Disorder
Week of January 16-22, 2026
Welcome to TRACKING THE CRISIS, a weekly round-up from The Democracy Collaborative tracking the administrative, legislative, and other actions of the Trump Administration as well as the many forms of legal and movement response from across a broad range of social, political, and economic actors. TDC is providing this service for collective informational purposes, as a tool for understanding the times during a period of disorientingly rapid flux and change in the U.S. political economy. This round-up is produced by humans, not by Artificial Intelligence. TDC should not be understood as endorsing or otherwise any of the specific content of the information round-up.
TRUMP TRACKER: Administration actions
Border Patrol kills 37-year old VA nurse Alexander Pretti in Minneapolis; Bondi demands voter rolls as condition for ICE leaving Minnesota, raising alarm over voter suppression aimed at 2026 midterms. On Saturday, January 24, Border Patrol agents shot and killed a second person in Minneapolis, who has been identified as 37-year-old Alexander ‘Alex’ Pretti, an ICU nurse who worked in the Minnesota VA Health Care system; court records confirm he was a U.S. citizen with no criminal record. The Department of Homeland Security claimed that Pretti was armed and approaching agents with a gun, and therefore CBP acted in self-defense; but multiple videos of the moments leading up to the shooting clearly show Pretti holding a phone as he was helping a woman who had been thrown to the ground before being pepper-sprayed and swarmed by Border Patrol agents who tackled him to the ground, where he is shown on his back being beaten by agents for several seconds before at least ten shots were fired, killing him. Kristi Noem claimed that Pretti had ‘brandished a deadly weapon at officers’ before the shooting; several video analyses confirm Pretti was carrying a handgun on his person, which is legal in the state of Minnesota, but videos and witness testimony confirm that Pretti never attempted to reach for his gun before a Border Patrol agent took the weapon from his waistband and was walking away from Pretti when he was shot.
State and federal officials traded blame for the shooting; as with Renee Nicole Good’s killing, Minnesota state law enforcement officials said that state investigators have been blocked by DHS from examining evidence, even after obtaining a warrant to access the crime scene. The National Rifle Association made a statement criticizing federal officials for treating open carry as a justification for lethal force. Over 60 corporate CEOs, including the head of Target, have called for ‘immediate de-escalation’ in Minnesota, and Senate Democrats and Republicans have called for an independent investigation of the shooting. As of this writing, a federal judge has granted a temporary restraining order barring DHS from altering or destroying evidence, and NY Governor Hochul has called for Kristi Noem to resign as eight more House Democrats have signed on to Noem’s impeachment resolution. A statement from Pretti’s family says Alex was a “kindhearted soul” who chose to participate in the protests because he “cared about people, and thought it was wrong”; his parents stressed the fact that “his last thought and act was to protect a woman.”Hours after Pretti’s shooting, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi issued a letter to Gov. Tim Walz outlining a list of demands as conditions for withdrawing ICE from the state, telling Walz how he can ‘end the chaos’ and ‘restore the rule of law’ to Minnesota by turning over confidential state voter data as well as Medicaid and SNAP records to the federal government, ending sanctuary city policies and ‘fully cooperating’ with ICE, including allowing ICE into all local jails and honoring federal requests to detain people on ICE’s behalf. Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon issued a response to Bondi’s letter, stating: “The answer to Attorney General Bondi’s request is no. Her letter is an outrageous attempt to coerce Minnesota into giving the federal government private data on millions of U.S. Citizens in violation of state and federal law.” Citing previous DOJ attempts to coerce his office into giving up the voter rolls, as well as court decisions blocking the Trump Administration’s lawsuits challenging 24 states who have also refused to turn over sensitive data, he added: “It is deeply disturbing that the U.S. Attorney General would make this unlawful request a part of an apparent ransom to pay for our state’s peace and security.” Bondi went on Fox News Sunday to reiterate her claims, threatening that Walz had “better support President Trump.” Walz on Sunday decried Bondi’s inclusion of ‘falsehoods’ in the letter, which accused him of being responsible for the deadly violence in Minneapolis, saying to the Attorney General, “we’re not going to do your job for you. We have other things we need to do." The letter drew a furious reaction from state officials, Democratic lawmakers and election integrity experts across the country; Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes outright called Bondi’s letter ‘blackmail’, and Sen. Chris Murphy said on CNN that the letter offers ‘definitive proof’ that the Trump Administration’s immigration enforcement surge is tied to a larger gambit to ‘take control’ of the 2026 midterms.
