“Pawlenty thought he was a king. Now he is just pathetic.”

Fight Back! interviewed Linden Gawboy, a leader of the Welfare Rights Committee and the Minnesota Coalition for a People’s Bailout on the implications of the May 5 Minnesota Supreme Court decision limiting Governor Pawlenty’s power of unallotment. Gawboy has been involved with fighting for low-income people at the Minnesota state legislature for over 15 years.

St. Paul, MN – Protesters assembled in the rotunda of the Minnesota state capitol here on April 15 for a rally to demand that the state government not “balance the state budget on the backs of working and low-income people.” The rally called on politicians to instead, “tax the rich.”

Fight Back News Service is circulating the following statement from the Welfare Rights Committee on the corporate media coverage that followed their March 23 die-in if front of the office of Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty. Some of the critical coverage focused on the participation of students from Southside Family School in Minneapolis.

‘These cuts would kill’

St. Paul, MN – Tombstones and bodies filled the halls outside the Governor’s office here, March 23, as participants in a ‘die-in’ demonstrated against the effects of Governor Pawlenty’s proposed cuts in health and human services. Members of the Welfare Rights Committee and the Minnesota Coalition for a Peoples Bailout, along with other social justice groups, joined the protest.

Saint Paul, MN – On March 10, a bill that would allow immigrants to get drivers licenses in Minnesota passed its first hurdle in a key vote. By a vote of 8-5-1, the “drivers license for all” bill, HF1718, passed the House Transportation and Transit Policy and Oversight Committee.

St. Paul, MN – A bill that places a moratorium on home foreclosures and brings a halt to the eviction of tenants from foreclosed buildings got through the Minnesota State House of Representatives Housing Policy and Finance and Public Health Finance Division, Feb. 9. The moratorium bill will now proceed to the House Commerce Committee. It is expected that Senate hearings on the bill will be announced in coming days.

St. Paul, MN – The battle is under way to put a moratorium on home forecloses in Minnesota. The first legislative hearing on an bill to put a moratorium on foreclosures and evictions began with a joint hearing by State Senate Economic Development and Housing Budget Division and Health and Housing and Family Security Committee, Jan. 27 at the Minnesota state capitol.

Picket demands “Tax the rich”

St. Paul, MN – Members of the Welfare Rights Committee and the Minnesota Coalition for a People’s Bailout gathered in the state capitol building, Dec. 2, outside the room where Minnesota Management and Budget department heads presented the ‘November Forecast,’ projecting a $1.2 billion deficit.

St. Paul, MN – On November 14, immigrant rights activists in the Twin Cities confronted a “tea party” rally of about 40 right wing anti-immigrant extremists at the Minnesota State Capitol. The anti-immigrant “tea party against amnesty” was in opposition to immigration reform legislation that may be introduced soon in the U.S. Congress, which might provide legalization for some undocumented immigrants. The tea party organizers oppose any legalization and instead support repressive mass deportations of the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in the country. The anti-immigrant extremists gathered to hear speakers and held signs with messages such as “If You Are Illegal Go Home” and “Pack Their Sack and Send Them Back”.

_75 Speak Out on Day of the Dead Holiday _

Saint Paul, MN – 75 people gathered outside the Ramsey County Adult Detention Center, Nov. 1. The protest took place on Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) to commemorate the more than 4000 immigrants who have died trying to cross the border into the U.S. from Mexico and the hundreds who have died in U.S. jails awaiting deportation. Día de los Muertos is widely celebrated in Mexico and by Latin Americans in the U.S. to remember loved ones who have died.