Everyone vs ICE: On the Ground In Minnesota

Summary

Podcast Summary: It Could Happen Here — "Everyone vs ICE: On the Ground In Minnesota"

Hosts: Margaret Killjoy & James Stout
Date: January 27, 2026
Podcast: It Could Happen Here (Cool Zone Media/iHeartPodcasts)
Episode Focus: A ground-level, human-focused look at how communities across Minneapolis—and wider Minnesota—are organizing to both protect neighbors from a surge in ICE raids and build resilient, mutual-aid-based networks under federal pressure.

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Overview of the Episode

This special crossover episode takes listeners on the ground in Minneapolis during an intense escalation of ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) and Border Patrol operations targeting non-citizen communities. Instead of focusing only on trauma, hosts Margaret Killjoy and James Stout center the episode on the beauty and collective power of mutual aid, rapid response, and broad-based resistance being built by everyday Minnesotans. The episode combines firsthand observations, interviews, and reflections to illustrate a city-wide mobilization against federal abductions, highlighting what other communities might learn from these efforts.

A somber postscript is added: only nine hours after these recordings, federal agents killed a community member, a reminder of the stakes and dangers inherent in such organizing.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Context: Federal Occupation and Community Response

• Minneapolis is in the grip of an intensified ICE operation, with both ICE and Border Patrol engaging in aggressive, often violent, detentions of non-citizens throughout the city and state.
• Specific tactics: Agents in rental SUVs, detaining individuals at random, targeting bus stops, schools, businesses (sometimes directly after patronizing them), and even using children to bait parents ([08:27]-[09:21]).
• The local and county law enforcement’s role as collaborators, not passive bystanders: "It was not ICE who kettled protesters today. It was Hennepin County Sheriff's Office." ([11:06]-[11:32])
• A city under occupation: The presence of federal agents is felt everywhere; "There are people everywhere standing guard, watching, blowing whistles." ([17:57]-[19:53])

2. Mutual Aid & Rapid Response: How Minneapolis Is Fighting Back

• Decentralized, block-by-block Signal chat networks allow neighbors to monitor, alert, and mobilize in minutes. Many had never heard of Signal before, showing the rapid upskilling and adoption by everyday residents ([17:57]-[19:53]).
• Mutual aid efforts meet material needs—food, diapers, safe rides, rent—because so many are forced to hide in fear of abduction ([25:10]-[27:00], [28:05]-[29:40]).
  • "The difference is this time they know their neighbors have their back." – James ([26:06])
• School adaptations: Many switch to remote learning due to ICE targeting bus stops ([26:17]).
• Business adaptation: Even larger organizations, like local food co-ops, close in solidarity ([13:41]-[14:13]).
• Organizing is hyperlocal and organic, not the result of top-down NGO strategy. Different blocks and neighborhoods have birthed parallel systems ([28:05]-[28:33]).

3. Unified, Broad-based Resistance

• The opposition transcends political ideology: Conservative and traditionally apolitical neighbors join progressives, radicals, and various cultural communities ([44:29]-[46:20]).
  • "A Republican business is closed for the general strike… my neighbor who is very conservative is pissed as hell." – Margaret ([44:45])
  • "What would Ronald Reagan do?" sign seen at protest ([45:02])
• Participation is so universal that even observers with mobility issues find ways to join: "My neighbor who... can't leave their house, they're just hanging out on the front porch… They're on the front line." ([53:24])

4. Tools, Tactics, and Spirit

• Whistles and honking: Carrying a whistle has become a community badge—alerting others in seconds changes the power dynamic and saps ICE’s ability to act in secrecy ([38:26]-[39:55]).
  • "You're handing someone a whistle and you're handing them responsibility. It's like handing someone their goddamn sword." – Margaret ([39:55])
• Speed of response: When everyone is ready to mobilize within minutes, even quick-hit ICE raids can be disrupted ([33:25]-[34:13]).
• PEOPLE vs. Power: "A city is made of people... not buildings." ([34:57])
• Resilience and hope: Despite the trauma, the hosts perceive a remarkable hope and even joy in the communal resistance ([35:02]-[36:27]).
  • "The spirit that is animating this city is the thing that will get us through it... I think we're gonna win." – Margaret ([40:57])
• Even 'ordinary' gestures—offering food, opening homes to cold observers—demonstrate solidarity ([15:39]-[17:08], [37:58]-[38:08]).

5. The Cost and the Need for Outside Support

• Traumatic loss is ongoing: ICE still kidnaps multiple people daily. Locals sometimes have to identify and contact loved ones of those disappeared, echoing historical traumas ([48:43]-[51:11]).
• The community’s efforts are sustainable so far, powered by volunteer labor and local donations, but financial help from outside is welcome and necessary ([29:43]-[30:06]).

6. What Other Communities Can Learn

• This level of hyperlocal, anti-fascist solidarity isn't unique to Minneapolis. "You can do all these things, too," they argue ([06:00]-[06:28]).
• Key lessons: Start small, build trust, communicate, decentralize, and focus on broad participation over ideology or hierarchy ([28:05]-[29:40], [48:08]).

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On ICE’s Behavior:

  • "They're grabbing people out of cars. They're snatching children and using them to bait out their parents." – James ([08:28])
  • "What is happening here is that people's lives are at stake." – James ([21:42])

• On Solidarity:

  • "We've asked people... 'What do you want people to take away?'... One of the main things is like, 'Hey, you can do it too.'" – Margaret ([05:16])
  • "The only time I've seen a city this much in lockstep is when I was in Kamishlo in 2023... where there is someone invading your town and taking your friends." – James ([20:16])
  • "You hand someone a whistle and you're handing them responsibility... It's like handing someone their goddamn sword." – Margaret ([39:55])

• On Participation and Transformation:

  • "Glad you're here gets so much further than what took you so long." – Margaret ([45:40])
  • "Leadership isn't what we need. Participation is what we need." – James ([48:08])

• On Trauma and Perseverance:

  • "Even when someone was killed by ICE, this did not stop people from doing this work. It brought more people out." – Margaret ([21:14])
  • "For so long I've believed that if people could see the cruelty, they would care... and this confirms that for me." – James ([52:34])

• On Winning:

  • "I think we're gonna win, and I haven't felt that way in years." – Margaret ([40:57])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [00:00-01:51] – Episode context & postscript on the killing of Alex Preddy.
• [03:03-05:03] – Mission as journalists: focusing on beauty and solidarity, not just trauma.
• [07:35-09:39] – The mechanics of ICE/Border Patrol activity in the city.
• [10:16-11:39] – Firsthand encounter with ICE and community response (whistles, alerts).
• [12:48-14:13] – Businesses, including co-ops, joining the strike.
• [17:57-19:53] – Decentralized communication, Signal loops, citywide vigilance.
• [25:10-27:00] – Why mutual aid is essential right now—including for kids and schools.
• [28:05-29:40] – Emergence and structure of mutual aid networks.
• [33:25-34:13] – How rapid response adapts to ICE’s changing tactics.
• [35:02] – "A city is made of people…" segment.
• [38:26-39:55] – The symbolism/effectiveness of whistles; shifting the power dynamic.
• [44:29-46:20] – Broad, cross-political community mobilization.
• [48:43-51:11] – The trauma of forced disappearances; echoes of Holocaust survivor stories.
• [52:34-53:09] – James’ reflection that witnessing cruelty brings action and pride in solidarity.
• [55:31-end] – Resources for support and donation.

