Since Donald Trump took office as president last January, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has deported roughly 540,000 people and caused dozens of deaths. A year on, Minneapolis, Minnesota, has been riven by protests and clashes with law enforcement following the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens, Renée Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, by ICE agents within the space of a month.
Claire, a 36-year-old mother, teacher, and organizer from the Minneapolis area, is just one of many civilians working to keep her community safe amid the raids and unrest. Here, she speaks to Vogue about seeing her students and neighbors targeted by ICE, losing faith in elected officials, and how people outside the Twin Cities can show their support.
Can you tell me a little bit about what the last few weeks have been like for you as a Minneapolis resident?
We live in Richfield, Minnesota, which is basically South Minneapolis. It’s where the video was taken of two people being detained. That’s a mile from our house. Our area has a very large Hispanic population, so we’ve had a really heavy ICE presence just within our neighborhood basically since they arrived a couple of weeks ago. It has been very overwhelming. Our daughter attends a Spanish immersion daycare in the area, so that was kind of our first bit of mobilizing. The daycare is a chain, and they had already been through this in Chicago, so we’ve been providing rides for all the teachers who feel unsafe driving right now.
School-wise, I had some meetings lined up with my sub—I’m out on bonding leave right now—and I had set up some meetings with parents. It just happened to be that both of these meetings were with Hispanic families and students I’ve had for a couple years. The day that Renée Good was killed was the day I had those meetings set up. Prior to that even happening, they had gotten ahold of me and said, “Hey, can we cancel? We don’t feel comfortable going out.” We had already been planning on moving everything virtual for them, and then everything obviously snowballed after that. Now I know that those students have not been in school since that event. A large portion of our Hispanic students are not attending school right now. It’s heartbreaking, and it’s crazy to see everything happening right outside our front door, literally. It’s crazy to see the disconnect, too, between Metro Twin Cities Minnesota and rural Minnesota, or other states, depending on where they’re getting their information and their news.
What part of all this has been the most difficult to witness?
You know, I think the thing that is most difficult for the parents who have been working together, and all the volunteers that I’ve been working with, is just knowing that the people being targeted truly are just regular people—people we care for, our neighbors that we say hi to on the streets and have little conversations with. Hearing this really charged language about them, like “illegals” and “aliens,” and having that disconnect with who they are as humans is so heartbreaking. The people who take care of our daughter are so lovely and wonderful, and they don’t deserve any of this. Her maestras are a range of ages, so to see that across the entire span, whether they’re in their early 20s or in their 50s, there’s still this same level of absolute fear. It just makes it really real.
How are you seeing families broach the topic of ICE raids with their children?