Faith leaders, labor unions, and community leaders are calling for a “Day of Truth and Freedom” on Friday, Jan. 23, urging all Minnesotans not to go to work or school, or to go shopping. Organizers held a Jan. 13 news conference outside of the Hennepin County Government Center in Minneapolis, led by JaNaé Bates Imari, an Auxiliary Minister at St. Paul’s Camphor Memorial United Methodist Church. The Day of Truth and Freedom will also include a march and rally in downtown Minneapolis at 2 p.m., Bates Imari said, “What we have seen and what we have witnessed, what we have all gone through is not normal. Renee Good was standing up for her neighbor. Her whistle blowing was returned by bullets. We will not, we cannot let that stand. Minnesota will not continue to be a testing ground for all the kind of fear and violence that is expected for the rest of the country.”
Speaking at the press conference, Abdikarim Hassan Qazi, a U.S. citizen who was born in Somalia, described how he has been bullied and harassed since the beginning of “Operation Metro Surge” in December. Qazi said, “We’re facing a tsunami of hate sponsored by our own federal government. The masks are going to come off. We’re going to hold them responsible for all their actions.” Rev. Brian Herron of Zion Baptist Church in Minneapolis said: “This is about evil, dark principalities, and wickedness in high places. Darkness can’t drive out darkness. Only light can break darkness, and we choose to be light today. We choose to speak peace and not hate.”