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Resource Links (as mentioned at [55:31])

At episode’s end, the hosts detail vetted links for those wishing to donate to support Minneapolis’ rent funds, mutual aid for supplies, legal protections, medics, and bail funds. Full list in show notes.

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Final Thoughts

This episode offers a powerful document of a city under duress, refusing to break, building new social structures in the ashes of state violence—"paradise built in hell." Instead of paralyzing fear or isolated trauma, Minneapolis offers a blueprint for hopeful, urgent, messy, decentralized, loving resistance.

"Leadership isn't what we need. Participation is what we need." – James ([48:08])

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For anyone looking to understand the current struggle against federal immigration violence in the U.S., or how solidarity and rapid community action actually look and feel on the ground, this episode is essential listening—and even more essential reading.

Transcript

[Margaret Killjoy]

This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hello, welcome to Cool People Did Cool Stuff. It Could Happen Here episode. And this is a little pickup we inserted because James and I. Hi, James.

[James]

Hi, Margaret and Margaret.

[Margaret Killjoy]

That's James. We're on each other's shows this week. We just spent three days in Minneapolis, culminating in the general strike last Friday. And we were there to cover the rapid response networks and the mutual aid networks that people have been building. And that's what we're gonna be talking about in these two episodes. But the reason that we're recording this little pickup right here to listen to at the front of it, is that nine hours after we finished recording these episodes straight, shortly after both of us had left the city, a man named Alex Preddy was killed by federal agents in what is obviously something that you all are familiar with. And we just kind of want to mark that because I think the tone and what we're talking about right now is we're so excited about these networks that people have been building, but obviously the tone would have changed a little bit had we recorded it only nine hours later, and we would have been talking about something slightly different. And that's just the breaks of podcasting.

[James]

Yeah. The fundamental message, I guess, wouldn't change. But we all know that doing what these people do can have terrible costs. And we were reminded of that again Saturday morning. And I guess we should just say that we grieve his passing and we're sending our thoughts to his family and the people who loved him.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

It's gonna be a really hard time for them.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Absolutely. Hello, and welcome to Cool People Could Happen Here. I'm one of your hosts, Margaret Killjoy. And with me today as my other host is James.

[James]

Hi, Margaret.

[Margaret Killjoy]

We are doing a special crossover episode of It Could Happen Here. And cool people who did cool stuff. And we're doing it because James and I are in sunny Minneapolis, which is true.

[James]

The sun was out. Yeah, I saw the sun.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

Yeah. I saw it through a cloud of cold, cold air.

[Margaret Killjoy]

The vapor of our own breath freezing. I have seen more people today with frozen eyelashes than any other point in my life put together.

[James]

Yeah. I breathed into my goggles briefly. And that froze.

Yeah, I took them off and my eyes froze. Yeah, yeah.

It was minus 30 Fahrenheit fuel, I guess, with windchill.

[Margaret Killjoy]

With wind chill. What is that in Celsius?

[James]

They come together at minus 40. So it's going to be like minus 35. I think something like that. It was. For those who are not familiar, cold. Very Cold.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And so the two of us came up to Minneapolis a few days ago and we have spent the past three days here talking to everyone we can about the rapid response networks that people have built to try to keep themselves and their neighbors safe from ICE and federal oppression and the sort of federal occupation of the city. And so what we thought we would do this is kind of neither of us have written scripts yet. We are still here. We just had a fun, slightly hectic day where we spent only about 20 minutes reasonably sure we were getting arrested. But we didn't get arrested.

[James]

No. Thank you, comrade Train.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah, we got on a light rail and we're able to leave a kettle by a light rail, which is a new experience for me.

[James]

Yeah, it was very European.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And yeah, we came up here to talk to people and that's been the, like. The story that I'm most interested in. Right. Is that we have all of these stories that are absolutely true. The stakes are really high here. But the things that people are building here are really incredible. And people know that they're holding down ICE here in a way that no one would have expected, I think. And I don't know. So.

[James]

Yeah. You want to.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Should we just talk about kind of our days since we've been here?

[James]

I think I just want to ground.

People before we do that. In that so much as if reporting on Minneapolis has focused on trauma and so much reporting on migrants focuses on trauma.

Right.

And I think people who have listened to our podcast know that that's not really a game. And so I understand when they hear that we've been in Minneapolis, I think we're going to talk about horrific things that we've seen. I want to talk more about the beautiful things that we've seen because I think those get missed and they're super important. Especially if you're listening in another city in the US which will face some degree of this or is facing some degree of this.

Right.

So I want to ground this in saying that rather than talking about the trauma people experiencing, which I'm sure will be incidental, I want to talk about how closely people are holding each other here and how special that is and what we can take from it.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And like without, obviously, we're not trying to paint a rosy picture of what's happening here, because what's happening here is like, I'm a cold hearted journalist, historian person, and I was crying multiple times in the past couple days as people told me about some of the stuff they've experienced. But some of it has Been, you know, we've asked people, we've said, like, hey, what do you want people to take away from this? And. And one of the main things is that kind of a, like, hey, you can do it too, kind of thing. And the other thing that people have talked about is, like, it would be really nice for people to see that what we're doing is amazing here, even if it's, like, coming out of such horrendous adversity.

[James]

Yeah.

One of the things that I've taken throughout my career is that in hard times, we can build beautiful things. That's what I wrote my book about, really. And what I've tried to report on all over the world. I think this is more evidence of that. And so you're going to hear things which are amazing, and the people who have done them are wonderful, but they're not uniquely special. You can do all these things, too, and I want you to see that it is possible where you live.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. So one of the first things that we did when we got here, we talked about to put ourselves in the story. I drove a long way and James flew a long way, and I picked up James at the airport, and we came to where we're staying, and we were talking about, like. And it was late at night, and we're like, all right, what are we trying to do tomorrow? And what are we trying to see and what are we trying to learn? And one of the main things. One of the first questions we had was like, what's the scale of what's happening here? Right. What were your impressions of the scale of what was happening? We should talk about what's happening here. Just, like, really quickly. I bet you all know about it in the news. Why do I have a different tone of voice when I'm talking into a microphone in this way? Instead of. Usually I'm in a zoom call, but instead we're both sitting in a bedroom on opposite ends of the bedroom, talking into microphones.

