Government Plaza, the administrative heart of Minneapolis, began to fill an hour before the call with which the Democratic city gathered this Friday for a large demonstration, the main one among the hundreds planned throughout the country to protest against the Government of Donald Trump.
Just a week ago, Minneapolis also took to the streets. Then, some 50,000 people who exceeded all expectations raised their voices against Donald Trump’s brutal immigration policy and federal harassment of a Democratic city and state (Minnesota).
The speeches began this Friday at 2:00 p.m. (local time, seven more in mainland Spain). By then, Sarah Keüler, who had driven three hours to be here, had already been out in the sun for a while, trying to combat the 14 degrees below zero. “We’ve had enough. The people of Minnesota don’t run away, when danger lurks, we come together more. It’s been a long time since I felt so proud of who I am,” she explained. A little further away, Bill, who did not want to reveal his last name, apologized for becoming inflamed when talking about what is happening. “I feel ashamed. It’s a fucking shame, I never believed that we would reach this extreme in this country, which I no longer recognize,” he said.
The organizers’ plan was to walk through the center of the city to the Target Center stadium, right where this Friday guitarist Tom Morello, a member of the protest rock band Rage Against the Machine, gave a benefit concert at First Avenue, the city’s flagship venue. Tickets sold out quickly for a line-up that was completed by jazz guitarist Al Di Meola and a surprise guest. The bets were two: would it be Eddie Vedder, leader of Pearl Jam? Or Bruce Springsteen? The money raised will go entirely to the families of those on these streets resistant since Operation Metro Surge began: the poet and the nurse. Both were American citizens and both were 37 years old.
Finally, the Springsteen option was confirmed. The musician published the song on Wednesday Streets of Minneapolisin honor of both victims. It has already become an anthem of the revolt. In the demonstration with which the city welcomed a new day of protests against ICE and the Border Patrol, a guy played it on a loop with a particular sound equipment: his cell phone and a megaphone.
The man joined the thousand people at 8:00 gathered around a tree in a parking lot near the Whipple federal building. It is to that sinister place where President Donald Trump’s immigration police take people, irregular immigrants and American citizens alike, Democrat.
After the speeches, the crowd walked in minus 20 degrees to the Whipple’s door to chants of “Our love melts the ice!” (It was a play on words; ice in English is “ice,” which is also the acronym for the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service, the federal agency that is carrying out the). Once there, the slogans of “ICE out” and “This is the strength of which our community is capable” continued, the shouts of “shame!”, directed at the police officers who were in the front row, and the insults to the twenty federal agents who were accumulating in the background.
More or less half an hour later, they walked towards the protesters and began warnings through a megaphone that the concentration had to be dissolved and that those who insisted on continuing protesting risked being arrested and charged with a crime of public disorder. Many participants left, while the vanguard of the protest put on gas masks and a group in charge of first aid distributed disposable masks to the least equipped. Finally, the smoke canisters arrived.
Inside the Whipple, a group from last Tuesday in a student protest is locked up, who have now become known here as “the Minnesota 16.” They were the reason for the call, after Attorney General Pam Bondi published their photos on her social networks, accompanied by their names, without caring about the presumption of innocence or placing a digital target on them.
The local independent journalist Georgia Fort had also arrived at those offices before dawn, guarded by the federal agents, and they went looking for her at her home. A couple of Sundays ago, he recorded a protest at a church in St. Paul, Minneapolis’ twin city. They accuse her of preventing a religious event. She, like him in Los Angeles, defends that she was reporting, and that the First Amendment protects her.