This week,the Washington Post reported on a new court filing submitted by the DOJ admitting that at least one DOGE employee had teamed up with an unknown ‘political group’ last year to analyze state voter rolls in an attempt to find non-citizens and overturn election results. CNN reported this week that the DOGE employee copied sensitive Social Security data including people’s names, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, addresses, citizenship status, parents’ names and other personal information to an ‘unauthorized third-party server’, and the Social Security Administration is unable to determine the current status of the data or who has access to it. On Thursday, Democratic lawmakers opened a probe into possible evidence of coordination between DOGE and 2020 election deniers, including a ‘voter data agreement’ with far-right election denial group ‘True the Vote’. The Trump Administration has pressured over 43 states to turn over unredacted voter data to the federal government, including U.S. citizens’ Social Security and driver’s license numbers, addresses, birth dates, party affiliation and voting participation history for the stated purpose of eliminating ‘fraud’ and rooting out ‘ineligible’ voters, and in September initiated lawsuits against 23 Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia for refusing to hand over sensitive data. In November, 22 Secretaries of State wrote a letter to Pam Bondi and Kristi Noem expressing “immense concern” after revelations that the Justice Department shared voter data with Homeland Security to identify non-citizens, seeking “clarity on whether DOJ and DHS actively misled election officials regarding the uses of voter data.” In December, it was revealed that the Trump Administration circulated a confidential draft MOU to more than a dozen states that would require election officials to strike any voter records that the federal government has deemed ‘deficient’.
Earlier this month, 17 former DOJ lawyers submitted an amicus brief warning that the federal government was building a national database to share data on millions of U.S. voters with the Department of Homeland Security. The brief points to reports and public statements revealing that the DOJ’s “true purpose in seeking these voter files is not what DOJ stated in its information requests,” and that its stated purpose “has been shown to be a pretext for other, undeclared aims.” Last week, the DOJ lawsuit against California was thrown out by federal judge David O. Carter, who called the demand for voter data an “unprecedented and illegal” threat to American democracy. LAist notes that Judge Carter also expressed concerns that the data could be used to conduct mass surveillance in violation of the Privacy Act, which prohibited the federal government from collecting sensitive data on citizens after numerous Fourth Amendment violations related to the Watergate scandal and COINTELPRO. The California decision was followed shortly by the dismissal of the DOJ’s case against Oregon, where the judge failed to find cause as to why the federal government needed to obtain the level of fine-grained, sensitive personal data on millions of Americans that it demanded, and this week the case against Georgia was thrown out because of filing errors. The New York Times reported last week that an initial pilot of the DHS federal verification tool that would be implemented if the SAVE Act is passed by the Senate, found only 0.02% of the nearly 50 million records scanned so far were flagged as ‘non-citizens,’ and of that percentage, local election officials found that the tool had mistakenly flagged a significant number of U.S. citizens. This week, the League of Women Voters and the Electronic Privacy Information Center filed a lawsuit against DHS and the Social Security Administration in the D.C. District Court, submitting evidence that U.S. citizens are already being kicked off voter rolls in the 22 states that are voluntarily using the new DHS system.
Bretton Woods dies at Davos: Tensions flare at 2026 World Economic Forum as transatlantic alliance plunged into crisis over Trump’s Greenland threats. Global elites came together this week for the 56th annual World Economic Forum under a cloud of uncertainty amidst Trump’s persistent threats to take over Greenland by military means or otherwise. Trump’s threat to raise a 25% tariff on any European countries that “don’t go along” with his plans for annexation loomed over the proceedings, as anxieties ran high among European leaders in anticipation of Trump’s arrival and keynote on the third day of the conference. This year’s conference, ironically named ‘A Spirit of Dialogue,’ had been preparing to highlight the growing dominance of AI in the global financial system, as throngs of tech CEOs came to Davos to address the potential risks to the financial system and AI hyperscaling within the OECD. However, it was the specter of a return to ‘Great Power’ geopolitics that dominated the week’s proceedings, which to many signaled a definitive end to the epoch of rules-based international order that has presided over international affairs since the end of World War II – with little certainty and growing dread as to what will replace it.