[James]

And.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And I somehow have a different cadence, and I don't know how I feel about it. Also, I've had to drink caffeine, which I don't do, because we've had to do an awful lot. And anyway, what was I about to ask you?

[James]

How widespread stuff is?

[Margaret Killjoy]

Oh, yeah, okay. We were gonna talk about what's happening here.

[James]

Yeah. So if people aren't familiar. Right. Ice, which is Immigration and Customs Enforcement, they're the agency charged with removing people from the United States who are non citizens. Right. Who are considered deportable, specifically the branch of Immigration and Customs Enforcement that we are seeing here is Enforcement Removal Operations, AKA ero. We're also seeing Border Patrol. Right. In the last year, actually more than a year now. Right. This began under the Biden administration with Operation Return to Sender in the Central Valley of California. We are seeing Border Patrol agents used to do internal enforcement of people who are generally documented, sometimes undocumented, but always non citizens. They are detaining them in the street, they are detaining them outside schools, they're detaining them at the bus stop, they're detaining them at places to work. And when I say detaining, that's kidnapping people.

Yeah.

They're grabbing people out of cars. They're snatching children and using them to bait out their parents. They're smashing people's car windows and pulling them out. They're barging into businesses. In one case, they ate at a Mexican restaurant and then arrested the workers there later that day. I've visited a lot of places where terrible things happen. Right. The shit that is happening here, it's the shit that people come to America to get away from. It is men in masks with guns pulling people who have done nothing wrong, who are here not harming anyone. People who do not have criminal records. Just for the. I don't feel like I need to say that on this show, but I need to say that every time I talk about this. Right. Like the vast majority, something like 80% last time I looked at a stats of these people have no criminal records. And a criminal record could be something like fucking parking in the wrong place.

[Margaret Killjoy]

I've been arrested.

[James]

Yeah. I don't care. I don't give a shit.

You can.

[Margaret Killjoy]

I've done a lot of crime. Everyone listening to this has done a lot of crime. Whether or not you've been caught.

[James]

Yeah.

Yeah. You probably eating is a crime. Yeah. You went a little bit too late through a red light, whatever. Like, I don't think that matters.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Exactly.

[James]

Even if you're a liberal, even if you believe that our justice system is fair, it should be fair for everyone. There shouldn't be different consequences for different people. Let's move past that. Right, so how widespread is this? Margaret and I got in late. We sat up even later talking. We looked at the shitty vegan pizza. We ate it.

[Margaret Killjoy]

We. It kind of was shitty. I was a little sad about it.

[James]

Yeah, I've had better. I won't. Name drop. Yeah, we. We woke up the next morning and within five minutes of our waking up, we heard like beep, beep. Beep, beep, beep. Coming down the street.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

Both Margaret and I ran to the front door, spent a while trying to put on snow boots, and watched an ICE agent rolling down the street in what they normally drive in. Right. Which are rental SUVs with the Windows blacked out.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And people following them, alerting the blog that ICE was here. Right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And we're not downtown. We like picked an area that's like.

[James]

Slightly, slightly out of it.

[Margaret Killjoy]

But we got warned that nowhere is goon free.

[James]

Yeah. And they were right. No worries. Goon free. Right. I mean, we have probably been within a 30 minute radius of the spot we're staying at for three or four days. Right. We've seen ice pile their car into a telephone pole. We've seen spent munitions on the floor. ICE tear gassed some people a few.

Blocks from us, but they were gone.

By the time we got there.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

The. And I want to get this out like front and center. At the start, it was not ICE who kettled protesters today. It was Hennepin County Sheriff's Office. Yeah. It was not ICE who arrested people who approached them with their hands in the air, trying to work out what was going on. That was Hennepin County Sheriff's office. I've seen press conferences with Minneapolis police. I don't know what their deal is. I'll tell you, the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office are actively participating in this. Right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

I'm not buying this. Local cops, good. This will shock listeners. I'm not buying the local cops, good federal cops, bad narrative. When cops get our squat side, they're on there on the side of the other cops.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Well, it's interesting because the thing that you have is that you have. There's the great classic, if those are neutral in times of oppression or siding with the oppressors. Right.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Because the overall situation here, it seems to be, is that you do have much more. The oppressive force here is an outside force as compared to any other protest movement I've seen in the United States. Very aware that it is outsiders who have come to their city to steal their neighbors.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Right. And so because of that, the federal forces are the forces everyone's mad at. Whereas a lot of the people who are standing up to federal forces are neutral or fine with police. And even like the concept of other federal agencies, they just don't want people snatching neighbors. Now, that's not universal, but that's like some of the people we've talked to. Yeah, but what state level law enforcement has decided is that they are committed to keeping the peace and they can't keep the peace against ice, which they probably, on some level morally know that they need to, but they don't. And instead they're like, all right, well, we can mess up the, you know, the protesters.

[James]

There won't be protesters. There ain't protestors.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Right. But yeah, like when we saw people drive down honking, the very first thing that we experienced in this town and we weren't sure what it was, we were like, is that, is that people following ice and honking. And I had done a fair amount of research before I came and I kind of knew about the whistles, but I didn't really know about this, like, incredible network that people have built.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

That what we saw was not in any way exceptional.

[James]

Right. That was just a standard street on a Wednesday morning.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And so we get into my vehicle and we start driving. You know, we have some places we think we're going to go check out. We have some, you know, friends who are local who are going to talk to us. And we get like two blocks, three blocks before we find people protecting Somali daycare.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Right.

[James]

Well, before that. Right. We went to the food co op to get food.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And we went into the food co op and we got our food. And on the way out, we see this big old sign on the door which is like, we're closed on the 23rd ice out of Minnesota. Yeah. I sat in Minneapolis, whatever it is, and it's in English, in Spanish, and it's like in solidarity with our migrant neighbors. We're not opening. Yeah. And like, obviously it's a food co op. Right, Right. It's not a reactionary space. That sort of planted a seed for me. Like, like this is a big ass business, you know, like, it's not a business that necessarily relies on migrant labor, but I can see it being a space where people are in solidarity. I wonder how wide that is.

Right.

And they. Even in the time we have been here, I've seen businesses put those out. That didn't happen when we were going out today. Right. Like, people being like, nah, this isn't right. But yeah, to go back, what happened was that Margaret was driving. I was riding next to Margaret. I saw a group of people, One guy had kind of tanned trousers on. And I was like, stop, Margaret. Margaret slowed down, signaled and turned into the parking lot these folks were at. And they immediately, they had seen us right. Ham on the brakes and turn up in a vehicle without estate plates. Then we then we better go speak to these people. We've probably scared them.

