WEBVTT - Minneapolis' Anti-ICE Rent Strike 0:00:01.680 --> 0:00:05.040 Cool Zone Media. 0:00:06.600 --> 0:00:08.879 Welcome to Dick It Happened Here, a podcast about things 0:00:08.920 --> 0:00:10.959 falling apart and how to put them back together again. 0:00:11.160 --> 0:00:13.840 And I'm your host, Bia Wong. This is one of 0:00:13.920 --> 0:00:17.000 the most acute places where everything is falling apart and 0:00:17.000 --> 0:00:18.720 one of the most acute attempts to put it back 0:00:18.720 --> 0:00:21.520 together again. We're just going to get right into it 0:00:21.560 --> 0:00:24.119 with me to talk about a potential rent strike that 0:00:24.160 --> 0:00:28.880 there is significant organization going on for right now in 0:00:28.920 --> 0:00:33.720 Minneapolis as a reaction to the federal occupation. Is Tara Rogavier, 0:00:33.760 --> 0:00:36.680 the director of the Tenant Union Federation. Tara, Welcome to 0:00:36.720 --> 0:00:37.040 the show. 0:00:37.640 --> 0:00:38.480 Thanks so much. Mia. 0:00:39.040 --> 0:00:42.520 So okay, let's rewind a little bit. Can you talk 0:00:42.560 --> 0:00:46.200 a bit about what the specific conditions of the occupation 0:00:46.320 --> 0:00:51.120 and also just sort of the preoccupation world for tenants 0:00:51.720 --> 0:00:55.040 got us to a point where there is potentially the 0:00:55.120 --> 0:00:57.840 largest rent strike we've seen in a century being organized 0:00:57.880 --> 0:00:58.280 right now. 0:00:58.880 --> 0:01:00.440 Yeah. Absolutely so. 0:01:00.520 --> 0:01:02.160 First of all, thank you so much for having me 0:01:02.280 --> 0:01:06.120 and I am boarding live from the Twin Cities, where 0:01:06.640 --> 0:01:10.199 we've been in a really intense organizing drive now for 0:01:10.640 --> 0:01:12.480 many weeks, and of course the people of the Twin 0:01:12.520 --> 0:01:16.200 Cities have very ferociously fought back against this federal occupation 0:01:16.360 --> 0:01:19.800 for nearly three months. But I appreciate your question because 0:01:19.800 --> 0:01:22.800 I think actually to take us back a little bit 0:01:23.040 --> 0:01:27.160 is critical to understand the circumstances we find ourselves in now. 0:01:27.640 --> 0:01:30.000 So the first and most basic thing to say is 0:01:30.400 --> 0:01:34.600 the rent is too damn high. Yep, people cannot afford 0:01:34.640 --> 0:01:37.440 the rent in any corner of the country. You know, 0:01:37.520 --> 0:01:40.039 It's been true for many years now that a person 0:01:40.160 --> 0:01:43.920 earning minimum wage cannot afford a two bedroom apartment in 0:01:44.000 --> 0:01:48.600 any American county, whether that's urban, suburban, or rural. And 0:01:48.640 --> 0:01:51.520 as our rents go up, the conditions of our homes 0:01:51.680 --> 0:01:54.800 get worse. So what we have taken as saying these 0:01:54.880 --> 0:01:57.080 days is that we're paying higher rents than we've ever 0:01:57.160 --> 0:02:00.880 paid for the worst conditions we've ever in. And I 0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:02.600 know you know that as a tenant and as a 0:02:02.600 --> 0:02:05.880 former tenant organizer, your goal, but so many of our 0:02:05.920 --> 0:02:09.120 people are living this reality every day. And you know 0:02:09.280 --> 0:02:12.560 I organize. I'm based in Missouri, and I helped to 0:02:12.600 --> 0:02:16.639 found and organize with Casey Tenants, and increasingly we're organizing 0:02:16.720 --> 0:02:19.840 tenants in places like Raytown, Missouri on the outskirts of 0:02:19.919 --> 0:02:23.400 Kansas City, and the stakes are so high, and I 0:02:23.440 --> 0:02:25.919 really want to make sure listeners are aware of this. 0:02:26.400 --> 0:02:28.000 All of us are aware of it, but just to 0:02:28.040 --> 0:02:30.359 put a fine point on it, when you get priced 0:02:30.400 --> 0:02:32.800 out of a place like Chicago, you might end up 0:02:32.800 --> 0:02:35.360 in a place like Kansas City. When you get priced 0:02:35.360 --> 0:02:37.200 out of Kansas City, you might end up in a 0:02:37.200 --> 