Michael Sainato
A “no work, no school, no shopping” blackout day of protest was kicked off by community leaders, faith leaders and labor unions on Friday in protest against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) surge in the state.
The Day of Truth & Freedom protest comes in the wake of the killing of Renee Good, the unarmed woman killed by a federal immigration officer in Minneapolis earlier this month.
Their demands include that ICE leave Minnesota, that the ICE officer who killed Good be legally held accountable, an end to additional federal funding for ICE, and for the agency to be investigated for human rights and constitutional violations.
Dozens of local businesses in Minnesota have announced closures in solidarity. The Minneapolis city council endorsed the day of action and the general strike. The day of action culminates with a march in downtown Minneapolis at 2pm local time.
“We are going to be having dangerously cold weather on Friday – -10F with wind chills. Like the high is going to be -10F with wind chills of up to -20F,” Chelsie Glaubitz Gabiou, president of the Minnesota Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, told the Guardian.
“We are a northern state, and we are built for the cold, and we are going to show up, but folks are going to need to pay attention to not just the march, but what people are doing, the individual stories of solidarity that people are going to be doing.”
The Minnesota AFL-CIO, the state’s federation of more than 1,000 affiliated local unions, has endorsed the day of action, along with dozens of local labor unions.
Key events
David Smith
Senator Elizabeth Warren and fellow Democrats have accused Donald Trump of letting white-collar criminals “off the hook” by diverting crucial resources to his sweeping immigration crackdown.
In a letter to federal watchdogs, the Democrats demand an investigation into the US president for shifting more than 25,000 personnel away from investigating fraud, tax evasion and money laundering in favour of his immigration enforcement agenda.
“The Trump Administration is letting white-collar criminals off the hook for all kinds of wrongdoing,” Warren, from Massachusetts, said in a statement. “Instead of protecting American families from fraud and predatory behavior, the Administration is diverting resources to pursue its inhumane immigration agenda.
“Nobody is above the law, and the Trump Administration needs to stop treating white collar criminals with kid gloves.”
In the letter to inspectors general of the justice department, state department, homeland security, the postal service and the treasury’s tax division, the Democrats allege that the administration is “diverting critical federal law enforcement personnel and resources” away from corporate crime and into what they describe as Trump’s “civil immigration dragnet”.
The letter – signed by Democrats including Warren, Senator Richard Blumenthal and Representatives Dan Goldman, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Madeleine Dean – demands a formal evaluation of the extent of the transfers and their impact on US financial crime enforcement.
It cites a “deep concern” that entire investigative units have been “gutted” as agents are sent to bolster Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations.
The president also made sure to tout his achievements at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week. “So many things accomplished,” he wrote in a post on Truth Social, “including the framework of a deal with NATO on Greenland. Also, the BOARD OF PEACE. WOW!!! MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
A reminder that the neither Trump, nor Nato chief Mark Rutte, have provided explicit details on the Greenland deal. Earlier in the week, the president said it would last “forever” while speaking to reporters in Davos.
Trump casts doubt on reality of global warming in face of upcoming snowstorms
Ahead of the snowstorms expected on the US east coast this weekend, the president took to Truth Social to posit how global warming could still exist in the face of adverse weather conditions like these.
“Record Cold Wave expected to hit 40 States. Rarely seen anything like it before,” he wrote. “Could the Environmental Insurrectionists please explain – WHATEVER HAPPENED TO GLOBAL WARMING???”
Of course, global warming does not stop winter … but in fact causes average global temperatures to rise. Increased temperatures also intensify snowstorms, and a rapidly warming Arctic has ultimately stretched the polar vortex – meaning the US is facing the brunt of colder weather over the coming days.
My colleagues Oliver Laughland and Tom Silverstone have spent time in Minnesota, following the fatal shooting of Renee Good.
In their latest piece, they travelled to neighbourhoods in Minneapolis, grappling with a surge of federal immigration enforcement, to speak with residents who are fighting to defend their communities from violence and intimidation. They also embed with ICE watch groups, hear from Somali American residents, and witness a swarm of federal agents conduct a sweep in the suburbs.
Watch here:
Donald Trump doesn’t have any public events today, according to the White House schedule.
He’s due to sit for a print interview later today, and meet with Frank Bisignano, the commissioner of the Social Security Administration.
We will, however, hear from the vice-president, JD Vance, who will speak at this year’s March for Life in Washington. A reminder that this is the country’s largest anti-abortion rally. The Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson, is also set to address demonstrators.
We’ll bring you the latest lines as that gets under way at 11am ET.
UN rights chief slams ‘routine abuse’ of migrants in US
The United Nations rights chief voiced astonishment on Friday at the “now-routine abuse” of migrants by US authorities, urging Washington to end practices “tearing apart families”.
Volker Turk called on the United States to ensure migration policies and enforcement practices respect human dignity and due process and slammed the “dehumanising portrayal and harmful treatment of migrants and refugees”.
“I am astounded by the now-routine abuse and denigration of migrants and refugees,” he said in a statement.
“Where is the concern for their dignity, and our common humanity?”