[Margaret Killjoy]

What's funny is we thought we scared them. No.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

They're not scared of us.

[James]

No.

[Margaret Killjoy]

They're looking to see if they're on to us. And it's such a huge difference. Right. Because when people are scoping us out, they're not like, oh, that might be ice. They're like, is that ice? Let's fucking get them.

[James]

Yeah, yeah. Like, if that's ice, we need to roll. We need to let people know. We need to start honking, we need to start whistling. So we get out, walk over and we start talking to these people and like that. The person who was most forthright, most forthcoming was an older lady. I mean, she shared her rage. I think it's fine to say.

[Margaret Killjoy]

I think it was 76.

[James]

76. Yeah. It's probably around zero Fahrenheit.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Like 80, something like that.

[James]

Warmer than that.

Right. So like, you know, minus 10 Celsius something there. Yeah. Blade's not wearing a hat.

Yeah.

Doesn't give a fuck.

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

I'm chilly in my, like, brand new winter clothes that I wear. And I live outside in the mountain. I don't live outside anymore, but I.

[James]

Live in the mountains. Yeah. Yeah. I'm wearing all my nice technical gear. This lady's got her poncho on a Parker and. Yeah. And she's just like so zealous. Is like, she's so happy to be doing what she's doing and so proud of herself for being the person who did it. Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And she. In an earnest way, like in a.

[James]

Way in a self congratulatory way, just in a, like, I am 100% convinced I'm in the right. And I will talk to you. Yeah. And I will say it with my whole chest. Yeah. Like, do you want to share some of the stuff she said? I thought it's really one of the.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Things that she said that.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Like, I mean, you know, she. I didn't get the impression she was like a wild political radical or something. Right. And she's just like, you know, my father fought fascists in France and Italy and like, he would be proud of me and like.

[James]

Yeah, I'm sure he would.

[Margaret Killjoy]

He would be.

[James]

Yeah. And I'm sure it also be disgusted at what's fucking happening.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And you know, and while we're talking, the Somali family whose daycare it is, comes out and gives us sambosas and we're like, no, no, no, no. We're journalists. You don't have to give Us anything. We're like, not even helping.

[James]

We're like.

[Margaret Killjoy]

They're like, you're here. You're with us. You are taking food.

[James]

Yeah. The guy was like, no, we're Somalis. We feed people. What's your deal? Are you vegetarian? We're like, yeah, we're vegan. So he comes out, goes back, comes out with the vegan ones. You know, like, they were delicious.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Really eat. No, it was the best food I've ever eaten. As we're standing there, more people come and go. So you're like, okay, this is happening here, right? You know, no pun intended. And as we leave, we talk to a few more people. We leave, and some of the other people we talk to are like. And they're people from different scenes. It's not, you know, like, it's not.

[James]

Just the old lady scene, Right. It's a diverse crowd, right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And, you know, we talked to a father who I tangentially know through the metal scene, who is like, yeah, my kid goes to school here. No one is taking kids while I can stand here. And he was like, I have work to be doing. He's like, we're supposed to be recording this band today or whatever. And he's like, no, I'm here. I'm doing this. There's no sadness.

[James]

No. He's like, this is what I have to be doing. It's the most important thing to do.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Every two blocks, there are people on the corner. Usually two people, sometimes alone. And those what we later learned because we were like, holy shit, there's ice watchers everywhere. Those are just the marked people we see. That's the minority. There are people driving constantly in very organized but entirely decentralized networks of rapid response where they have come together in these hyper local signal loops. Signal is an encrypted messaging app that you can use on any device, Android or iPhone. The government can't break its encryption. However, there's no truly safe system.

[James]

It's the safest one we have.

And it automatically deletes messages after a period of time.

[Margaret Killjoy]

If you set it up, too. Yeah. Which you should. And so people are using this system. And, you know, a ton of these people had never heard of signal before in their life, and now they're using this system. And also we talked to folks and people felt that, like, a certain level of transparency about the networks they're building is very useful.

[James]

Yeah, we should probably address this head on. Like, just to be super clear. Like, everything we are sharing is because people have implored us to share It. Right. We did not sneak in and find its information. People openly gave it to us. Because they wanted you to hear it. Right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Because they understand that this is the kind of system that is currently proving effective, and they want people to learn from what they're doing. And so they've created hyperlocal systems, like block by block. You have groups where neighbors are able to check in on neighbors, and people are able to say, hey, I saw this thing. Right. And so there is constant presence all over town. And when I say town, we spent our time in Minneapolis, but we have talked to a lot of people who say the St. Paul is doing a similar thing. The suburbs are doing a similar thing. Even some small towns elsewhere in Minnesota are starting to do this.

[James]

Yeah. I don't quite know where the town is, but if people are local, like, a few years ago, I went to a massive Ren Fair here, and I really outed myself.

[Margaret Killjoy]

It's okay. I brought a cloak I must wear.

[James]

And folks all the way out there.

Are doing it, too, which is.

That was. That place had a rural Midwest vibe, let me tell you.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And so people are doing this all over. I have never seen unity like this.

[James]

No. Like, the only time I've seen a city this much in lockstep is when I was in Kamishlo in 2023. And where is that? Kamishlo is the capital of what is generally referred to as Rojava, the autonomous administration of north and East Syria. And at that time, we were being bombed by Turkey. Turkey takes offense at Kurdish people having any autonomy. And this is what that felt like, because there is someone invading your town and taking your friends.

Yeah.

And everyone. I remember there were funerals. Right. So One bomb killed 34. SAE shot at the internal security forces.

Yeah.

And I remember everyone rolled out for the funeral. Like, it was like a general strike.

Yeah.

And that's what it feels like here. Like, you could walk through town the day that happened and see people were sad and like. But they were sharing their sadness. Yeah. And here people are mad and they're sharing their anger, but also their love for one another.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. Even when someone was killed by ice, this did not stop people from doing this work.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

It brought more people out to do this work, because people are like, no, this. This. This work needs to be done. And on some level, the scale. Is that right? Like, because if someone is seeking asylum, like, no one runs unless they have a reason, you know? And so sending people back to the places that they've sought asylum from often just means killing people.

[James]

Yeah.

I mean, let's look at the things that have happened in the last month. Right. Gay men being sent back to Iran, where the punishment for that is death.

Yeah.

People from this community, Koran people. Right. Being sent back to Myanmar, where we know that they are directly delivered to a military prison. They are sending people back to Mauritania, where, again, you can be punished for being queer by death. Right. Like, what is happening here is that people's lives are at stake. I think sometimes people think, oh, it's inconvenient. You go back to a place where life is less, you know, you don't have a target. No, that's not the deal. We're sending people back to Venezuela. Right. We're sending people from the US To Venezuela. The US notably just kidnapped the president of Venezuela. Those people aren't going to have a nice time.