0:02:41.000 place like Raytown, Missouri. When you get priced out of Raytown, Missouri, 0:02:41.200 --> 0:02:43.720 there is no place else to go, and you're just 0:02:43.800 --> 0:02:47.640 stuck renting from the landlords of last resort, the people 0:02:47.639 --> 0:02:51.440 who are very keen to exactly how desperate the tenant 0:02:51.440 --> 0:02:55.000 condition is today, and then they exploit that by keeping 0:02:55.080 --> 0:02:58.040 us living in filth and hiking the rents at every turn. 0:02:58.360 --> 0:03:01.760 So that's some of the content that brings us into 0:03:01.760 --> 0:03:06.520 this moment, and that will be the context underlying every 0:03:06.560 --> 0:03:10.280 crisis following this one. And I think that's a really 0:03:10.320 --> 0:03:13.720 important thing to note, because the story I'm about to 0:03:13.720 --> 0:03:15.800 tell you about what's going on here is then also 0:03:15.840 --> 0:03:19.560 a story of possibility about what might go on in 0:03:19.600 --> 0:03:22.560 every crisis that we encounter from this point on. So 0:03:23.440 --> 0:03:26.240 we started organizing a tenant union, a twin cities wide 0:03:26.240 --> 0:03:29.320 tenant union at the end of January, and the reason 0:03:29.400 --> 0:03:32.080 for that is that the tenants of the twin cities 0:03:32.360 --> 0:03:36.000 had essentially been organizing unions for the two months preceding 0:03:36.040 --> 0:03:37.760 that as a way of fighting ice. 0:03:38.320 --> 0:03:41.040 Every building has a group chat right now. 0:03:41.640 --> 0:03:47.200 Every building has someone distributing whistles and zines so that 0:03:47.240 --> 0:03:49.920 people get information about how to spot ice, what to do, 0:03:49.960 --> 0:03:53.240 advice is there. People are organizing mutual aid to take 0:03:53.280 --> 0:03:55.600 care of their neighbors. That is essentially the work of 0:03:55.640 --> 0:03:56.400 a tenant union. 0:03:56.520 --> 0:03:58.400 Yep. So all we've done in the. 0:03:58.440 --> 0:04:01.400 Last couple of weeks is ads kind of structure and 0:04:01.440 --> 0:04:05.280 formality to the way that tenants have already gotten organized 0:04:05.480 --> 0:04:06.960 under this federal occupation. 0:04:07.440 --> 0:04:11.080 Could I ask a quick question here about how how 0:04:11.120 --> 0:04:14.360 the sort of citywide federation came together? Yeah, because that's 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:18.520 something I've seen attempted before. But it is pretty difficult. 0:04:19.160 --> 0:04:22.839 Yeah, it's a great question, and I think this won't 0:04:22.839 --> 0:04:25.840 surprise you that in a moment of crisis, Yeah, it's 0:04:25.880 --> 0:04:32.039 actually easier than in other circumstances, unfortunately, to get people organized. 0:04:32.200 --> 0:04:36.080 So a process that might have otherwise taken months to 0:04:36.200 --> 0:04:40.320 sort of align all the various entities organizing tenants in 0:04:40.360 --> 0:04:43.040 the Twin Cities took a matter of four and a 0:04:43.080 --> 0:04:43.640 half days. 0:04:43.920 --> 0:04:44.960 It's astonishing. 0:04:45.200 --> 0:04:47.920 Yeah, it's the best I've ever seen anything like. 0:04:47.880 --> 0:04:52.560 This move, right, And that's not to say it was easy, right. 0:04:52.600 --> 0:04:55.680 It took a lot. And you know, it took a 0:04:55.680 --> 0:04:58.120 lot from us as the Tenant Union Federation, but more 0:04:58.120 --> 0:05:00.920 to the point, it took a lot from tenants here 0:05:01.080 --> 0:05:04.679 who have been organizing in their own formations for many 0:05:04.760 --> 0:05:08.800 months preceding this crisis. So there's a local organization we're 0:05:08.839 --> 0:05:12.480 working with called Inqualinosunidos. They've been organizing for ten years 0:05:12.839 --> 0:05:15.479 and they've a base of mostly Latino and Somali tenants 0:05:15.839 --> 0:05:18.520 all across the city. Then there's a crew that's been 0:05:18.600 --> 0:05:22.040 organizing in South Minneapolis, the South Minneapolis Tenants Union. Then 0:05:22.040 --> 0:05:24.480 there's tenants to have been organizing in Saint Paul. Then 0:05:24.480 --> 0:05:27.360 there's tenants to have been organizing autonomously in their properties 0:05:27.400 --> 0:05:31.039 and forming tenant associations and marching on the landlord. So 0:05:31.640 --> 0:05:33.599 what we tried to do as quickly as possible was 0:05:33.640 --> 0:05:37.360 kind of assemble all of these forces and really focus 0:05:37.400 --> 0:05:40.159 ourselves on the project of building something that was bigger 0:05:40.200 --> 0:05:44.320 than some of its parts that could create the potential 0:05:44.440 --> 0:05:47.520 for enduring power out of this moment. And the thing 0:05:47.560 --> 0:05:49.559 that we said in those four and a half days 0:05:49.560 --> 0:05:52.640 of sprint as we tried to assemble this force is 0:05:53.080 --> 0:05:57.719 the tenant Union is good for protection today and power tomorrow. 0:05:58.120 --> 0:06:01.040 So this is just an experiment. We actually don't know 0:06:01.080 --> 0:06:03.640 what's going to come of this, but it's an experiment 0:06:03.640 --> 0:06:05.920 that I personally feel extremely invested in. 0:06:06.320 --> 0:06:08.200 Yeah, because I, like you, have. 0:06:08.080 --> 0:06:11.880 Lived through many moments of uprising and activation in the 0:06:11.960 --> 0:06:16.520 last several years, and unfortunately, more often than not, that 0:06:16.680 --> 0:06:22.200 uprising and that activation eventually evaporates, and the tenant Union 0:06:22.320 --> 0:06:26.480 offers one potential vehicle to hold some of that activation 0:06:26.680 --> 0:06:29.720 into the future and to channel it into real and 0:06:29.839 --> 0:06:30.680 enduring power. 0:06:31.200 --> 0:06:32.560 Yeah. 0:06:32.680 --> 0:06:35.279 There's another aspect of this before we get into what's 0:06:35.279 --> 0:06:37.480 happening right now that I was really interested in, which 0:06:37.520 --> 0:06:42.960 is how did the sort of connections and organizational bonds 0:06:43.160 --> 0:06:46.640 with labor unions start happening? Because that's another really cool 0:06:46.680 --> 0:06:48.520 feature of this that's pretty unique. 0:06:48.800 --> 0:06:53.120 Yeah, totally unprecedented, and even I, yeah, my mind's can 0:06:53.160 --> 0:06:56.880 have blown right. A sort of contextual piece that's important 0:06:57.040 --> 0:07:02.120 is that the people of Minnesota are built different. There's 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:09.680 a longstanding alignment partnership relationship among organized labor and between 0:07:09.880 --> 0:07:14.600 labor and community organizations here that sort of doesn't have 0:07:15.320 --> 0:07:18.880 a comparison anywhere else in the country. And I might 0:07:18.960 --> 0:07:21.960 be speaking out of turn, but I've never seen anything 0:07:22.040 --> 0:07:25.280 like this. I've never seen this depth of alignment among 0:07:25.400 --> 0:07:30.000 organized labor, between labor and community, and so that context 0:07:30.120 --> 0:07:33.640 is really important to understand because then I think in 0:07:33.720 --> 0:07:38.280 this moment of crisis, labor is much more open to 0:07:39.200 --> 0:07:42.520 a call from community groups and from tenants than they 0:07:42.560 --> 0:07:45.840 might be in other types of situations. So, you know, 0:07:45.880 --> 0:07:49.720 we really leaned on the local relationship and the depth 0:07:49.720 --> 0:07:53.560 of relationship between groups like Inculinos Nidos and these like 0:07:53.680 --> 0:07:57.840 labor tables that have existed. And you know, further important 0:07:57.840 --> 0:08:01.600 context is like groups like i CiU Local twenty six. 0:08:02.000 --> 0:08:05.760 We're leading the call for this general strike day on 0:08:06.200 --> 0:08:09.960 January twenty third, and there was this incredible table of 0:08:10.120 --> 0:08:14.480 labor leadership that came together to sort of lead that day. 0:08:15.000 --> 0:08:17.480 Can you explain for our listeners, like when you're talking 0:08:17.520 --> 