Minneapolis, MN – As the candidates for governor were preparing to debate inside the Pantages Theater here Sept. 15, about 30 members of the Minnesota Coalition for a People’s Bailout, including folks from the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee and the Welfare Rights Committee were on the street out front.

Inside the debate, Rosemary Williams, of the Minnesota Coalition for a People’s Bailout, rose from the floor and challenged the candidates on the issue of education, specifically the closure of the only public high school in North Minneapolis, a predominantly Black part of the city, and the less than equal education opportunities for African American students.

Coalition groups have actively followed the candidates on the campaign trail to promote a people’s agenda.

Linden Gawboy of the Welfare Rights Committee stated, “We were there to send a message to the politicians and the audience members. We want jobs or income now. Stop foreclosures and evictions. Stop attacks on immigrants.”

#MinneapolisMN #ImmigrantRights #CapitalismAndEconomy #PoorPeoplesMovements #WelfareRightsCommittee #MinnesotaCoalitionForAPeoplesBailout #RosemaryWilliams #HousingStruggles #MIRAc #TomEmmer #MinnesotaImmigrantRightsActionCommittee

Minneapolis, MN – The outpouring of online anger at Target turned to the streets on Aug. 5, as more than 50 people protested outside of Target’s store on Lake Street and Hiawatha Avenue in the heart of Minneapolis’s Latino community. Target is under fire for contributing $150,000 to MN Forward for television ads in support of Minnesota Republican governor candidate Tom Emmer, a man infamous for his extreme anti-immigrant, anti-gay and anti-minimum wage views.

Outrage ensued when Target’s support for Emmer came to light last week. A Facebook group called “Boycott Target Until They Cease Funding Anti-Gay Politics” quickly amassed over 46,000 members and within days MoveOn.org collected more than 260,000 signatures against Target’s support of Emmer.

The Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAc) and the Boycott Arizona-MN (BAM!) campaign rallied numerous communities to protest outside the Lake Street Target store, all outraged at Emmer’s extreme right wing politics and at Target’s support of the candidate.

According to Anh Pham of MIRAc, “We organized this protest because immigrants spend a lot of money at Target and we don’t want that money going to people who attack our community. This is a powerful opportunity to join together in alliance with workers, poor people and the LGBTQ community. Target really screwed up – but we are building a broad and powerful coalition to stop Target from doing this again and to stop Emmer’s agenda in its tracks.”

MIRAc’s Ana Vasquez outlined Emmer’s voting record for anti-immigrant bills, including drastic measures like denying prenatal care to women who are undocumented and his praising of Arizona’s anti-immigrant SB1070 bill, calling it “a wonderful first step.”

Jennie Eisert of the Anti-War Committee spoke about the outrage toward Emmer and Target from the LGBTQ community. Emmer supports bills to deny domestic partner benefits to gay and lesbian couples and supports a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. Target is particularly vulnerable to criticism from the LGBTQ community, as they have spent years cultivating a gay-friendly image.

Deb Konechne of the Welfare Rights Committee and Minnesota Coalition for a People’s Bailout spoke about Emmer’s long record of attacks on working class and poor people, which blew up in his face in the recent flap over Emmer’s proposal to lower the minimum wage and to cut wages for servers that get tips.

Target’s large financial contribution to MN Forward is one of the first examples of the fallout from the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2009 ruling that allows corporations to give unrestricted money to political campaigns. Target’s CEO Gregg Steinhafel was unprepared for the whirlwind of anger from the LGBTQ community, immigrants and workers. As they spun into damage-control mode, Target initially said they were supporting Emmer because of his pro-business policies, not because of his social policies. Then under increasing pressure, on Aug. 5 Steinhafel issued an apology, saying he was sorry that gay Target employees felt offended by this. Organizers of the Thursday’s Target protest declared that the half-apology was not enough, because Steinhafel did not commit to stop funding for MN Forward or Emmer’s campaign and also only addressed the anger felt by the LGBTQ community, not by immigrants or workers.

#MinneapolisMN #PoorPeoplesMovements #Labor #LGBTQ #MIRAc #SB1070 #TomEmmer #MinnesotaImmigrantRightsActionCommittee #BAM #BoycottArizonaMinnesota #Target

Roseville, MN – This may be seen as the week that Republican candidate for governor Tom Emmer’s campaign imploded. After making a statement on the campaign trail calling for restaurant workers who earn tips to get a wage cut so that restaurant owners can earn more money and then bizarrely stating that many tip-earning servers make over $100,000 a year, a firestorm erupted. Emmer spent the next week trying to backpedal and avoid the visceral anger from working-class Minnesotans at his out of touch, anti-worker views.

Going into overdrive to do damage control as his election campaign spun out of control, Emmer first worked a day as a server in a restaurant to show he’s not out of touch with working class people (while recording the stunt for his campaign website). When that didn’t calm the storm, Emmer called a ‘town hall meeting’ with restaurant workers on July 14 at Ol’ Mexico restaurant in Roseville, supposedly to listen to their concerns and to try to convince them he doesn’t really want to cut their wages.

With all the media filming, one restaurant worker after another talked powerfully about how difficult it is for them to get by on the paltry wages and tips they earn and how a wage cut would be devastating. Whenever Emmer spoke, he was booed and laughed at. It was a rare moment, when the mass media let the righteous anger of working class people come through clearly.