Right.

And if you were a US Intelligence agency and you wanted to insert people into Venezuela, that's how you would do it.

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And Venezuela knows that.

[James]

Yeah.

They're not that dumb. And they are very paranoid.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And they are a state which has a great deal of ability to do violence based on that paranoia.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And so people are aware of the stakes and they're doing something about it. And what's cool. It's so interesting because at the same time, there's a little bit of like, yeah, we're built different and certainly around the cold. That is absolutely true. And there is all of this stuff in the history of at least Minneapolis that people have built resistance out of all of this very active multiculturalism going back decades. We've talked to organizers who grew up and, you know, we talked to an organizer who grew up in the American Indian movement and was talking about, like, black and indigenous solidarity going back to the 60s and 70s. Right. And you know, and was saying, like, there's all of this multicultural and solidarity. There's also all of these, like, cultural events. Right. They have this huge May Day parade. Right. Or festival.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Every year. It's funny, I've spent a lot of time in Minneapolis, but I've never actually been here for this. But everyone's always talking about it where basically people go to this park and build puppets and build giant puppets together. But it's decentralized. And so there's all of this history of decentralized organizing. And in 2020, of course, the uprising kind of began here. And people are very aware of that. And so they have all of these networks that have been built for years, and they weren't necessarily crazy active in the intervening years. But people know each other on some level. And that's the thing, though, because we expected kind of. I expected people being like, ah, yes, they had all of these deep interconnections. And most people we're talking to are like, no, I know my neighbors now.

[James]

Yeah, we did six months ago.

[Margaret Killjoy]

We have these small seeds. Right. And so people here are and aren't special about that. But do you know what is special, James?

[James]

I shudder to think, Margaret.

[Margaret Killjoy]

I think what's special is the fact that you and I run anti capitalist podcasts. Special has a lot of meanings that are interrupted by advertisements. Yeah.

[James]

It is different.

[Margaret Killjoy]

It is a thing. And here they are.

[James]

Yeah. Thank you. Please insert name of advertiser here for buying us a low grade vegan pizza which still cost us more than $.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And we're back.

[James]

Yeah.

I wanted to talk a little bit about, like, the structures that exist. Right. And I think probably the way to do that is to break this down into two distinct, I guess, categories. And I think these are distinct in terms of organizing for the most part. Right. One is mutual aid and one is rapid response. Yeah. And I just want to break down why people are doing mutual aid first. Right. First of all, we're doing mutual aid because it is the way that we build a better world by taking care of one another without trying to extract profit from one another. Why they're doing it is because people right now who are at risk of deportation are afraid to leave their homes. They are living like a lot of Jewish people lived in Nazi. This is an. This is a comparison to somebody whose grandparents fled the Holocaust made for us today like Jewish people did in Nazi Germany. Right. The difference is this time they know their neighbors have their back.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And so they're afraid to go out. Right. Schools are offering remote education because kids are afraid to go to school because ICE has been hitting school bus stops.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

People can't go out and get groceries and they can't go to their jobs, so they can't pay their bills. And so that requires, if we want to take care of people, we have to feed them, we have to help them pay their bills, meet their material needs, get their kids educated. Rent, that is a heavy lift. Capitalism extracts a pretty heavy fee for paying rent. Right. We give most of our lives to capital so that we can get food and pay rent, clothes and shit. We have to do that without that here. Right. And people are doing it. So they are organizing food drop off, they're organizing diaper banks, they're organizing to give People rides who might not feel safe driving by themselves.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

They are taking people's kids to some often. Right. A scenario that I'm very familiar with is citizen children born to non citizen parents. So those kids, no one is safe. When you have this many people running around with weapons.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Right.

[James]

And very poor training and then a lot of anger and yeah, not very good at driving in the snow. But their kids are still able to go out and go to school. But it's a bad idea for their parents who take them. Right. So you're seeing people organizing school runs, getting food for people. Then you've got businesses that are owned by migrants. Right. Or businesses that are largely staffed by migrants. So it's trying to keep those places afloat so that community can continue to care for itself, but when its workers can't come in. Or what if the majority of the clientele of the business of migrants, well, maybe people volunteer to do delivery so that that business can stay afloat and those migrants can still get the foods that make them feel safe at a time when they don't feel safe, whatever it is, people are meeting each other's needs without trying to extract financial compensation from each other.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And to talk about the decentralized nature of this again. And it's hyperlocal, like no org, many orgs, but no one org stepped in and was like, ah, this is the way to do it. Here's this top down flow chart. Instead, all of these groups started in different ways. Like we've talked to people from different neighborhoods. We're like, ah, it all started like this. And then they paint a completely different picture from people from three blocks over.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And like, you know, someone was like, the mutual aid here started with one mom who was like, well, I'm making food.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And in her own kitchen made food.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And then it was like, I will carry the entire weight of the world as necessary upon my shoulders.

[James]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And then other people were like, okay, I'll help you lift this. I think of the. Have you seen the meme about like, I can't lift weights with my anarchist friends? No, I can't lift weights with my anarchist friends because every time I pick up the barbell, like 30 of my friends come over and help me lift the barbell while singing John Henry.

[James]

Yeah, that's perfect.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And that's what's happening here. So one person starts doing this thing and people say, oh, that's a good idea. And there are these other networks that can then tie that in and people will be heavily involved in one network and have a little bit of an understanding of what's happening in the other networks. But enough people are talking to each other that they're learning best practices. They're learning what does and doesn't work, and they're also changing to get.

[James]

To meet the threat. Yeah, I think the other thing is.

Here that no one's coming in with tax deductible funding. This is just people taking care of people. That has been sustainable for some time since mid December. We're now in late January.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

That is a thing that, like, there is a need for money.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

To keep making that happen. And that is an area where people outside of Minneapolis can help if they want to. So I just want to flag that.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And we will drop some resources at the end of these two episodes, and we'll drop at the end of the first episode, and hopefully you'll. If you feel so inclined, you'll be able to help financially. But. Yeah, let's talk about rapid response.

[Margaret Killjoy]

ICE is not as large of an agency as they wish it was. You know, there's so much news about how hard of a time they're having hiring people to the point where they, like, hired the, like, leftist journalist who was, like, yeah, applied as a joke, you know. You know, and so they've. They've had this surge here. The flood, they called it, I believe, of agents here. And, you know, there's about 3,000, I think, ICE agents in the city.

[James]

Yeah. I think it was Metro surge here. Midway flood was Chicago.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Okay. And they can't do that everywhere at once.

[James]

No.

[Margaret Killjoy]

So if you play video games, Minneapolis is tanking. Do you know the concept of tanking?

[James]

Yeah. You don't have to be a video game. You can do it in Dungeons Dragons.

