started to reach for their tear gas and their pepper spray, until they finally used it. Thankfully the tear gas didn’t disperse well in the humid, snowy air.

It is beyond clear that they are here in my city and around my state to harass and terrorize us. They’re no longer even trying to keep up the charade that any of this is about law enforcement or immigration. They think they can scare us into submission, but we are showing them what real community looks like, and that scares them.

When I began writing this post, I intended to include one of the many pictures I took at the scene this morning, but I won’t sully your feed with images of violence. They have, however, been sent to the Minneapolis Park Board and the Hennepin County Attorney’s office as evidence of the agents’ lawlessness.

I didn’t want to write about this again. I wanted to write a more uplifting post about how we can collectively create a better world. Eventually, I’ll write that post and talk about the wonderful things I’ve seen this community do in the face of authoritarianism. For now, I’ll tell you that my afternoon was spent with 1500+ other Minnesotans, singing in the streets of downtown, asking these agents to stop the violence.