What does it mean to live in Minneapolis at this moment?
Well, the protest is ongoing, multiple times throughout the day, starting as early as 7 am at the federal Whipple Building, where agents are headquartered.
Throughout the day, people are gathering at the memorial site, the location where Renee Good took her last breath. The memorial is growing every single day I go there. More flowers, more bears, more signs. There's also protesting and marching that's happening in different areas around the city, including the hotels where organizers and activists are confirming that these agents are staying. It's very reflective of what the reality was here in 2020 and 2021, where we had protests every single day for months straight.
But now, it's not just the protesting. Every 15 to 20 minutes, we're getting alerts that someone across the metro area or across the state is being apprehended by ICE, not just folks whose legal status is in question, but observers, or a member of the clergy. This is happening at hospitals. On the lawn outside of a school while students were being released. We're seeing people arrested inside of McDonald's and Target. People are starting to stay home, which then is impacting the local economy here. But then we're also now seeing [ICE] go door-to-door at people's homes. It really just feels like there is nowhere you can go to get a break from it. It just seems like things are escalating.
The other thing I just did an update about on my social channels was the amount of out-of-town agitators that are showing up—people like Jake Lane and Jayden Scott—well-known people on social media that do not live in Minnesota. It just seems like, based on their actions, that they are there to incite violence, to escalate things. And that also is not new to us. We saw that here in Minneapolis back in 2020, but a lot of those reports were not believed. There was a national narrative that was put forth as well, that Minneapolis burned down their own neighborhood. And the people here are like, well, based on what we observed, we actually don't think it was us that started the fires.
What is the role of journalism in today's world? Can journalism be neutral at a time like this?
Media could not be neutral about the dismantling of our democracy and still expect to be protected by it. Media is one of the powerful sectors. Media has the power to make a truth a lie and a lie the truth, in the words of Malcolm X. We’ve found ourselves at this point that it's like, if you're telling both sides of the story, you're likely telling the truth and a lie. There's a difference between differing perspectives and promoting non-realities, promoting lies, delusion, divisiveness.
I think the media plays a vital role, and for too long has hidden behind these ethics and code of conduct of being “objective,” being neutral, telling both sides. Those things, in my opinion, have contributed to our demise and the loss of trust with the community. And if mainstream, traditional outlets can't figure out a way to reform their editorial process, I think that it's only a matter of time before the digital-first organizations and outlets that are leading and operating on a different value set become the go-to sources that have amassed the trust of this nation.
What does it mean to you to be a truth-teller in a moment when the truth is under attack?
It is an honor. But it also is a duty to me, I think, to be walking in the vein and the spirit of Ida B. Wells, W.E.B. Du Bois. I often also reference the photographer who took the images of Emmett Till. To be on the right side of history.
Oftentimes, people don't understand that there is a cost to tell the truth. There's a cost to stand up for justice. But it is a sacrifice that, in my opinion, is worth making. I strongly believe that the decade that we're living in will be in history books. To know that you're on the right side, it gives you the courage to continue paying that cost, to continue making those sacrifices.
