Minnesota braces for massive anti-immigrant enforcement protests despite dangerous cold

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A vast network of labor unions, progressive organizations and clergy is urging Minnesotans to stay away from work, schools and stores Friday to protest against immigration enforcement in the state.

Minneapolis and St. Paul have seen daily protests since the Jan. 7 killing of Renee Goode by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. Federal law enforcement officials have been ramping up in the Twin Cities for weeks and frequent community members and activists who track their movements.

“We really, really want ICE to leave Minnesota, and they’re not going to leave Minnesota unless there’s a lot of pressure on them,” said Kate Hevlin of Indivisible Twin Cities, one of the more than 100 groups that mobilized. “They should not be walking any street in our country the way they are now.”

On Thursday, a prominent civil rights attorney and at least two other people were arrested for their involvement in an anti-immigrant enforcement protest that disrupted a Sunday service at a church in St. Paul. They were taken into federal custody Friday morning.

Vice President JD Vance, meanwhile, visited Minneapolis to meet with ICE officials and address reporters. He encouraged the protesters to remain peaceful and urged city and state officials to cooperate with federal forces to ease the overcrowding in Minneapolis.

Organizers hope Friday’s mobilization will be the largest coordinated protest action to date, with a march planned for Friday afternoon in downtown Minneapolis. The National Weather Service warned of dangerously cold weather, and early Friday, the temperature in Minneapolis was minus 21 with a wind chill of minus 40 (minus 29 Celsius with a wind chill of minus 40 Celsius).

Havlin compared the presence of immigration enforcement to a winter weather warning.

“Minnesotans understand that when we’re in a snow emergency … we all have to respond and that makes us do things differently,” she said. “And what’s happening with ICE in our community, in our state, means we can’t respond as business as usual.”

More than 100 small businesses in the Twin Cities, including large-scale coffee shops and restaurants, said they would either close in solidarity or donate a portion of their profits, organizers said.

Somali businesses in particular have lost sales amid the increased enforcement as workers and customers stay home for fear of detention.

Some businesses are choosing to close in solidarity with protesters instead of “unsettling obstacles” where agents arrest employees, said Luis Arguta of Unidos MN, a civil rights group.

Many schools were planning to close on Friday, but cited various reasons. The University of Minnesota and the St. Paul Public School District said there will be no in-person classes due to the extreme cold. Minneapolis Public Schools was scheduled to be closed “for a teacher record keeping day.”

According to a delegation of representatives of religious traditions including Buddhists, Jews, Lutherans and Muslims, clergy planned to join the march as well as hold prayer services and fasts.

Bishop Dwayne Royster, leader of the progressive organization Faith in Action, arrived in Minnesota on Wednesday from Washington, DC.

“We want ICE out of Minnesota,” he said. “We want them out of all the cities in the country where they are practicing extreme overreach.”

Royster said at least 50 faith-based organizers from his network joined the protest. About 10 were traveling from Los Angeles while others in the same group planned a solidarity rally in California, an organizer there said.

“It was a very painful experience,” said the Rev. of a major immigration enforcement operation in Los Angeles last year. Jennifer Gutierrez said. “We believe that God is on the side of migrants.”

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Associated Press reporters Jack Brooke and Sarah Raza in Minneapolis and Tiffany Stanley in Washington contributed.