Thousands of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents have been deployed to Democratic-led Minneapolis, as the Republican administration of Donald Trump presses its campaign to deport what it says are millions of illegal immigrants across the country.
Michael Sainato
A “no work, no school, no shopping” blackout day of protest was kicked off by community leaders, faith leaders and labor unions on Friday in protest against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) surge in the state.
The Day of Truth & Freedom protest comes in the wake of the killing of Renee Good, the unarmed woman killed by a federal immigration officer in Minneapolis earlier this month.
Their demands include that ICE leave Minnesota, that the ICE officer who killed Good be legally held accountable, an end to additional federal funding for ICE, and for the agency to be investigated for human rights and constitutional violations.
Dozens of local businesses in Minnesota have announced closures in solidarity. The Minneapolis city council endorsed the day of action and the general strike. The day of action culminates with a march in downtown Minneapolis at 2pm local time.
“We are going to be having dangerously cold weather on Friday – -10F with wind chills. Like the high is going to be -10F with wind chills of up to -20F,” Chelsie Glaubitz Gabiou, president of the Minnesota Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, told the Guardian.
“We are a northern state, and we are built for the cold, and we are going to show up, but folks are going to need to pay attention to not just the march, but what people are doing, the individual stories of solidarity that people are going to be doing.”
The Minnesota AFL-CIO, the state’s federation of more than 1,000 affiliated local unions, has endorsed the day of action, along with dozens of local labor unions.
Minnesota gears up for anti-immigration enforcement protests on Friday
Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. My name is Tom Ambrose and I will be bringing you the latest news lines.
We start with news that a vast network of labor unions, progressive organizations and clergy has been urging Minnesotans to stay away from work, school and stores on Friday to protest against immigration enforcement in the state.
“We really, really want ICE to leave Minnesota, and they’re not going to leave Minnesota unless there’s a ton of pressure on them,” said Kate Havelin of Indivisible Twin Cities, one of the more than 100 groups that are mobilizing. “They shouldn’t be roaming any streets in our country just the way they are now.”
The Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St Paul have seen daily protests since Renee Good was fatally shot by a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer during an operation on 7 January, AP reports.
The Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which represents nearly 2 million service and healthcare workers across the US, is leading calls for nationwide participation.
“Martin Luther King wrote to Cesar Chavez during the Great Boycott and said our separate struggles are really one struggle,” David Huerta, president of SEIU-United Service Workers West (USWW) and SEIU California, said on Sunday on Politics Nation with the Rev Al Sharpton on MS Now.
“Right now, more than any time ever, we see our civil rights, workers’ rights, and immigrants’ rights … in alignment with one another.”
He added: “When we look at Minneapolis – the violence, the cruelty that’s being brought by this federal government against working people – it is now more than ever that we have to stand together, regardless of our differences.”
Friday’s mobilization was planned as the largest coordinated protest action to date, including a march in downtown Minneapolis despite dangerously cold temperatures that the National Weather Service forecast in the single to double digits below zero (-20 to -30C).
In other developments:
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Donald Trump withdrew on Thursday an invitation for Canada to join his “board of peace” initiative aimed at resolving global conflicts. “Please let this Letter serve to represent that the Board of Peace is withdrawing its invitation to you regarding Canada’s joining, what will be, the most prestigious Board of Leaders ever assembled, at any time,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post directed at the Canadian prime minister, Mark Carney.
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Greenland has demanded its red lines on sovereignty be respected after Donald Trump claimed an agreement with Nato would give the US full and permanent access to the Arctic island, the object of an increasingly bitter months-long dispute. Jens-Frederik Nielsen, Greenland’s prime minister, said on Thursday he did not know what was in the deal but the largely self-governing territory wanted a “peaceful dialogue” with the US, and its sovereignty was non-negotiable.
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Before the US military snatched Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, earlier this month, Delcy Rodríguez and her powerful brother pledged to cooperate with the Trump administration once the strongman was gone, four sources involved at high levels with the discussions told the Guardian. Rodríguez, who was sworn in on 5 January as acting president to replace Maduro, and her brother Jorge, the head of the national assembly, secretly assured US and Qatari officials through intermediaries ahead of time that they would welcome Maduro’s departure, according to the sources.
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The White House posted a digitally altered image of a woman who was arrested on Thursday in a case touted by the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, to make it seem as if she was dramatically crying, a Guardian analysis of the image has found. The woman, Nekima Levy Armstrong, also appears to have darker skin in the altered image. Armstrong was one of three people arrested on Thursday in connection to a demonstration that disrupted church services in St Paul, Minnesota, on Sunday.
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Jack Smith, the former special counsel, has defended his decision to seek criminal charges against Donald Trump for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election in his first and perhaps only public appearance to discuss the cases after they were dropped last year. “No one should be above the law in this country, and the law required that he be held to account,” Smith said in his opening remarks before the House judiciary committee. “So that is what I did.”
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The Trump administration will block organizations that receive US foreign aid from subsidizing diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives and what the administration calls “gender ideology”. The new policy will affect about $30bn in foreign assistance.