[Margaret Killjoy]

I know. I know they do.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

You can tank in Dungeons and Dragons. But the actual. Weirdly, I think the concept of tanking comes not from Dungeons and Dragons. Later editions of. This is a nerd tangent.

[James]

Anyway, James and Margaret talk about Dungeons and Dragons etymology.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. The concept is that one person stands there and takes the damage while other people heal that person and do damage to the people attacking that person or, like, prepare themselves.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Well, in the video game version is you. You know, one person takes all the damage while everyone else is also helping do the damage back. That's literally just the World of Warcraft version. But Minneapolis is tanking. The Twin Cities and Minnesota are tanking, and all of the ICE agents that are here aren't somewhere else. And one of the ways that they're making that possible is through rapid response.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And rapid response. That's what the name says. It is a way to respond rapidly, which is the other. Okay, this is the other question I had coming in. Why does this work? This was my thought. I was like, why does blowing whistles at ICE agents make them not able to kidnap people? So I was like, does this work? That was one of the main questions we asked people. The answer is yes, it doesn't work all the time. This is still a tragic situation. Everyone involved is kind of traumatized to medium to greater degrees. I don't want to say to lesser degrees. But what happens is that if the ICE agents are outnumbered, they usually don't successfully abduct anyone, even though they're the only harmed people in the situation. Even though they. Theoretically, the way that police would act, being outnumbered, it helps, but it's not as much of a game changer.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

With ICE being wildly unpopular, occupying force, so far at least currently outnumbering them seems to often stop abductions at first, I believe December ish. The way that ICE was handling things was these big, spectacular raids that we've seen a lot of places. 30 agents are showing up and raiding this place. Right. And so if you get a call about that, a rapid response can be 20 minutes, can be 30 minutes, you can show up, and you're still part of fighting against this happening. This is what's happening all over the country, Right?

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

So ICE here adapted and started moving faster and faster. And so now often these abductions take two or three minutes. So they were like, how do we get a crowd in two minutes? And when an organizer first, which everyone here is an organizer, When a person who does this first suggested that to me, my thought was like, well, you don't. Yeah, that's impossible.

[James]

It's not.

[Margaret Killjoy]

They do it.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And they do it because everyone here in Minneapolis. Not everyone. Everyone. But I haven't run across too many counterexamples. Is themselves willing to respond.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And so when you hear people honking and whistles outside, you go outside.

[James]

Yeah. I mean, we heard someone was mentioning that they had seen. And to be clear this morning, again, the real feel was in the minus 30s, Celsius and Fahrenheit, which is last.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Friday, if you're listening to when this comes out.

[James]

But they had said they were on a block, they heard some honking, they come outside, their neighbors were outside and cut off pajama pants and Crocs screaming and blowing whistles. Right. Like. And we saw it. Even when Someone mistook us for ICE agents.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Right.

[James]

And within a couple of minutes, a couple of people have come and we were like, yo, we're doing this. Like.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

Long hair, you know, like septum rings. Yeah, exactly. Like, crusty. Like, you can. You can see us coming.

[Margaret Killjoy]

But out of state plates.

[James]

Yeah. A city is made of people.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

Right. Like the. The people are like the. The blood pumping through the veins of a city. It's not made of buildings.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And there are people everywhere. And when all of them are willing to show up.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

Right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Or half of them.

[James]

Yeah. Well, in the entire time we have seen here, the only person who has expressed any negativity about what is happening is a person in a truck today who was honking at a large protest that we were part of in a way that was clearly adversarial.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Oh, yeah.

[James]

Yeah. Literally one person.

[Margaret Killjoy]

He was also stuck.

[James]

Yeah, he was also stuck and had been stuck for some time. And he appeared to be struggling with a merge situation that happened when.

[Margaret Killjoy]

We actually don't know his political opinions. We just know he was unhappy.

[James]

Yeah. He was just. That's the only person I've seen express any. Yeah. Upset, like every. The person checking us out at the supermarket. The people who we have run into at coffee shops. Right. Like.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

Randos outside the Dollar General store. Yeah. People we see in the street, but people we see in the street standing. It's cold as fuck. No one's just like vibing on a park bench currently, but everyone is 100% in it.

[Margaret Killjoy]

On the fuck these guys page.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Like, we. Today we heard about an ICE vehicle that crashed into a pole. And this is actually fairly common, I believe, because one, they don't know how to drive in ice. And Minneapolis is ic and they were driving like a. I don't know whether the vehicle was all wheel drive or not. It was a Ford Escape. Yeah. But it was some not all terrain tires.

[James]

Yeah, I know. Those were pretty. Those were some California ass tires. Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And it's just crashed into a pole in a, like, pretty impressive way. Like, they had to be going at a decent speed.

[James]

Yeah. They. Both airbags had deployed. The radiator was done. The engine block was, you know, like, they'd crumple the front of the car. It's because they drive erratically when people are driving behind them to try and get rid of them. And they are driving ill equipped, both skill wise and vehicle wise.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And so we showed up an hour and a half after the crash. They just abandoned the vehicle there. Like, they came and got some of their stuff out of the car.

[James]

Tossed them. Tear gas.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah, tossed them tear gas. We saw the canister on the ground of CS gas, and they just left it there. And they were not going to clean it up. I don't believe they will ever clean it up. That'll be on the local police or whoever, you know.

[James]

Yeah. City.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And we're standing there and a guy drives by, and he's just a normal man. No distinguishing features.

[James]

Man in van.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. No belief to be subcultural or lefty or someone drives by and is like, oh, shit, is everyone okay? And I was like, oh, that's a nice vehicle. And he just starts laughing. He parks his car, he gets out, he's taking pictures.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And this happens over. And this is. Must have been happening over and over for an hour and a half.

[James]

Yeah. What else I noticed then was like, so we were walking up and this. This person popped out of their house and was like, hey, what's happening? We're like, oh, I spiffed it into this pole.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And they were like, okay, if you guys need anything, like, I'm here. I'm taking care of some kids, or.

An elder, I can't remember, but they.

Were like, you need to come in the house.

It's cold.

Just come to come knock on the door. Like, you need a hot drink. You know, like.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And we're more press. We're not like, hello. We are the activists, you know?

[James]

Yeah.

Like, you know, I'm.

To be clear, I'm wearing a helmet. Mark. We're both wearing helmets with. With big blue press patch. Yeah. So one of the things I noticed is, like. And it's been repeated a bit and then reported on a little bit, like these 3D printed whistles, right?

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

One of the ways that people identify someone saying that people know you're cool. It's like people are all carrying whistles around their necks. I was just keeping an eye on this as we met people throughout the last few days. Everybody had a carabiner with their keys and a whistle on it, or a whistle around their neck, or there was a whistle on a lanyard on their wrist. It's like a little marker.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And what's interesting is we've talked to people about how at the beginning, a lot of people are like, this seems kind of silly, right? You're like, oh, they're the federal. I mean, they're the Gestapo, right?