0:08:19.560 about it like a labor table, can you explain what 0:08:19.560 --> 0:08:19.880 that is? 0:08:20.160 --> 0:08:22.600 Yeah, I mean, essentially as far as I understand it. 0:08:23.160 --> 0:08:27.640 There's just a really regular conversation that labor leaders are 0:08:27.640 --> 0:08:31.240 having together and these days, I think more often than not, 0:08:31.440 --> 0:08:33.760 it's not just labor, it's labor. And then they've pulled 0:08:33.800 --> 0:08:37.240 in partners from community groups and tenant unions and some 0:08:37.280 --> 0:08:41.840 of the resistance formations as well, and that also is remarkable, right, 0:08:41.880 --> 0:08:43.679 I'm saying this as though it's just kind of like, 0:08:44.120 --> 0:08:48.079 you know, fact of the matter. It's amazing that labor 0:08:48.160 --> 0:08:51.600 leadership in a context like this is in touch enough 0:08:51.679 --> 0:08:56.040 that they understand who's leading some of the decentralized autonomous 0:08:56.160 --> 0:08:59.720 resistance work and is not only aware of that, but 0:09:00.280 --> 0:09:02.480 them in to these kinds of war rooms that are 0:09:02.520 --> 0:09:06.520 now existing, and they're talking on an almost daily basis 0:09:06.559 --> 0:09:09.520 as far as I understand it, So the ask moved 0:09:09.559 --> 0:09:13.720 pretty quickly. I think we brought a vision and a 0:09:13.760 --> 0:09:17.880 strategy to some of the closest labor partners, and their 0:09:18.080 --> 0:09:21.560 willingness to join in on the strike drive comes from 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:24.920 an intense clarity about the stakes for their members. 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:29.760 Any of these unions include membership. 0:09:29.440 --> 0:09:33.560 That cannot make the rent on March first, and so 0:09:33.679 --> 0:09:35.720 they're not taking this lightly right, This is a big 0:09:35.840 --> 0:09:39.080 risk They're sticking their necks out for something that is 0:09:39.160 --> 0:09:41.640 a total moonshot. We don't know whether or not we're 0:09:41.640 --> 0:09:43.640 going to be able to pull it off, but what 0:09:43.640 --> 0:09:46.319 we know is we needed to try for some additional 0:09:46.400 --> 0:09:49.000 leverage that we didn't have a couple days ago. 0:10:00.640 --> 0:10:04.160 I'm astonished by effectively every part of this, because every 0:10:04.480 --> 0:10:06.760 and every fourth thing you say is like, this is 0:10:06.760 --> 0:10:10.720 the coolest thing I've ever seen. But yeah, how fast 0:10:10.720 --> 0:10:15.280 this came together is astonishing. The willingness and speed with 0:10:15.320 --> 0:10:21.040 which labor is mobilizing is sort of is astonishing, And yeah, 0:10:21.040 --> 0:10:26.079 I don't know this is this is really cool. Yeah, 0:10:26.120 --> 0:10:28.640 And I guess the next thing I wanted to ask 0:10:28.720 --> 0:10:31.680 about outside of sort of the how did this organization 0:10:32.080 --> 0:10:36.000 come together? Is what are the specific demands being made? 0:10:36.480 --> 0:10:42.000 Yeah, so there's three main demands related to the strike drive. 0:10:42.440 --> 0:10:46.040 One is ICE out, and a part of that that 0:10:46.040 --> 0:10:49.160 I feel like you'll be interested in is ICE is in. 0:10:49.200 --> 0:10:53.600 The federal government is pretending that the reason for the 0:10:53.679 --> 0:10:57.840 invasion is economic. They're like, this is an economic intervention. 0:10:58.520 --> 0:11:01.600 ICE is here to fix the economy by deporting a 0:11:01.640 --> 0:11:04.400 bunch of people who are taking your jobs. Part of 0:11:04.440 --> 0:11:07.559 what we're trying to do is highlight what is the reality, 0:11:07.720 --> 0:11:11.240 which is that ice is bad for the economy. Ice 0:11:11.280 --> 0:11:15.520 has devastated the economy. We're trying to heighten that contradiction 0:11:15.640 --> 0:11:19.120 between what they say they're here to do and what 0:11:19.200 --> 0:11:23.040 is actually occurring. And so we will demonstrate if we 0:11:23.120 --> 0:11:27.360 authorize a strike, what actual economic disruption looks like if 0:11:27.400 --> 0:11:29.600 tenants exercise their economic power. 