Why we're participating in ICE OUT MN

MCEA is joining nonprofit organizations, faith leaders, labor unions, and businesses in a one-day civic pause in daily activities: no work; no school; no shopping. ICE OUT Minnesota: A Day of Truth and Freedom is happening this Friday, January 23. Minnesotans are instead asked to gather with loved ones and neighbors, to demand that ICE representatives leave Minnesota, and to call for a transparent investigation and accountability following Renee Good’s death.

You might ask, why would an environmental law organization participate in a civic pause to protest ICE activities? My job as Executive Director of MCEA is to keep our mission central to all that we do. I have decided that MCEA should participate for three reasons.

First, MCEA staff are being harmed by ICE activities in Minnesota right now. Safety for our staff is my first priority. Like countless community members across the state, MCEA staff and our families have been pulled over, questioned, detained, and threatened by ICE agents.

Second, MCEA is an organization with strong partnerships with communities and organizations all over Minnesota who are affected in different ways by ICE activities. It is imperative at this difficult moment that we stand together in solidarity against oppression and fear.

Third, our mission depends on respect for the rule of law. As Juventino Meza, former MCEA attorney, now with our partner group Immigrant Law Center, said at our event last fall, “the forces that are attacking the rule of law and immigrants are also actively attacking environmental protections. These attacks on the law weaken the very fiber of our democracy. It feels like hyperbole to say that, but it is not. It’s reality today, right now. These forces want to silence voices of dissent.”

Juventino’s statement was not hyperbole, and today it feels prescient. We cannot ignore the lawlessness and attacks on basic constitutional rights happening in our own state. These attacks pose a direct threat to our right to express dissent and our ability to use the courts to enforce our environmental rights.

If you are the leader of a business, an organization, at a university, or any other institution in Minnesota, I invite you to join us on January 23, and sign your organization up to be part of ICE OUT Minnesota. In the big scheme of things, MCEA is a small organization. But together we can send a strong message that we oppose the injustices happening in our state.

I’ve never been more proud to be a Minnesotan. We must stand together at this moment, and I invite you to join us.

In Action, 

Kathryn Hoffman, MCEA CEO

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