A man holds a 3D printed whistle in his mouth as demonstrators gather outside of the Henry Whipple Federal Building, shouting at federal vehicles and recording their plates Saturday, Jan. 17, 2026. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)
When I left Portland in early February for my hometown of Minneapolis to swap newsrooms for a week and report for our States Newsroom sister site, the Minnesota Reformer, I took one central worry with me.
I feared most that the people I love in the Twin Cities would have irrevocably changed over the past few months, and that I’d find them markedly fearful, exhausted or completely disillusioned after enduring a monthslong federal incursion into their neighborhoods and daily lives. An incursion that has included 3,000 masked federal agents roaming the streets — three of whom killed two civilians in broad daylight in residential areas — arresting untold numbers of parents, kids and U.S. citizens in a chaotic dragnet immigration enforcement operation…