[James]

Yeah, yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And we have whistles. And so it seems so absurd.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

But there's so many parts of it they hate. They want to operate in secrecy. We see watchers on every corner. We don't see ice. Like, this is a city under occupation, but it's like, visibly under occupation by its own defenders. Right. It is, like, infiltrated by federal agents. Not like you don't. You know, I've been in places where you have, like, the. The police rolling around in their tank, things with tires. Yeah.

[James]

Bearcats.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And like, this isn't that because they can't actually express much force.

[James]

They can't even be seen as they go. They're trying their very hardest to hide. Right. They have tinted vehicles. They cover their faces. They keep getting different rentals so people can't recognize it. They are trying their best to blend in and failing.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And everyone having a whistle. So not only is it effective because it draws attention to them. It makes you a defender. It's a very cheap and easy way. You hand someone a whistle and you're handling them responsibility. You're saying, like, you are now. It's like, I mean, he's handing someone their goddamn sword, you know, in a, like, knight fantasy land way. Right?

[James]

Yeah. Like, you're one of us when we take care of each other.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And you are going to defend people.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And you're going to defend people by casting these people. Like, it's so interesting because I'm so used to thinking, like, power doesn't need to hide. Right? Like, yeah. You know, and when journalists are like, oh, well, what they really fear is the truth. And, you know, I'm like, well, how.

[James]

It doesn't need to hide. But the power is not with the folks driving around in occupying the city right now. The more relevant power is with the folks standing on street corners who don't feel the need to hide, who aren't afraid. Right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And, like, this is part of why I hate saying things like this. I think we're gonna win, and I haven't felt that way in years. And I think that this spirit, the spirit that is animating this city is the thing that will get us through it. And when I say win, win conditions are all weird and hard, and we're gonna lose a lot of people. Like, we're going to lose a lot.

[James]

Of grabbing people off the street here every day, despite all of this.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Because when I'm like, oh, people are stopping so many abductions. They're also. Everyone we've talked to has stopped abductions and failed to stop abductions.

[James]

Yeah. And that haunts a lot of them, I think.

[Margaret Killjoy]

I think so, too. And, yeah, people are really Torn between those two things.

[James]

Yeah. I'll just say that as someone who's been in it for a minute when it comes to advocacy for migrants. Right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

If I go back three years ago to 2023, it was hundred Krusties and anarchists and Quakers and Sikhs who were feeding thousands of people in the desert, right?

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And in a big city, a Metro area of 3 million people, 45 minutes away, people didn't believe me when I told them it was happening because nobody gave a shit to include the local media. Then I was in la, right, in summer this year, and there were young folks there who were mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore. Right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And did really inspiring stuff.

[James]

Did really inspiring stuff and very brave stuff. And so many of them were those kids who were in that situation where they are citizens and their parents are not, and they believe in the right to freedom of expression, of speech and they came to use it. Right. But I could walk five blocks from there and it could have been any other day in la, right?

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

I went to a fancy coffee shop. I overpaid for coffee because the way.

[Margaret Killjoy]

People didn't give a shit, you mean.

[James]

Or didn't for the most part.

[Margaret Killjoy]

No, you're right.

[James]

But they cared. I think they cared. A lot of people say, oh, it's terrible what's happening.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

But, you know, some people spoke to me about their film script. It was la, right? That's a given. But it did not feel like the city was locked in. This feels different to that. Yeah. It feels more locked in than it even felt in 2020. Because everybody sees this as an external thing.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. But do you know what doesn't like doing ad transitions right now? It's me. I don't actually like doing it, but that is my job. And here's some ads. And we're back. The external threat part is really fascinating and is like a key to a lot of this, I believe. You know, the difference between the tone of 2020, where it was this nationwide internal threat, this is still absolutely present. Right. All of the problems from 2020 are.

[James]

Still here, pointed 40 millimeters at oxygen.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. Earlier today. And we watched them arrest a lawyer.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And we'll get to that. But the thing I've been thinking about is that in protest movements, you often say things like, oh, it radicalized you, or I got radicalized by this, or this isn't radical. Even though it's higher stakes, more risk. Like, it's not radical to say, man, I don't think you should kidnap literal children you know, I don't think it's.

[James]

Normal, which is why very normal people are very pissed off.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And like. And one of the things that's come up from multiple people, you know, and the Internet commenters will say, well, then why'd they vote this way? And that's just a. That doesn't get us anywhere.

[James]

Yeah. What the fuck are you doing?

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah, we have talked to a bunch of people who are like, oh, yeah, that Republican business is closed for the general strike. Or my neighbor, who is very conservative, is pissed as hell.

[James]

Yeah. I saw a sign today and we'll.

Get to the big protest. I saw a.

What would Ronald Reagan do?

Yeah, the person. Right.

So this person has not just thought that, yeah, they have got out their pens and paper and their crafting supplies. They've made that sign, they've got their ass down to the middle of town and it is minus 10, minus 15. And they are out and about with their what would Ronald Reagan sign? Because they are that pissed off and.

[Margaret Killjoy]

No one's mad at them.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Because at a certain point it doesn't matter.

[James]

Yeah, like, I'd rather they were here.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah, like, exactly. And like, the thing I've been thinking about a lot is that glad you're here gets so much further than what took you so long.

[James]

Yeah, 100%.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And there just is a line. The federal government has crossed it. And the more people who are aware of that, the better.

[James]

Yeah. I think it's really important that part of the organizing here has been so wide and so inclusive and so broad and yet so focused. Right? Yeah, it's so focused on keeping their neighbors safe and thus it can be so broad because most people think that's the right thing to do. That is what is allowing them to do this right now. And it doesn't matter where someone was yesterday or in November of 2024, if they're on a street corner today looking out for their neighbors.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And I'll say that I'm not going to name them, but to shout out, part of the reason I'm here is that someone I know who, I don't know if they have a political ideology to their name. Just a young queer person I know was talking to them a couple weeks ago and they were telling me about how I didn't understand the scope of the rapid response networks. It's hard to see from outside.

[James]

Yes, it is. Yeah. Unnecessarily. It's something that people don't always talk about to everyone. Right, right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Totally. And so talking to this person and they're like, oh, earlier today, I went and stood in front of an apartment building because of ice. And I was like, your apartment building? And they're like, no, about a block away. And I'm like, okay. And they're like, yeah, I just wanted to go stand out front to make sure ICE didn't get in. And I'm like, okay, I don't quite understand. And then they're like, oh, yeah. And I go to the hotels where ICE are at, and me and my friend sit there and write down license plates, and. And I'm just like. And I'm imagining this is just, like, an activity they're doing.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

I don't quite understand, you know, but I'm like, why are you doing it? Right. And not that. Not that it's a. It's an obvious answer on some level, but they're like, because I told myself I was someone who would do what's right.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And I think that in all of our hearts, we tell ourselves that when it comes down to it, we do what's right. And, like, you know, people like talking about, like, comparisons between now and Nazi Germany and the rise of fascism, and they're like, you know, there's the. The meme about, like, how y' all ended up fascist. You're. You're failing an open note test.