Notwithstanding the self-justifying rhetoric employed by Trump over the last several weeks regarding national security, Greenland finds itself at the core of the geopolitical maelstrom as Trump’s threats of an outright colonial takeover of Greenland has touched off, or perhaps unmasked, a new ‘Scramble for the Arctic’ among the United States, China, and to a lesser extent, Russia. For a certain coterie of U.S.-based billionaire interests – reportedly including Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos, along with hedge funds that back mining interests and have ties to Trump and Howard Lutnick’s personal fortunes – U.S. suzerainty over the rare earth minerals that lie under Greenland’s tundra would give a critical advantage to U.S. capital in the AI ‘arms race’ against China, whose effective monopoly on rare earths used in the production of late-model electronic components has repeatedly stymied Trump’s trade war ambitions. Trump himself has emphasized ‘national security’ concerns, not only claims of Russian and Chinese warships supposedly ‘covering’ the Arctic Ocean but mainly the island’s centrality to his ‘Golden Dome’ missile shield project, the latest iteration of an ambitious plan to achieve dominance over atmospheric and outer space that has captivated U.S. foreign policy hawks at least since Reagan’s ‘Star Wars.’ All three powers, but especially Russia and China, have shipping interests at stake in the Arctic as global warming melts the polar ice cap, opening the fabled Northwest Passage and other potential shipping routes which would cut travel time between China and Europe by as much as 50 percent.
Ahead of the summit, Trump antagonized European allies by publishing personal text exchanges between himself and French President Macron, as well as with NATO head Mark Rutte, on his social media accounts. Messages from both leaders struck a conciliatory, flattering tone, in contrast with the tougher stances they were taking in the media. On Monday, the Norwegian government confirmed that Trump’s published exchanges with Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre were genuine, in which Trump suggested that since he was snubbed for the Nobel Peace Prize, he “no longer feels an obligation to think purely of Peace.” On Tuesday, European leaders held the podium as they used their platform to reiterate their commitment to territorial sovereignty; European Commissioner Ursula Von der Leyen stressed a need for all parties to show ‘unequivocal respect’ for European nations’ sovereignty, and called for the EU’s ‘permanent independence’ from the United States. Macron, donning a pair of mirrored aviator sunglasses apparently due to an eye condition, performed a tough-guy impression as he responded scathingly to Trump’s threats, asserting that Europe would not ‘give in to bullies’ and that anything otherwise risks the continent’s ‘vassalization’. He also advocated for the use of the EU’s Anti-Coercion Instrument, otherwise known as the ‘trade bazooka,’ as a nuclear option should negotiations over Greenland fail; the instrument acts as a kind of sanction restricting U.S. trade, effectively closing off the EU market to U.S. firms. Amidst all the tough words from European leaders, it was Canadian premier Mark Carney who stole the show at Davos on Tuesday, getting a standing ovation as he delivered a frank and somber assessment on the “breaking of the world order, the end of a pleasant fiction and the beginning of a brutal reality where the geopolitics of the great powers is not subject to any constraint.” Speaking hours after Trump posted a social media meme showing U.S. flags over Canada, Greenland, and Venezuela, Carney called on fellow leaders to be honest with themselves over the tense situation with the United States, saying this moment was “a rupture, not a transition” proclaiming the death of the ‘rules-based order’; and chastising his European allies to stop their appeasement and flattery strategy vis a vis Trump in the “hope that compliance will buy safety,” adding that “it won’t.” He exhorted what he called the “middle” powers to step up and “act together,” stressing that “if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.”
