Minneapolis, MN – With wind chills bringing temperatures below zero, 15,000 Minnesotans took to the streets in Minneapolis on Saturday to demand ICE get out. The protest was organized by a large coalition of immigrant rights groups and unions in response to an upsurge in attacks by ICE in the past month in the greater Twin Cities area. Many of these attacks have focused on the Somali community after Trump’s racist call for mass deportations of Somali Minnesotans.

Community members have witnessed ICE agents drag a pregnant woman through the streets, shoot pepper balls and tear gas at responders, smash car windows and kidnap people in broad daylight. During the coldest and darkest time of the year, the people have been chasing these federal agents all over the Twin Cities, militantly fighting back, letting them know they are not welcome here.

The march was organized by a large coalition that included unions and immigrant rights group such as Minneapolis Federation of Educators Local 59, SEIU Local 26, Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAC), UNIDOS, Comunidades Organizando el Poder y La Acción Latina (COPAL), Minnesota 8 (MN8), Immigrant Defense Network (IDN), Council on American-Islamic Relations, among others.

The march included three trucks with multiple speakers from different organizations and unions. The front truck included fiery chants and speakers led by MIRAC members. MIRAC speaker Myrka Zambrano said, “We march here so they know that there is resistance. Here and all across the country, we want ICE out of our cities and we will scream it as loud as we need to!”

Emcees kept the energy high for the nearly one and a half mile march, with chants uniting the crowd against ICE. Protesters marched below a freeway bridge and echoes of “Chinga la Migra” boomed as they neared a Somali mall.

Speakers highlighted support for Somali neighbors amidst racist attacks from the Trump administration. Jaylani Hussein of CAIR-MN addressed protesters, “You showed up today! You came out today knowing it was going to be cold! You showed up for your neighbors, for your friends, for your teachers, for your union brothers and sisters. You came out today to show that Minnesota will not let ICE divide us!”

Tracy Molm of the People’s Action Coalition Against Trump (PACAT) said, “In PACAT we believe our struggles and fights against the reactionary and racist policies of the second Trump administration must be met with action. While we have many different struggles, we are united in our commitment to fight back and shut it down!”

MIRAC emcees concluded the march by inviting protesters to shop at the many immigrant-owned businesses on Lake Street that have been struggling due to the recent attacks on their community. Their call to action invited the crowd to show up and take the streets with MIRAC for their 20th anniversary May 1 march in 2026.

#MinneapolisMN #MN #ImmigrantRights #MIRAC #PACAT #ICE #CAIRMN #MFE9 #SEIU #MN8 #UNIDOS #IDN #COPAL #CJC #Feature

St. Louis Park, MN – Dozens of immigrant rights supporters gathered to protest on March 5 in the inner-ring suburb of Saint Louis Park outside Hardcoat Inc., an aluminum finishing business. Last week immigration officials swarmed the Hardcoat building at West Lake Street and Taft Avenue and detained seven immigrant workers.

The protest was called by the Immigrant Defense Network, a large network of organizations that was formed in Minnesota after the presidential election.

At the protest, a statement was read by a family member of one of the detained workers, and members of COPAL, MN8 and MN Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAC) spoke.

In the last two weeks there were also immigration raids at workplaces in Duluth and Rochester, Minnesota. Speakers at the protest emphasized that the ICE operation at Hardcoat and in other parts of Minnesota shows the reality of Trump's attacks on immigrants – they are going after workers, not criminals.

#StLouisParkMN #MN #ImmigrantRights #MIRAC #COPAL #MN8

Saint Paul, MN – On the afternoon of April 2, about 50 people gathered for a protest in Saint Paul’s Frogtown area to “Stand up against hate” and demand justice for Asian people who have been targeted in hate crimes, discrimination and violence.

The action was organized by Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAC) and Minnesota 8 (MN8) and was called in response to the recent attacks on the Asian community in New York City as well as commemorating the one-year anniversary of the Atlanta spa shootings. The Atlanta Young’s Asian Massage victims include: Delaina Ashley Yaun, Paul Andre Michels, Xiaojie Tan, Daoyou Feng, Soon C. Park, Hyun J. Grant, Suncha Kim and Yong A. Yue. One additional victim, Elcias R. Hernandez-Ortiz, was injured in the shooting. Recent New York hate crime victims include Yao Pan Ma, a Chinese immigrant, Michelle Alyssa Go, Christina Yuna Lee and GuiYing Ma.

The group gathered at the corner of the Sun Foods parking lot on University Avenue in Saint Paul to hear speeches, do chants and then set off on a march. Speakers included Brooklyn Park City Councilmember Xp Lee, Reverend Jenny Sung, Rebecca Chang from MN8, and Diana Hernandez and Louie Tran, organizers with MIRAC.

Councilmember Xp Lee spoke first, asking the crowd, “Who wants to see their grandparents beaten up? Who wants to see their family members murdered and harassed? Also, who wants to see their people deported who have been here long and have built a great life here for themselves in this country? I don’t want to see that. You all don’t want to see that. But we are going to continue to see that if we don’t fight for the changes that we need to see happen.”

Between speeches, the emcees read out the names of victims of Atlanta spa shootings and the most recent victims of hate crimes in NYC and the crowd responded with “Presente!” to say that they are still here with us.

Rebecca Chang of MN8 reminded the crowd that violence against Asians in the United States is not new. She said, “This county has been built on a culture of hate and violence since the start. Since the start of Asians Americans arriving in the United States, we’ve been stereotyped as perpetual foreigners, even though our ancestors and families are in the United States in the first place because of economic inequality and war that the U.S. had a direct part in creating around the world.”

MN8 organizes to end detention and deportation in Southeast Asian communities, and Chang informed the crowd that “over 16,000 Southeast Asian community members currently have deportation orders.”

Reverend Jenny Sung spoke next, thanking the crowd for standing up against hate and reminding them: “We have each other’s back.”

Diana Hernandez from MIRAC ended the first set of speakers with the reminder that, “It would be so easy to blame the entirety of the rise of this wave of violence on Trump’s racist handling of the pandemic, but we must confront the fact that the COVID-19 pandemic only aggravated the xenophobia and racism that already existed in this country.” She then highlighted the link between Asian American immigrants and other non-white immigrants who have confronted discrimination and violence and brought attention to the culture of fetishization of Asians in the U.S., exclaiming: “that's not appreciation, that’s exploitation!”

The protesters then set off on a march down a stretch of University Avenue in the Frogtown neighborhood, home to a significant Asian-American community and many shops and restaurants of various Asian nationalities. They chanted slogans such as, “When Asian people are under attack, what do we do? Stand up, fight back!”

The march ended back at the starting point, where one last speaker, Louie Tran from MIRAC, addressed the crowd, saying, “They’re gonna always try to divide us” he said, and then asked the crowd to remember the link between the Asian community, the Black community and other ethnic groups, reminding them to keep coming out to support each other’s struggles. The action ended with a final, energetic chant of: “The people, united, will never be defeated!”

#SaintPaulMN #ImmigrantRights #PeoplesStruggles #AsianNationalities #MIRAc #MN8