0:11:29.760 --> 0:11:32.560 So that's one thing, Ice out, Ice fully out. 0:11:32.640 --> 0:11:35.280 There's all this talk about a drawdown now, but there's 0:11:35.280 --> 0:11:36.559 still ICE agents here. 0:11:36.400 --> 0:11:38.520 K napping people on a daily basis. 0:11:38.960 --> 0:11:42.800 The second thing is a statewide eviction moratorium. And this 0:11:42.880 --> 0:11:45.319 has been a demand for the last two and a 0:11:45.360 --> 0:11:49.080 half nearly three months. The governor has not moved on it, 0:11:49.480 --> 0:11:52.840 the state legislature has not moved on it. Eviction court 0:11:52.880 --> 0:11:57.160 is running quote unquote as normal during a time there 0:11:57.200 --> 0:12:01.640 are three thousand federal agents in Minneapolis, Pall. So demand 0:12:01.720 --> 0:12:05.240 number two is end evictions, no evictions under federal occupation 0:12:05.360 --> 0:12:09.040 and frankly not for a long time until something resembling 0:12:09.080 --> 0:12:12.320 real recovery is possible. And then demand number three is 0:12:12.400 --> 0:12:15.720 real rent relief, and they're real is important here because 0:12:16.160 --> 0:12:18.640 it's not enough just to get tens of millions of 0:12:18.679 --> 0:12:22.000 dollars that we would then be expected to apply for 0:12:22.120 --> 0:12:24.560 and turn around and give to the landlord. So when 0:12:24.559 --> 0:12:27.640 we say real rent relief, we mean tens of millions 0:12:27.679 --> 0:12:31.240 of dollars that come with strings attached. If landlords benefit 0:12:31.280 --> 0:12:34.720 from what is effectively a bailout because of how bad 0:12:34.840 --> 0:12:38.280 ICE is for the economy, then they should be accountable 0:12:38.600 --> 0:12:42.240 to a higher standard of tenant protections. So one ICE out, 0:12:42.240 --> 0:12:44.760 two eviction moratorium, three rent relief. 0:12:45.360 --> 0:12:48.760 These are fairly moderate demands, and they remind me a 0:12:48.800 --> 0:12:52.880 lot of a series of both demands and also just 0:12:52.920 --> 0:12:55.440 the way that policy works treating the initial parts of 0:12:55.440 --> 0:12:58.200 the pandemic, where there was there were a lot of 0:12:58.240 --> 0:13:00.960 in a lot of cases there actually were like moratoriums 0:13:00.960 --> 0:13:06.080 that you know, we're never enforced as strictly as the 0:13:06.200 --> 0:13:09.679 letter of what they said, but was a thing that 0:13:09.760 --> 0:13:13.360 was implemented in conditions where suddenly people just literally couldn't 0:13:13.400 --> 0:13:16.040 work because massive external force. 0:13:16.840 --> 0:13:17.280 Totally. 0:13:17.679 --> 0:13:19.959 Yeah, a lot of what we're working with right now 0:13:20.200 --> 0:13:24.679 is groundwork that was laid during the COVID nineteen eviction crisis, 0:13:24.720 --> 0:13:27.240 or the early years of it. Right The bill that 0:13:27.280 --> 0:13:30.080 we introduced in the state legislature this week is literally 0:13:30.120 --> 0:13:33.760 modeled after the Rent and Mortgage Cancelation Act that we 0:13:33.800 --> 0:13:36.680 wrote back in twenty twenty to try to get rents 0:13:36.679 --> 0:13:39.360 and mortgage is canceled when people couldn't go to work 0:13:39.400 --> 0:13:41.120 and couldn't leave the house because. 0:13:40.800 --> 0:13:42.160 Of the pandemic. 0:13:42.679 --> 0:13:45.559 And I think that's actually an important thing again to 0:13:45.640 --> 0:13:50.600 keep in mind because crises like this will continue happening 0:13:51.000 --> 0:13:57.439 under today's conditions. Right We're hurtling towards deep and encompassing authoritarianism, 0:13:57.679 --> 0:14:01.560 there's escalating climate catastrophe. We're going to be in this 0:14:01.679 --> 0:14:07.520 situation much more frequently and at higher degrees of stress. 0:14:07.600 --> 0:14:09.080 Pretty much for the rest of our lives. 