Trump arrived in Davos Wednesday, announcing that he had withdrawn his tariff threats in classic TACO fashion; some analysts credit his sudden turnaround not to the persuasive powers of his fellow heads of state, but to capital – to stocks and especially bond markets, both of which had plunged as fears of another trade war sent investors rushing to ‘Sell America’. His lengthy speech on Wednesday took aim at a number of allies as well as leaders who spoke the day before, including Carney and an ‘ungrateful’ Denmark, and declared that “if it weren’t for the United States, you’d all be speaking German right now.” He reiterated his earlier walkback, promising not to use military force on Greenland, and said that he had reached ‘a framework of a deal’ with NATO for some concessions, likely over military bases. His comments drew ire from Indigenous Inuit and Danish Parliament member Aaja Chemnitz, who said “NATO has absolutely no mandate to negotiate anything whatsoever without us in Greenland,” and repeated what Greenlanders have been saying through the whole saga: “Nothing about us, without us.” After meeting with Trump, Ukraine’s Zelenskyy used his time on the podium Wednesday to excoriate European leaders, saying their refusal to take his warnings on Trump seriously made him “feel like Groundhog Day,” and that “Europe still feels more like geography, history, a tradition, not a real political force, not a great power.”
“Catastrophic success”: Trump debuts new ‘Board of Peace’ organization with a new coalition of the willing to rival UN and oversee Gaza, as Jared Kushner reveals grand plan for the suburbanization of Gaza’s devastated territory. Arriving in Davos on Wednesday, Trump began his address to the World Economic Forum saying he’d brought ‘phenomenal news’ from America. The surprise was Trump’s ‘Board of Peace’ initiative, originally billed as a committee that would oversee the reconstruction of Gaza under Trump’s peace plan, but now operating with an expanded role that has thrown up red flags among the international community as to whether it is intended to rival the United Nations. Ahead of Davos, Trump invited dozens of countries to join the new organization, for which he is charging a $1 billion fee for entry for member countries. The White House announced the revamped organization on Friday, January 16 and billed Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, and Ajay Banga, the head of the World Bank as initial members. Notably, the board did not include Tony Blair, the only person named to the board when it was formed to oversee Gaza reconstruction in September. According to Al Jazeera, Blair was dropped from consideration in December after several Arab and Muslim countries objected to his involvement. When asked about the possibility of it rivaling the UN, Trump reassured people that the Board of Peace would ‘work with’ the UN; observers at Davos noted how the new organization’s logo curiously resembles that of the UN. A Haaretz investigation into the group’s new charter found that it had dropped any mention of Gaza – the purpose under which the body was created – and outlined Trump’s personal role, bestowing on himself vast powers over the organization, such as single veto power and the right to name a successor.
Around 20 countries signed up for the Board’s “First Three Years Free” special ahead of the official launch in Davos, including Argentina, Egypt, Hungary, Israel, Qatar, and the UAE; it was also unclear as to where revenue from the proposed $1 billion fee for membership would go. Beyond these countries, many of whose leaders are aligned with Trump politically, most OECD leaders showed little interest in the venture; many of the United States’ traditional allies in Europe, such as France, outright declined the invitation, prompting Trump to threaten a 200% tariff on French wines and champagne. The UK officially declined their invitation this week, citing concerns about Putin’s relation to Trump and how it would affect his potential role. Notably, none of the 54 sovereign countries from Africa received an invitation, which Bloomberg said “showed [Trump’s] disdain for Africa yet again.” Trump officially ‘disinvited’ Canada from the organization after Mark Carney’s speech declaring a ‘rupture’ in the postwar rules-based international order. A sparsely attended signing ceremony took place on the summit grounds Thursday. During the inaugural proceedings, Trump Administration officials emphasized the group’s expansive role in resolving conflicts beyond its original mandate in Gaza; Marco Rubio said “This is not just a board of peace… it is a board of action.”
At the ceremony, Trump and Jared Kushner unveiled some of the first AI-generated images from their ‘Master Plan’ for Gaza, a collection of planned subdivisions including gleaming high-rises, data centers, a special economic zone with preferred tariff rates for member countries, and a high-end ‘coastal tourism destination along the coast, all of which notably failed to include any Palestinians. Trump gushed that Gaza would be a “beautiful piece of property,” prompting criticism from experts and Palestinians in the diaspora, who slammed it as an “imperial agenda” that reduces the genocide to an “investment opportunity.” The Washington Post notes the plan contrasts sharply with the present reality in Gaza, where Israeli troops still control more than half of the enclave while some 2 million Palestinians are crowded into the other half, living in tents or bombed-out shelters. The technocratic Palestinian committee named to administer Gaza under Trump’s peace plan were denied entry by Israel earlier this week, as satellite images showed the Israeli military clearing areas of rubble in southern Rafah, possibly for a refugee camp-like ‘residential zone’ for up to 20,000 people announced in December.
