“Everybody Showed Up”: Stunning Crowds at Minnesota Day of Strike and Shutdown Against ICE
Sid Shniad
Working In These Times January 23, 2026
“Everybody Showed Up”: Stunning Crowds at Minnesota Day of Strike and Shutdown Against ICE
Extreme cold didn’t stop the shutdown on Friday as some 100 faith leaders were arrested, residents stayed home from work, and an estimated 50,000 or more marched through downtown Minneapolis.
Sarah Lazare
Throngs of protesters in Minneapolis took to the streets on Friday, January 23, 2026 to
Tens of thousands of Minnesotans chanting “No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here,” marched through downtown Minneapolis Friday afternoon to demand ICE leave the state.
The massive demonstration in subzero temperatures was a central part of an economic shutdown that included strikes, arrests and civil disobedience, hundreds of businesses closing their doors, and rallies. The call for “no work, no school, no shopping” was put out publicly roughly 10 days ago by a coalition of unions, faith groups and community organizations.
The idea was to “suspend the normal order of business” as a way to protest the unprecedented federal deployment of thousands of masked, armed federal agents on Minnesota.
Organizers estimated the crowd was at least 50,000, with some guessing higher, around 100,000. The big turnout is stunning because it was -9 degrees when the march began, temperatures that can quickly cause frostbite to exposed skin.
“Oh my God, today is amazing, overwhelming, and very powerful,” said Feben Ghilagaber, an airport food service worker and steward for UNITE HERE Local 17. “It was bigger than I was expecting, much bigger. I was kind of worried about the weather, but everybody showed up.”
According to Ghilagaber, “a lot” of airport workers in her union didn’t go to work Friday in order to support the shutdown, with many of them calling in sick.
It is too early to assess how many workers withheld their labor as part of the day of action, which organizers refer to as a “Day of Truth and Freedom.” But workers and unions were central to the day’s events. A commercial electrician and member of IBEW Local 292 who was holding a sign reading “General Strike is a Path to Justice,” told me during the march that he was “out here to support immigrant rights, support every American.”
“I mean, ICE is just deplorable,” he said. “And I mean, anyone could get in the path of the ICE agents. It just infringes on our own civil rights.”
Another Minnesotan, who requested anonymity to protect her from retaliation by ICE, told me, “I’m here today to stand up for everyone, stand up for myself. I am impacted. I came here when I was two years old. My parents brought me here from Mexico. All I know is America, so seeing everything that’s going on, seeing my family ripped apart, seeing kids being snatched, an innocent woman shot for standing up for what’s right, it’s all surreal.”
“I’m speaking out for those who couldn’t be here today,” said the 29-year-old, “who are hiding, who every time the doorbell rings their heart stops.”
Earlier that morning, about 100 faith leaders blocked a key road outside of Terminal 1 departures at the Minneapolis – Saint Paul International Airport in an act of civil disobedience against ICE.
With thousands of supporters behind them, they sang “before this campaign fails, we’ll all go down to jail — everybody has a right to live.” They held signs showing abducted members of UNITE HERE Local 17.
The crowd — including striking workers and union members, some of whom work at the airport — stayed outside in the subzero temperatures to cheer on the civil disobedience. Supporters passed around hand warmers and snacks to help sustain the crowd.
Katrina Zabriskie, 22, watched her mother, a Minnesota-based chaplain, get arrested. “It was really emotional,” she told me. “When the crowd started chanting, ‘We love you,’ I started to cry. Mostly I’m just really proud.” Many of the faith leaders prayed in the moments before they were arrested by police.
“We care about the safety of our neighbors,” Zabriskie added. “We believe it is deeply unjust taking people from their homes and deporting them, brutalizing them, and keeping them in detention centers. It’s not something that should be happening.”
Those roughly 100 clergy, according to a news release from the ICE Out of MN coalition, were arrested for their part in “the statewide shutdown ICE Out of Minnesota: A Day of Truth & Freedom.” The clergy’s demands focused on Delta and Signature Aviation, which they said have been complicit in and have helped facilitate the deportations of Minnesotans.
The faith leaders want Delta and Signature Aviation to publicly call for “an immediate end to the ICE ‘surge’ into MN and for ICE to leave the state.” They also urge the companies to “join Minnesotans” in demanding that the ICE agent who killed Renee Good be held “legally accountable,” and “call for Congress to stop funding ICE.”
Good, a poet and mother of three who lived in Minneapolis, was shot and killed by ICE agent Jonathan Ross on January 7. Public outrage over the murder energized organizers and residents throughout Minnesota and across the country, and was a rallying cry throughout the day.
The civil disobedience at the airport was significant because the site has become a flashpoint in the federal assault on Minnesota.
“Delta relies on MSP as a major hub, and Signature Aviation provides logistical support for ICE operations,” the ICE Out of MN coalition said in a statement released after the arrests of clergy.
“The MSP Airport serves tens of millions of travelers each year and is now used as the key site in DHS’s operations to abduct and rush out Minnesotans to detention centers,” the statement said. The coalition added that “an estimated 2,000 people have been deported through MSP, and many people who work at MSP have been abducted by ICE while at work or commuting to and from the airport.”
But while the airport is the site of abductions, it is also the site of struggle. Some of the protesters, workers and faith leaders outside the airport could be heard chanting “We are the workers, the mighty mighty workers!” A sign read, “We are under reacting,” and another person with a bullhorn loudly emphasized: “We are here to tell corporations to stop being complicit with ICE.”
Earlier on Friday morning at the airport, Nick Benson, an organizer with the grassroots and non-partisan group MN50501, told me “This airport is the narrow end of the funnel where our neighbors are getting shipped off to God knows where.”
The strike and actions across the state — as well as solidarity actions across the country — also come on the heels of harrowing news that a 5-year-old was taken by ICE agents from the driveway of his home in the Minneapolis area on Tuesday. The preschooler and his father are now reportedly being held in a detention center in Texas.
For weeks, federal agents have been stalking and abducting people at schools, daycares and from their homes — and unleashing violence on people trying to protect their neighbors.
The broad coalition that came together to help organize Friday’s work stoppage also had specific demands that include ICE immediately leaving Minnesota and that Jonathan Ross, the ICE agent who shot and killed Good, be “held legally accountable.” They’re also calling for ICE not to receive any “additional federal funding … in the upcoming congressional budget, and ICE should be investigated for human and constitutional violations of Americans and our neighbors.”