People brave the cold to protest against Ice (Picture: Mike Auger)
Donald Trump has been forced to withdraw Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents from Minnesota after mass resistance.
Border tsar Tim Homan on Thursday said that Operation Metro Surge is ending in Minneapolis.
When Trump’s thugs invaded Minneapolis last month, the Department of Homeland Security boasted of “largest immigration enforcement operation ever”.
Trump, the US state and the far right seemed all-powerful. The invasion saw Ice thugs murder Renee Good and Alex Pretti, round up thousands—and terrorise tens of thousands more.
But, even in the face of such odds, Trump has been forced into a retreat. If they thought this would defuse the protests, they will be very disappointed. Activists, trade unions and migrant groups know they can win more if they keep fighting.
Leo, a university student from Minneapolis, spoke for many when he told Socialist Worker, “I think it’s great. But we also can’t let the community we built, the energy we have and everything our city has built go to waste.
“That’s kind of what happened around Black Lives Matter (BLM) in 2020. There was so much energy in Minnesota and so many calls for defunding the police. But the police budget has only gone up since then.
“People in the circles I’m in want to focus on how we can build on this and keep people involved.
“How to keep the average everyday person active and how they can build among their co-workers and build stronger unions. We also can’t trust this administration—they do lie a lot.”
He added, “Ice is going round buying up old warehouses to turn into concentration camps. The camps that they plan on building have 50-60 people in a room lying in their own shit and piss. It’s abhorrent.
“They will definitely expand into other states. People here are trying to coordinate with people that they know in other states and build the kinds of organising we have here in other places.
“For example, we don’t need any more whistles–everyone has a whistle in every pocket–so the people who make them are shipping them out to other places.
“I plan on going to the Minnesota Migrant Rights Action Committee (Mirac) protest tomorrow. There is also a talk discussing the link between what is happening in Palestine and our own struggle to not be occupied by our own government.
“It’s not the end by any means.”
Mirac organised a demonstration last Sunday. It said, “We won this battle only because we fought day in and day out and did not let up the pressure!
“But we have not yet won the war—and we cannot stop the pressure now. We must continue our fierce struggle against these racist attacks on immigrants. Stay in the streets to demand—Ice out, no compromises, no more deportations, legalisation for all.”
The Ice Out of Minnesota Coalition said, “President Trump thought he could break us but he was wrong.
“Over the last three months Minnesotans showed our country what it means to stand up to tyranny and protect our communities.
“In the coldest months of winter, when it would have been easy to stay home and look the other way, we bundled up, headed out into our communities and said, ‘No.’
“These masked thugs leaving our state can be spun any way people want, but history will show what this was.
“Regular people, clergy and teachers, janitors and soccer moms, people across all of our complicated differences simply refused to let our neighbours be attacked and abducted without a fight.
“The level of solidarity shown by Minnesotans should be an example for everyone and we couldn’t be more proud.”
The Coalition made clear that “the fight for justice is not over for the scores of Minnesotans who were killed, assaulted or had their civil rights violated”.
Tens of thousands of people took part in mass resistance to Trump’s invasion of Minneapolis. They took part in networks to resist raids in neighbourhoods and provide support for those afraid to leave their homes.
They surrounded hotels housing Ice agents, banged pots and pans and blared guitars to stop them from sleeping.
The networks were built through previous waves of resistance, such as the Black Lives Matter Movement in the wake of George Floyd’s murder in 2020.
The “economic shutdown” on 23 January was a decisive point in the resistance. Why? Because there was a glimpse of the US working class entering the stage.
Labor Notes magazine said, “Almost a quarter of Minnesotans say they took part in what organisers called ‘a day of no work, no shopping, no school’ on 23 January.”
On the day Christa Sarrack, president of a union that represents 6,000 hospitality workers, said it may have seen the largest workers’ action ever seen in the state.
The US union leaders did not officially call strikes. The day saw workers voluntarily not go into work or community organisations pressure businesses to shut for the day. The Graduate Labor Union at the University of Minnesota, for example, advised its 4,000 members not to show up to work.
But there was an enthusiasm from below and union leaders in Minnesota felt under pressure to back the call for the shutdown.
The key task is trying to deepen the potential that the shutdown showed through national strikes across the United States.
Trump’s regime can be beaten by mobilising the social power of workers through strikes to shut down the system and disrupt the state’s repressive institutions.
In Britain, Trump’s ally Nigel Farage wants a British Ice on our streets to terrorise migrants and black and brown people.
Reform UK has momentum as it grows from the failures of Labour and its racist scapegoating, but the US victory is a reminder that the far right is not an unstoppable juggernaut.
It should be a spur to build the Together demonstration against the far right in London on 28 March—and a bigger, anti-racist left out of it.
Let’s make it a day when we bring the radical spirit of Minneapolis onto the streets of London.
Dominion Society is building links with Restore Britain
Demos will be held across Britain