ICE launches new operation targeting Somalis, African asylum seekers in Maine; legal observers intimidated by ICE at their homes as local sheriffs, state officials decry federal retaliation, ‘ransom’ demand for state voter rolls. DHS launched another ICE operation targeting Somali immigrants in Maine this week, announcing Operation ‘Catch Of The Day’ as a law enforcement action claiming to focus on the ‘worst of the worst’ criminal offenders. Out of the roughly 1,400 primarily African migrants DHS has designated as ‘operational targets’ in the state, around 100 people were arrested in the first 3 days of the operation as thousands of protestors rallied in Portland and Lewiston and immigrant neighborhoods and schools braced themselves for a Minneapolis-style crackdown. Court records show that other than about 13 people with criminal offenses confirmed by the federal government, many of the African asylum seekers who were detained either had no criminal record, pending immigration reviews or were once arrested but never charged for a crime. Governor Janet Mills said local businesses and schools have been disrupted by the operation, and challenged federal officials on Thursday to show warrants, provide real-time arrest information and basic information about detainees, decrying the federal government for carrying out “secret arrests” while keeping state and local officials in the dark. Local residents, officials and law enforcement officers are bearing witness to the ‘dragnet approach’ being taken by ICE in the state, as calls to ICE watcher hotlines surge and reports are emerging of ICE agents “indiscriminately snatching people off the street,” businesses and healthcare providers being squeezed due to workers being detained or calling in sick for fear of being detained, a man dragged from his car which was left running in the street, and an 18-year old student abducted as he left a grocery store, among others. A federal judge has issued an order demanding that ICE explain why they detained an Angolan man with no criminal record during a routine check-in at a Scarborough immigration office. The Portland Press-Herald is keeping a running log of known individuals detained by ICE with as much background information as they are able to obtain as raids progress.
York County Sheriff William King said a corrections officer with no criminal record was detained earlier in the week, and Cumberland County Sheriff Kevin Joyce condemned ICE’s “bush league” tactics after one of his recruits, who had a legal work permit, was arrested by a group of seven agents who left his car ‘unsecured’ in the street. Hours later, ICE executed a “very chaotic” transfer of approximately 50 detainees out of Cumberland County Jail and canceled their contract with the county in apparent retaliation for Joyce’s comments, as the sheriff reportedly “positioned his facility as unwilling to abet what he saw as sloppy federal tactics.” Maine law enforcement officials across the state also say they are grappling with a recent Justice Department memo asserting authority for ICE officers to force entry into homes with an administrative warrant; several sheriffs and police chiefs said residents should always report home invasions, but fear ‘blue-on-blue’ violence if masked ICE agents refuse to identify themselves. Sen. Angus King blasted the memo as “the first time in my experience that a memo is held to violate the Constitution” (the Fourth Amendment which guarantees the right to safety in homes unless a specific judicial warrant is issued); and said he confirmed that the memo is not currently in the Federal Register. After the murder of Alex Pretti at the hands of Border Patrol officers in Minneapolis on Saturday, Gov. Mills demanded that the Trump Administration withdraw ICE agents from the state.
