Thousands march in Minneapolis to protest ICE after Shooting

by Alyssa Chen, Minnesota Reformer

Thousands peacefully protested in Minneapolis Saturday against the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown following the shooting and killing of a woman by an U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent.

The marchers began at Powderhorn Park and passed by the site where Good was killed. The protest was part of over a 1,000 planned demonstrations against ICE across the nation this weekend.

Among the demonstrators was a group of Roosevelt High School students. Hours after ICE agent Jonathan Ross shot and killed 37-year-old Renee Good, Border Patrol agents arrived at the high school and deployed tear gas as students were being dismissed.

“I want to be able to go to work and school without worrying that we are going to be attacked,” said junior Maria Delong, who said she burst into tears watching a video of her favorite teachers being tackled by federal agents.

Fahad Mo, 26, is a Somali-American who grew up in Cedar-Riverside, which has a large Somali community. He’s part of the Cedar-Riverside Protection Alliance, a newly formed group working to protect the Somali community in the neighborhood from immigration officers.

“I want Trump to know Somali-Americans are always going to be here,” Mo said at the protest. “Immigrants are always going to be here.”

The Minnesota Somali community has been the focus of a targeted deportation campaign by the Trump administration since late November, even though the vast majority are citizens or legal residents.

Protests at the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building, which federal immigration agents use as a base, has been more confrontational. Federal agents fired pepper balls at a small group of protesters at the Whipple Building at the same time as the much larger Powderhorn protest, CNN reported.

On Friday night, police arrested 30 people, who have since been released, for blocking streets and damaging property at a protest outside hotels in downtown Minneapolis where ICE agents are thought to be staying, the Star Tribune reported. The police said protesters caused about $6,000 in damage from broken windows and graffiti at the Depot Renaissance Hotel.

Among the speakers at the Powderhorn protest was Isa Lopez, an activist who was charged with assaulting, resisting or impeding officers at a federal law enforcement action on Lake Street in June.