Then an hour into the forum, immigrant rights activist Rachel Lang challenged Emmer about his anti-immigrant positions, ending her statement by saying, “I’ve got a tip for you – this is not Arizona!” Earlier in the campaign, Emmer created a firestorm of controversy by saying on an interview with Minnesota Public Radio that he thought Arizona’s anti-immigrant law SB1070 was “a wonderful first step.” This May, Emmer’s closest allies in the state legislature introduced an SB1070 copycat bill in Minnesota. In past years Emmer has backed bills to refuse prenatal care to pregnant women who are undocumented and to make Minnesota an English-only state.

Just as Lang finished confronting Emmer on his anti-immigrant positions, another immigrant rights activist who has gone by the name of Robert Erickson walked up to Emmer and said, “I have a tip for you too Emmer!” as he dumped 2000 pennies on the table in front of him. The forum erupted into chaos as the startled candidate jumped out of his seat and then abruptly ended the forum early, as his security shoved the protester out the back door.

The local media then investigated the now-infamous “penny protester,” and discovered that ‘Robert Erickson’ was a pseudonym used by Nick Espinosa, an activist with the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAc). He created the pseudonym last year to get on the speakers list at an anti-immigrant Tea Party rally. At that rally he ‘punked’ the Tea Partiers by starting out giving what sounded like an anti-immigrant speech, then turning it into a rallying cry against the European immigrants who came to this continent illegally 500 years ago and carried out genocide against Native Americans. Espinosa has used the pseudonym for several other protests and guerrilla theater actions since then.

With the crush of media coverage of the ‘penny protest,’ Espinosa revealed his true identity and told his personal story of his father being deported back to Ecuador when he was 15. He then challenged Tom Emmer to come do a forum in the heart of the Latino immigrant community to explain the anti-immigrant positions he has taken over his years in the state legislature and now as a candidate for governor. Not surprisingly, Emmer refused.

This summer MIRAc initiated the Boycott Arizona-MN (BAM!) campaign, which has targeted Arizona companies and has also targeted Emmer’s candidacy, since he said Arizona’s SB1070 law is “a wonderful first step.” Members of MIRAc joined with other immigrant rights activists to confront Emmer when his campaign marched in the Cinco de Mayo parade in West St Paul just days after he praised SB1070. MIRAc and the BAM! campaign again protested against Emmer on June 16 when he spoke at a fundraiser in Columbia Heights. After the ‘penny protest’ on July 14, one local TV reporter asked Espinosa, “Do you plan to continue following his campaign and doing things like this everywhere he goes?” Espinosa responded, “Absolutely. Until the election, as long as he holds these extremist anti-immigrant positions, we’ll be there for you Emmer.”

#RosevilleMN #MIRAc #RobertErickson #SB1070 #TomEmmer #MinnesotaImmigrantRightsActionCommittee

San Pablo, MN – En el desfile del Cinco de Mayo en San Pablo, el candidato Republicano para el gobernador Tom Emmer recibió una reacción no esperada — rechazo. El rechazo fue debido a su apoyo por la nueva ley anti-inmigrante en Arizona, SB1070. En un programa de radio en MPR, Señor Emmer calificó la nueva ley como una cosa “maravillosa”. Muchas personas han comparado la ley SB1070 de Arizona con las leyes racistas que existían en el sur de los Estados Unidos en contra de los Afro-Americanos hasta las victorias del movimiento para los derechos civiles en los años 1960.

Cuando activistas pro-inmigrantes se dieron cuenta de que Emmer iba a hacer presencia y hacer campaña en el desfile del Cinco de Mayo en San Pablo, decidieron no quedarse callado. Tomaron la iniciativa de informar la comunidad sobre la posición anti-inmigrante de Emmer y para enfrentar su campaña en el desfile.

Los activistas pro-inmigrante llegaron con pancartas con mensaje pro-inmigrante y anti-Emmer, explicando que Emmer apoya la nueva ley racista en Arizona. También gritaron “booo!” cuando llego el grupo de Emmer en el desfile, y gritaron consignas como “Emmer, escucha, No Somos Arizona! No leyes racista aquí en Minnesota!” Muchas personas que simplemente llegaron a ver el desfile también se unieron al coro de “booo!” cuando se dieron cuenta que Emmer apoya la ley anti-inmigrante en Arizona.

Emmer no solo apoya la ley SB1070 en Arizona, sino que sus aliados más cercanos en la Casa de Representantes de Minnesota han propuesto la misma ley aquí en Minnesota. Emmer ha promovido muchas otras propuestas de ley anti-inmigrante aquí en Minnesota durante su tiempo como miembro de la Casa de Representantes estatal, por ejemplo una propuesta de hacer ingles el idioma oficial del estado, una propuesta para requerir la ciudanía para recibir becas para asistir a la universidad, una propuesta para eliminar cobertura de salud para los inmigrantes con la única excepción del parto de un bebe, y otras medidas extremas en contra de los trabajadores inmigrantes.

Alejandra Cruz, una de los organizadores de la protesta dijo “Sentimos la necesidad de denunciar públicamente su apoyo al SB1070, una ley de odio que sanciona el perfil racial en contra de los Latinos. Tuvimos que denunciar su presencia en un desfile que celebra nuestra cultura. Le mandamos un mensaje fuerte que Minnesota no es Arizona, y no vamos a permitir este tipo de odio y intolerancia en nuestro estado!”

#SaintPaulMN #Arizona #SB1070 #TomEmmer #CincoDeMayo