0:14:09.480 --> 0:14:13.720 So it's good actually for us to start learning from 0:14:14.120 --> 0:14:16.600 the work that we did five years ago and applying 0:14:16.640 --> 0:14:19.760 it here to like borrow and steal from our past 0:14:19.760 --> 0:14:22.840 selves to build from something rather than start from scratch. 0:14:23.240 --> 0:14:25.239 I wish we didn't live under these types. 0:14:25.000 --> 0:14:29.600 Of you know, cascading crisis, but that's the situation we're in. 0:14:29.640 --> 0:14:31.200 And I've been feeling. 0:14:30.920 --> 0:14:33.880 So often in the last month that the only touch 0:14:33.920 --> 0:14:36.120 point in my life I have to this moment is 0:14:36.160 --> 0:14:38.080 the early months of the pandemic. 0:14:38.760 --> 0:14:43.200 Yeah, and I think that gets at the depth and 0:14:43.320 --> 0:14:47.240 seriousness of the crisis in a way that I feel 0:14:47.240 --> 0:14:51.880 like is not understood outside of Minneapolis. I mean, I think, 0:14:52.080 --> 0:14:55.480 you know, like my connections, I'm from Chicago, my connections 0:14:55.520 --> 0:14:57.760 in Chicago, there was a lot of that experience. But 0:14:58.000 --> 0:15:01.480 even in Chicago it was kind of there were places 0:15:01.480 --> 0:15:03.600 that were like that, and then you could go like 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:08.400 three neighborhoods over and everything was sort of operating normally 0:15:08.480 --> 0:15:11.120 for the most part until the next sort of raids came, 0:15:12.080 --> 0:15:15.480 and that I feel like, I don't know, it seems 0:15:15.480 --> 0:15:17.760 to be listening to you talk about this that's been 0:15:18.480 --> 0:15:20.480 the catalyzing force for all of us, that it is 0:15:20.760 --> 0:15:22.560 just constant crisis everywhere. 0:15:23.080 --> 0:15:26.120 Yeah, and I think you're right that people outside of 0:15:26.160 --> 0:15:29.840 the Twin Cities maybe don't understand the depths of the devastation. 0:15:30.000 --> 0:15:33.040 But just to put a fine point on it, conservative 0:15:33.160 --> 0:15:37.200 estimates show over forty seven million dollars and lost wages 0:15:37.760 --> 0:15:39.640 among people who have not been safe to go to 0:15:39.640 --> 0:15:42.320 work in the last three months. Yeah, forty seven million 0:15:42.400 --> 0:15:45.400 dollars and lost wages. I just had a conversation with 0:15:45.560 --> 0:15:49.320 a dad yesterday whose kids go to a school where 0:15:49.640 --> 0:15:52.640 there are eighty families where the parents have not been 0:15:52.680 --> 0:15:54.360 safe to go to work, they haven't been safe to 0:15:54.400 --> 0:15:57.240 take their own children to school, and so the other 0:15:57.360 --> 0:16:00.000 parents in the school have been organizing support around them 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:01.960 for the last two months, and they just did a 0:16:02.040 --> 0:16:05.320 round of calls through all those families this week. 0:16:05.800 --> 0:16:07.320 None of them can make March rent. 0:16:07.720 --> 0:16:12.480 Right, So, even if we're living under a supposed draw down, 0:16:13.120 --> 0:16:15.920 the crisis is still so alive. And I think that's 0:16:15.960 --> 0:16:20.440 also why you see organized labor lining up alongside us 0:16:20.520 --> 0:16:24.200 in this strip drive. They know, like Local twenty six 0:16:24.240 --> 0:16:26.880 has two hundred members that cannot make the rent on 0:16:26.960 --> 0:16:29.520 March first. So I think that that sort of like 0:16:29.640 --> 0:16:33.880 economic side of this story is not really known, felt, 0:16:33.960 --> 0:16:37.040 or understood outside of the Twin Cities right now, but 0:16:37.160 --> 0:16:40.760 everyone here knows and feels it because they've turned their 0:16:40.800 --> 0:16:44.160 lives inside out for the last three months to organize 0:16:44.400 --> 0:16:46.280 you know, millions of dollars in mutual aid. 0:16:46.320 --> 0:16:47.960 But here's the thing is, we. 0:16:47.880 --> 0:16:52.280 Cannot go fundme our way out of this scale emergency. 