[James]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

You know, but Minneapolis isn't failing the open note test.

[James]

Yeah. Yeah. They are, like, passing with flying colors. Right? Like.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

I mean. Yeah. I think, you know, you and I are both history appreciators.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And history has taught us a lot. Right. The big coalitions do better than small one or ones that fracture into a million pieces. Like, leadership isn't what we need. Participation is what we need. And, yeah, you see a lot of it in action here. And, like, all of us, Right. Like, anyone who's spent any time reading, writing, learning, listening to history, whatever, has thought, what would I do? What we're finding out is that, yeah, we're not alone in having thought, what would I do? And most people have said, well, I wouldn't be one of the ones who did something. And so they're doing something.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And I think about maybe my last thought for today is that when ICE abducts people, which they do every day, they just disappear people, right. They just show up, they pull someone over, literally, just for being brown. To be really, really transparent, the police have come out and been like, could you please stop pulling over all of the brown cops?

[James]

Yeah, yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Like, and when they pull someone over, they just take them and they leave the car. Sometimes running, sometimes in drive and just drive away. And I was like, are we walking into a ghost town?

[James]

Right.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Are we gonna see this everywhere? And in my three days here, I haven't seen the abandoned vehicle except the ice. Abandoned vehicle that crashed. But it is happening every day. And we have talked to people who see it every day. And a very common activity is the ghastly approaching an abandoned vehicle abandons the vehicle that has been the occupation vehicle has been stolen. Yeah. And trying to figure out who the fuck it was. And going through and finding the information to contact people's loved ones and say, like, hey, your wife has been stolen.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

You know, and like. And that. And we were talking to, you know, a decent number of the people that we talked to about this were Jewish. And they're, you know, talking about, like, this is what my family told me about.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

You know, and like, that was one of the first things that someone told me that really made me cry. This whole thing has been really challenging. All my cynicism and detachedness from hard things. But hearing those stories and then just seeing the people who do that, which could be anybody, because people step up. It's God. I just. I say I can only imagine it, you know, but it. Like that's a. That is a daily reality here, is someone was just stolen.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Person was just stolen. And I have to go through their effects to figure out who they were.

[James]

Yeah. I guess when we were speaking about that, I was thinking about experiences I've had in the desert, right. Where you find someone's bag as they're walking through and it's got too hot, they've taken off their bag. And you go through all the little ephemera, the little things that people thought were worth carrying across the world, and you try to piece together their life and work out who they are. And you look at pictures of their children, and you look at pictures of their spouse and their home, and you hope that they're okay. Right. And in this instance, they're not okay. Right. And it's not the abstract violence of the structures of borders and walls and surveillance that have killed them or taken them. In this instance. Right. It's five people in masks and a car over there. And it's happening in the middle of cities where people can see it. Right. Part of the function of the border is to take the violence away from where people can see it. And they got away with that for so long that they figured they could just bring it into cities and it makes my heart so proud that when people could see it, they said, fuck, no, you're not doing this in my town. Because for so long I've believed that if people could. Like, the reason I'm a journalist, Right. The reason that I have spent the better part of 10 years like, like receiving trauma is because I really believe in my heart that people could. If people could see the cruelty, they would care and they would do something.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And like, this confirms that for me. Right. People can see it and they have cared and they have done something amazing.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Right.

[James]

And that makes me so proud of them.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. The paradise built in hell, as Solnit put it.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

You know, people are finding community and a really active way and learning what people can do for each other and the levels in which people are plugging in. You know, there's the whole long standing cliche that for every frontline activist, there's 10 support people.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

And you're like, well, here it's. Those lines aren't so clearly delineated.

[James]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Because on some level, you know, we've talked to people who have been like, oh, my neighbor who, you know, has so many mobility issues that they can't leave their house.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

They're just hanging out on the front porch.

[James]

Yeah. They're on the front line.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah, exactly.

[James]

The front line comes to you.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. Like we talked to someone earlier who was pepper sprayed this morning while walking their dog.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

You know, because while walking their dog, they witnessed masked agents stealing a person.

[James]

Yeah.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Well, about do it for part one of it could cool people here. And we'll be back on Wednesday or whenever it. We actually don't know what the scheduling is going to be of this particular episode.

[James]

Yeah.

We'll be back in the subsequent episode of the podcast feed you're listening to.

[Margaret Killjoy]

That's right. That's right. And yeah, you're going to final.

[James]

Let me say this right. I was really sad when I came here because my friends were dying in Rojava.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah.

[James]

And I wish I was with them in a strange way because I know the sense of togetherness they feel. And I felt that here. And that was really special for me because I would struggle to be dealing with this alone.

[Margaret Killjoy]

Yeah. And we're going to talk a bit more about rapid response stuff. And there's also, just to point some articles people's way, there's a series of articles that came out from crimethink, which is crimethink.com that have talked about some of the structures of rapid response networks and people here are putting together a lot of resources about what they have and haven't learned. And we're going to be talking about some of those things that people have learned and things like that. But it's really worth understanding wherever you are, because you're also that person who can hang out on your front porch. I mean, not necessarily literally you hang out on your front porch. But it's like the idea is when the entire city mobilizes, it works. And I think that when we realize that we can mobilize the entire country, it works. That's my theory. Yeah. See you all soon.

[James]

Hi, friends, it's me, James. I'm back. And I'm back because we asked some people on the ground if they could provide us with some links to places where people could donate that had been vetted that they knew would be going to people helping people on the ground. And they provided us with a lot of different links. So I'm going to tell you what each of these links are, and if you'd like to donate, you can just scroll on down whichever app you're using to the podcast, show notes and you can click one of the one of the links below. So there's rent, support for neighbours in Philips, Rent, support for neighbors in Central. Rent, support for neighbors in Powderhorn, supplies for political art making, protective gear for legal observers, diapers and menstrual supplies. There are Abolish Ice T shirts that you can purchase. There is a fundraiser for Northstar, Frontline, Street Medics and the Twin Cities Swallow Terrier Yet Bail Fund. There are links for both a Venmo and CashApp donation there.

[Podcast Announcer]

It Could Happen Here is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from Cool Zone Media, Visit our website coolzonemedia.com or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts, you can now find sources for It Could Happen here, listed directly in Episode Descriptions. Thanks for listening.

[Margaret Killjoy]

This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.