Volunteer legal observers in Maine are also reporting that masked ICE agents are showing up at their homes in tactical gear to threaten them, issuing stark warnings not to follow their operations. One legal observer says she was tailed by ICE agents and ‘sandwiched’ between two federal vehicles, while another drove to her home and started honking aggressively. Westbrook mayor David Morse condemned the actions, saying “this is outrageous behavior from a federal authority, and I stand by our citizens’ rights to peacefully observe and/or protest.” Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows ordered a pause on the issuance of undercover license plates for law enforcement, refusing a Border Patrol request in advance of this week’s operations; she cited “too much irregular activity happening around the country” on the part of federal agents, and said the Maine Bureau of Vehicles will not issue undercover plates until there is sufficient assurance that they will not be used for unlawful purposes. She also responded forcefully to Pam Bondi’s letter to Tim Walz on Saturday requiring the state of Minnesota to turn over its voter rolls as a condition for ICE to leave the state, saying that Bondi has “made explicit what has long been clear: ICE is invading our states and inflicting violence in order to create chaos and control our states and elections"; and directly challenged the Attorney General on Sunday, saying “Maine will never turn over our voter rolls as a ransom payment to get ICE out of our state.” Right-wing publication The Maine Wire has launched a vigorous social media campaign against Bellows for her stance; Bellows was doxxed, swatted and sent death threats in 2024 for attempting to disqualify Trump from Maine’s ballot line in 2024 for his involvement in the January 6th insurrection.
Vance defends ICE operations in Minneapolis as Pentagon readies troops; Minnesota state and local officials investigated by DOJ. As shocking scenes continued to emerge from a city under siege, residents and journalists on the ground in Minneapolis have suggested that the reality is even worse than it looks, and viral videos fail to capture the ‘surreal’ feeling of being in a U.S. city overrun by an unrestrained, militarized occupation-style force. In the last week, before the shooting of Alex Pretti, ICE agents have detained U.S. citizens and held them without observance of rights to due process; raided public schools and taken children from classrooms, including 5-year-old Liam Ramos on the way home from preschool with his father, who was also detained; entered hospitals and shackled patients to their beds; eaten lunch at a Mexican restaurant and then detained restaurant employees after finishing their meal; and arrested over 100 faith leaders who joined a protest decrying ICE’s actions. On Wednesday, January 22, the U.S. Army issued a ‘prepare-to-deploy’ order to a military police brigade at Fort Bragg, North Carolina as well as to about 1,500 troops stationed in Alaska as Trump repeated threats to invoke the Insurrection Act in Minneapolis. Three activists were arrested at a church in St. Paul for disrupting a service with a protest calling out the pastor for being an ICE official; the White House later posted an AI-altered meme of arrested protestor Nekima Levy Armstrong that darkened her skin and made her appear as if she was crying while being arrested. A magistrate judge in Minnesota rejected federal prosecutors’ attempt to indict CNN journalist Don Lemon on federal charges for reporting on the church protest.
On Thursday, JD Vance traveled to Minneapolis to show ‘unwavering support’ for ICE amid continuous protests in nearly every corner of the city. Vance held a press conference where, flanked by federal agents and ICE vehicles emblazoned with the slogan ‘Defend the Homeland,’ he blamed the media, local and state officials, ‘far-left people’, and residents’ “weird reaction” to ICE for the turbulence in Minneapolis. Saying that he did not see ‘any need’ for troops in Minneapolis ‘right now,’ he called on local and state officials to “lower the temperature,” suggesting that ICE operations could be ‘less chaotic’ if local officials and law enforcement cooperated with federal forces. Three Minnesota police chiefs and a county sheriff criticized ICE and CBP’s actions within their jurisdictions, and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey blasted Vance after the press conference, accusing ICE of racial profiling and saying that Vance sounded like “he wanted to be mayor of this city… except he’s only been here two hours.” Vance’s calls for peace, he said, should be directed at DHS: “Peace is not spraying irritants and chemicals at peaceful protestors, it’s not arresting a 5-year-old, and it’s not dragging a pregnant woman through the streets.” Governor Walz added that he agrees the temperature should be taken down, but ‘actions speak louder than words’ and “we don’t need 3,000 ice agents in our streets – more than every local police department combined.” Meanwhile, Walz, Frey, Minnesota AG Keith Ellison and St. Paul Mayor Kaholy Her were issued subpoenas by the Justice Department amid what legal experts call a ‘highly unusual’ federal investigation into the role it claims state and local officials played in obstructing ICE operations; CNN reports that the DOJ has ordered the FBI to open a probe into the officials’ campaign finance records.