0:16:52.760 --> 0:16:56.200 It requires state intervention, and that's what we're calling for. 0:16:56.800 --> 0:16:58.440 I want to come back to that the forty seven 0:16:58.520 --> 0:17:01.440 million number for a second, because I think when we 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:03.400 hear numbers like that, we're used to hearing them in 0:17:03.440 --> 0:17:09.320 the context of you know, state agencies or multi billion 0:17:09.359 --> 0:17:13.359 dollar companies. And this is not that. This is not 0:17:13.400 --> 0:17:17.359 a situation where these people have billions of dollars and 0:17:17.400 --> 0:17:19.800 you're losing some fraction of that. This is something where 0:17:19.800 --> 0:17:24.040 every single one of those dollars matters, so acutely, it's 0:17:24.040 --> 0:17:27.400 not forty seven million dollars coming from Google. Is forty 0:17:27.400 --> 0:17:31.640 seven million dollars coming from people like you, And that 0:17:31.800 --> 0:17:35.680 is an unfathomable humanitarian crisis. 0:17:36.280 --> 0:17:40.960 Yeah, it's a huge crisis and one that kind of 0:17:41.040 --> 0:17:46.760 ludicrously the leaders at the state and city level have 0:17:47.880 --> 0:17:53.200 suggested that everyday people should solve. Forty seven million dollars 0:17:53.240 --> 0:17:57.720 for everyday people is enormous. You know, through extraordinary efforts, 0:17:58.280 --> 0:18:00.640 the people of the Twin Cities have or is something 0:18:00.640 --> 0:18:04.160 in the neighborhood of six million dollars in rental assistance 0:18:04.200 --> 0:18:07.840 for their own neighbors, like mutual aid style. Forty seven 0:18:07.840 --> 0:18:10.560 million dollars or fifty million dollars. Seventy five million dollars 0:18:10.920 --> 0:18:13.720 is nothing for the state to figure out. Right at 0:18:13.760 --> 0:18:17.399 the city level, there's you know, something to the tune 0:18:17.400 --> 0:18:21.320 of sixty million dollar pot that's funded through sales taxes 0:18:21.400 --> 0:18:24.679 that goes into the maintenance of the downtown infrastructure. They 0:18:24.800 --> 0:18:27.240 pulled some of that money just this past week to 0:18:27.359 --> 0:18:28.639 support small businesses. 0:18:28.840 --> 0:18:31.639 Yeah, what about the people, right What about. 0:18:31.400 --> 0:18:34.600 The people who have had to scrounch together what they 0:18:34.640 --> 0:18:37.440 can to take care of themselves, dip into their savings, 0:18:37.880 --> 0:18:41.840 put together funds to take care of their neighbors. That 0:18:41.880 --> 0:18:45.160 can't continue like that forever. And it's ludicrous that they've 0:18:45.200 --> 0:18:48.000 been asked to do that until now. So you know, 0:18:48.080 --> 0:18:51.960 the strike drive is really about making that point in 0:18:52.040 --> 0:18:54.520 public that the state. 0:18:54.359 --> 0:18:55.480 Needs to intervene. 0:18:55.600 --> 0:18:59.360 We need solutions, We need some level of commitment from 0:18:59.400 --> 0:19:02.359 the state, the governor, of the state legislature, and from 0:19:02.440 --> 0:19:05.919 the cities in order to protect people, to keep them 0:19:05.920 --> 0:19:08.200 in their homes for now, and to make them whole 0:19:08.320 --> 0:19:09.160 in the long run. 0:19:19.800 --> 0:19:22.560 I think the other element of this too, and something 0:19:22.600 --> 0:19:25.680 that I remember dealing with doing tenant organizing, is that 0:19:26.440 --> 0:19:28.959 on a very basic level, this is the most brutal 0:19:29.040 --> 0:19:31.960 possible time that you can be evicted. It is February 0:19:32.040 --> 0:19:35.119 right now, it is going to be early March, which 0:19:35.160 --> 0:19:39.360 is whether that can just kill you. And on top 0:19:39.440 --> 0:19:42.600 of that on sort of political level, where we're very 0:19:42.680 --> 0:19:44.960 used to talking about eviction as like a kind of 0:19:45.680 --> 0:19:48.320 process that we're used to happening. But it's like, no, 0:19:48.520 --> 0:19:53.239 we're sending a bunch of people out into whether that 