What Ohio—and Other States—Can Learn from Minnesota’s ICE Resistance

When George Floyd was murdered by Minneapolis police in 2020—mere blocks from where both Renee Nicole Macklin Good and Alex Pretti would be murdered by ICE almost six years later—my South Minneapolis block started a WhatsApp group. The chat was used for sharing information and keeping our streets and each other safe. Many other blocks and neighborhoods across the Twin Cities did the same.

As time passed, our neighborhood group chat became more about socializing and swapping tidbits of information on goings-on around the city. Then, in January 2026, when ICE began its violent occupation of our home, our group chat quickly returned to its original purpose. Neighbors shared ICE sightings and organized mutual aid for community members who could no longer safely work, grocery shop, go to school, or otherwise leave their homes. Our block was far from alone.

“How do you avoid bureaucracy to be able to get them the money?”

Dieu Do, a statewide organizer with Our Revolution, Bernie Sanders’s anti-oligarchy nonprofit, and a member of the all-volunteer Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee (MIRAC), told NPQ, “A lot of the old groups of 2020 came back up because of everything happening.”

“That structure we had was really, really helpful,” she said. “I wish we didn’t have to have that in the first place, [but] it made Minnesota so organized because we already had a lot of those connections made.”

“How do you avoid bureaucracy to be able to get them the money?”

The Trump administration reportedly may be setting its sights on the Haitian community in Springfield, OH, though a federal judge recently blocked the termination of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitian immigrants. Ohio and other potentially targeted states can learn a lot from the swift and effective organizing that took place across the Twin Cities.

Minnesota’s tragic history with police violence, from the cop watches of the Native American Movement that started in the 1960s to Floyd’s murder in 2020, meant that it was perhaps more ready to respond to ICE than other places, and that the state has many urgent lessons to offer others.

Unifying Across Neighborhoods

While much of the response to ICE raids in the Twin Cities and Minnesota has been organic, one thing to note, Do says, is that it’s also been hyperlocal. She was involved with responding to ICE raids before Trump’s current “Operation Metro Surge.” Back then, that sometimes meant taking up to 20 minutes to get to a location.

“What the occupation has taught us is that instead of having people dispatched all over responding to everything that’s happening, there can be a hyperlocal response in our own neighborhoods,” Do said.

This can look like talking directly to neighbors, restarting or creating neighborhood group chats, and patrolling the streets of your own block. And the same advice for preestablished connection and communication applies to the nonprofit sector.

“There’s been this really lovely fluidity between formal and informal structures right now. Everyone just understands the speed of response that’s required. We don’t really have time to mess around and think about whose space this is or who should lead it. Instead, it’s about what is the fastest way to make this happen?” Michael Anderson told NPQ in an interview. Anderson is a small-business owner in Minneapolis whose consultancy works with nonprofits in Minnesota and beyond.

He offers the example of MONARCA, a Twin Cities rapid response coalition aimed at protecting people’s rights. MONARCA trained thousands of Minnesotans on how to conduct ICE watches and more in mere weeks.

“There’s not a lot of organizational territorialism happening. This has been really, really unifying across neighborhoods, communities, organizations in the [nonprofit] sector, and philanthropy,” he said. “For whatever it’s worth, it’s been a silver lining of this.”

Clear Communication Structures

The response to ICE has been effective because individuals and organizations have not only worked together but worked in their lanes while letting others do the work that they do best.

“This occupation really decimated families and people’s ability to work and to live. So, the need for mutual aid really skyrocketed—like everything, from rent and mortgage support to school, grocery, and legal fees if you were detained by ICE,” Do explained.

“The biggest role nonprofits can play, especially preemptively, is having that cross-communication early on,” she said. “And just being able to create very clear and communicative structures on what organizations are handling what kind of mutual aid, and what organizations are handling which community; what the parameters on mutual aid will be, and getting that money out to people quickly.”

A City of Minneapolis report estimates that the ICE occupation has cost the city at least $203.1 million.

Do notes that accountability is still needed, especially when dispersing funds, but that the goal is to be able to get money to those who need it as quickly as possible. “How do you avoid bureaucracy to be able to get them the money?”

MIRAC, for example, received what Do says was a “huge influx” of donations. Rather than working to distribute funds themselves, the group funneled the money onward to other organizations already working in and with the communities in need. This approach made disseminating the funds easier, quicker, and more effective.

“We gave a huge amount of funds to, like, 20 different organizations who all serve their respective communities, from mosques serving the Muslim community to nonprofits serving the Southeast Asian community to churches that serve already underserved parts of the Twin Cities like North Minneapolis,” she said.

Generational Impact

If or when ICE does shrink its footprint in the Twin Cities (which, despite the claims from Tom Homan, acting director of ICE, has not meaningfully occurred) or any other city ICE invades, the need for help still won’t end anytime soon.

A City of Minneapolis report estimates that the ICE occupation has cost the city at least $203.1 million. And both Anderson and Do believe that community needs will continue for years if not decades.

“What’s the need for local philanthropy to think about the long-term economic recovery for immigrant business, for example?” Anderson said.

Do, who is part of a national cohort of interfaith fellows, shared this with her group recently: “What we experienced in Minnesota was so traumatic and so violent that I think it will impact us for generations. I don’t think we can fully grasp how much this has impacted us.”

“We’ve seen the best versions of people and organizers come to this movement to fight this, but also the lesson we want to give folks in other states around the country is never forget who the real enemy is,” she added. “When you’re so tired and burnt out, the system wants us to turn on each other.…[But] the longer we fight each other, the less time we have to fight the opposition and to actually fight for a world where there is an abolishment of ICE, where immigrants are safe in this country, where everyone is safe.”

For More on This Topic:

‘How Do You Teach a Child Who Has Been Pepper-Sprayed?’—The Impact of ICE on Educators

Giving Birth Under Surveillance: Migrants, ICE, and Obstetric Violence

The Danger ICE Poses to the Disabled Community