MOVEMENT TRACKER
Minneapolis General Strike sees simultaneous solidarity actions in more than 300 cities. On Friday, January 23, many schools, businesses and civic institutions in Minneapolis and across the state of Minnesota shut down for a ‘Day of Truth and Freedom’ called just 10 days before by a coalition of organized labor, faith, and community groups. The Minnesota AFL-CIO endorsed the action, along with dozens of local and regional labor bodies. While no-strike clauses under the Taft-Hartley Act prohibit many unions from formally banding together for a general strike, the “economic blackout” action on Friday was, for all intents and purposes, the first true general strike the United States has seen in 80 years; and is based on the same premise, as CWA Local 7250 President Kieran Knutson said: “Nothing runs without the working class in this country. And today we’re going to show our power.” Over 50,000 people braved subzero temperatures to come together for a rally in downtown Minneapolis in a show of solidarity that went beyond organizers’ expectations. Hundreds of faith leaders from across the country traveled to Minnesota to participate in the general strike, deploying in groups to patrol neighborhoods and protect immigrant families; about 100 were arrested at a demonstration at the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport against Delta Airlines’ support for ICE contracts, as another group of about 100 protestors blockaded the entrance to the ICE detention facility at Fort Snelling.
The strike and mass boycott was also joined by over 700 local businesses across the state, encouraged by networks of Somali and Black-owned small businesses, and many that stayed ‘open’ did so to provide demonstrators with a warm place to sit, hot coffee and meals free of charge. Minneapolis AFL-CIO President Chris Shields said he was pleasantly surprised to hear that many businesses even gave their workers a paid day off as part of their decision to close, to the reported dismay of pro-business Trump Administration officials; another labor organizer said it was essential that business leaders ‘break their silence’ around ICE raids that have significantly impacted the city’s labor force. Minneapolis Regional Chamber of Commerce president Mike Logan said that although opinions on the strike are mixed within the business community and the Chamber itself “doesn’t particularly love the idea” of a general strike, business and labor were in general agreement on the fact that ICE’s presence has disrupted the local economy, affecting small businesses and workers alike.
To many organizers concerned with the lack of substantive opposition in Congress and the Democratic Party in the face of escalating authoritarianism, the revival of the general strike as a tactic in Minneapolis – and subsequently, its re-entry into the national conversation – marks a watershed moment in the anti-Trump resistance that offers hope and a way forward for the nation as a whole. Over 300 cities across the country answered Minneapolis’ strike call and staged solidarity demonstrations as well as community meetings and political education events to talk to their own communities about what a general strike is and what it can do; raising the conditions of possibility within the public imagination to go on the offense and embrace more risky, yet effective tactics of mass disruption. Sarah Jaffe in the New Republic notes that the particular history and lineages of popular resistance in Minneapolis undoubtedly played a role in the success of this week’s general strike call; not only in recalling the memory of the Minneapolis General Strike of 1934 and the numerous times Minneapolis workers battled fascists into the 1940s and beyond, but also through the deep community connections and networks of care and mutual aid forged in more recent moments of struggle – notably COVID and the George Floyd rebellion – spawning an abolitionist consciousness among the populace that never went away, but continued to provide for people and communities in the spirit of solidarity, laying the essential groundwork that has cohered and sustained the deep community infrastructure now helping to fulfill embattled immigrants’ basic needs while undertaking unrelenting resistance to ICE’s occupation; a model that offered hope, comfort and courage to activists across the country and showed a way forward even before the killing of Renee Nicole Good. Even as the city reels from another brutal public murder at the hands of federal agents, residents continue to step up, braving ever-greater personal risks to protect immigrants, tell the truth and struggle to win the narrative about the reality they are experiencing, and harden themselves for what may come next.
‘Free America’ Walkout on anniversary of Trump inauguration, Women’s March draws engagement in smaller towns across the country. Thousands of people also participated this week in the ‘Free America’ mass walkout on Tuesday, January 20, an event organized by the Women’s March and a coalition of around 50 national liberal organizations. The walkout was timed for the 1-year anniversary of Trump’s second inauguration and the 9th anniversary of the original Women’s March in Washington DC that took place at the start of Trump’s first term. According to organizers, around 48,000 people in over 800 locations in all 50 states signed up to participate in the action; students staged walkouts at middle schools, high schools and universities, and thousands of workers left work early to join marches and rallies in centrally located public spaces, state Capitol buildings and congressional offices. Notably, many actions took place in smaller towns and deep-red districts that do not often host ‘left-leaning’ protests, like Arlington, TX; Summerville, SC; Norman, OK; Boise, ID; South Lake Tahoe, CA; Morgantown, WV; Bowling Green, KY; Marietta, OH; Marana, AZ; Bozeman, MT; Stuart, FL; Rockford, IL; York, PA; Aberdeen, WA; Boothbay Harbor, ME; Tuscaloosa, AL; and Odessa, TX, among many others.
Observers are noting that as the Trump Administration escalates its tactics and heightens the personal risk of engaging in dissent, the wave of grassroots community defiance has grown and spread outward to more communities and sectors of civil society, engaging not only the usual activist crowd but also local politicians, judges, middle-class suburban ‘wine moms’, parents, state prosecutors, tow truck drivers, librarians, scientists, actually libertarian gun enthusiasts, and kids playing Roblox. Even local law enforcement officers are finding themselves having to face off against the Administration’s actions. An update from the Crowd Counting Consortium finds that in 2025 protest activity increased 133% relative to 2017, the first year of Trump’s first term, and an overwhelming majority of U.S. counties – 42% of which went for Trump in the 2024 election – saw more than one protest over the past year. Erika Chenoweth of the CCC notes that the data shows a “very diffuse protest mobilization around the country,” a distinct feature of the current moment that “cuts against the narrative that protest is confined to major cities, to the coasts, and to predominantly liberal areas where it doesn’t change anybody’s mind.”
Greenlanders mock MAGA with ‘Make America Go Away’ protest hats and spark viral resistance memes and support throughout Europe as Indigenous residents tackle history, press for independence amid Trump threats. Bright-red MAGA parody baseball caps sporting the phrase “Make America Go Away” have become a new protest symbol and fashion craze among Danish and Greenlandic people who have taken to the streets over the past few weeks in response to Trump’s push to annex Greenland. An AI-generated video showing anthropomorphized polar bears, walruses, penguins, sled dogs, and orcas taking up arms to defend Greenland against Trump went viral throughout Europe as the crisis deepened. On January 19th, Greenland held its largest protest ever against Trump annexation threats and the prospect of new tariffs, mobilizing over 25% of the population of the capital city of Nuuk. Greenlanders also turned the colonial tables on Trump, planting signs in the snowy banks along roadsides bearing the slogan ‘MANA’ – “Make America Native Again.” In Copenhagen, thousands marched simultaneously in a “Hands Off Greenland” protest as political leaders faced off with Trump; ahead of the Davos summit, protestors in Zurich clashed with Swiss riot police as they burned U.S. flags and smashed windows of U.S. businesses with the message that “Trump is Still Not Welcome Here.” On Tuesday, January 20, as tensions reached a high pitch, Greenland PM Jens-Frederik Nielsen said the island and its people should be “prepared for everything,” and that the government was developing an information campaign for its people, including guides on what they can do in the event of a U.S. invasion.
Many Greenlanders have felt like their life “was on pause” over the last several weeks, and resented feeling like pawns in an imperialist Great Power game as the threat of a U.S. takeover overshadowed their long-standing colonial issues with Denmark and undermined the Indigenous movement for independence. Icelandic pop star Bjork called for Greenland’s independence earlier this month as the leaders of all five parties in Greenland’s parliament issued a statement saying, "We do not want to be Americans, we do not want to be Danes, we want to be Greenlanders.” An article in Grist magazine outlines several decades of Inuit Greenlanders’ struggles and wins that, despite still being a formal colony, managed to forge a ‘global model’ for Indigenous self-governance that is now imperiled as Trump’s threats forced the two polities back together into a protectorate-style relationship. Feeling like their voices have been excluded in the geopolitical drama surrounding the island, Inuit Greenlanders have spoken out through online avenues such as blogs and Native art for political education, hoping that this moment in the spotlight can illuminate issues of sovereignty that are both concerns and sources of hope for all Indigenous peoples.