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:56.600 will kill them, and then also just into the arms 0:19:56.600 --> 0:20:00.119 of a federal occupation. And it's the only and that, 0:20:00.160 --> 0:20:01.840 of course I could think of business like, yeah, you're 0:20:02.000 --> 0:20:04.480 evicting people into the hands of the Gestapo, which is 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:08.000 one of the most evil things that can even possibly 0:20:08.040 --> 0:20:11.560 be contemplated. And yet it's just what business as usual 0:20:11.560 --> 0:20:12.000 has been. 0:20:12.480 --> 0:20:16.359 Yeah, I mean, it's hard to even find the words 0:20:16.400 --> 0:20:19.719 to describe the evil. And as you said, it's not 0:20:19.840 --> 0:20:25.160 dissimilar to the first year of the COVID nineteen pandemic, 0:20:25.320 --> 0:20:28.320 before there was a vaccine, eviction courts and states like 0:20:28.359 --> 0:20:31.480 mine and Missouri were just open. You know, the courts 0:20:31.480 --> 0:20:34.320 were open in my county starting in May of twenty twenty, 0:20:34.359 --> 0:20:37.160 a full year before we had a vaccine, and people 0:20:37.200 --> 0:20:40.560 were being evicted into the streets during a time when 0:20:40.600 --> 0:20:42.920 we were told to stay home in order to protect 0:20:42.920 --> 0:20:45.040 ourselves and our neighbors from a deadly virus. 0:20:45.160 --> 0:20:46.640 Yeah, so it's a really similar thing. 0:20:46.920 --> 0:20:50.280 You know, the quote unquote business as usual of state 0:20:50.400 --> 0:20:54.800 sanctioned violence, and every eviction is an act of violence. 0:20:55.160 --> 0:20:59.000 The sort of normalcy in the mundanity of that violence 0:20:59.800 --> 0:21:02.480 is practiced every day and in front of our eyes 0:21:02.560 --> 0:21:06.639 right now. And I think that point about mundanity is 0:21:06.680 --> 0:21:09.240 important to draw out right because I think what we've 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:11.360 seen in the Twin Cities in the last three months 0:21:11.520 --> 0:21:17.480 is really visible in your face state violence, as the 0:21:17.480 --> 0:21:20.120 ice agents have come and pupper sprayed and beat people 0:21:20.200 --> 0:21:22.399 up and of course shot and killed people as well. 0:21:23.040 --> 0:21:26.560 The day to day violence of eviction is actually. 0:21:26.680 --> 0:21:31.440 Harder to mobilize people around because it's so boring, it's 0:21:31.440 --> 0:21:35.400 so bureaucratic, it's so taken for granted that the state 0:21:35.440 --> 0:21:38.760 treats us like this, that the state exists to protect 0:21:38.880 --> 0:21:43.240 property over people and their lives and their needs. And 0:21:43.320 --> 0:21:46.440 that's an interesting thing to think about in this moment too, 0:21:46.680 --> 0:21:48.879 where there may or may not be a drawdown of 0:21:48.920 --> 0:21:52.439 the federal agents, but the long standing economic impacts of 0:21:52.520 --> 0:21:57.080 this invasion are here, and it'll be an interesting test 0:21:57.160 --> 0:22:01.960 of people's solidarity and focus and endurance to continue showing 0:22:02.040 --> 0:22:04.920 up in the months after the agents. 0:22:04.680 --> 0:22:08.640 Go away, assuming they do, which is also. 0:22:08.960 --> 0:22:12.280 Yeah, yeah, yeah, assuming they go away, right. 0:22:12.320 --> 0:22:14.640 But you know, I have faith, I have more faith 0:22:14.680 --> 0:22:17.080 than I've ever had in my life that the people 0:22:17.119 --> 0:22:20.720 of the Twin Cities who have so righteously fought this 0:22:20.800 --> 0:22:24.000 invasion are showing up and will continue to show up 0:22:24.160 --> 0:22:27.400 even after a time when the agents are gone, assuming 0:22:27.440 --> 0:22:30.280 that happens. And that's a critical test, that will be 0:22:30.320 --> 0:22:32.879 a turning point because we live in a world where 0:22:33.000 --> 0:22:36.000 this mundane violence actually does happen all the time, even 0:22:36.000 --> 0:22:37.040 outside of crisis. 0:22:37.600 --> 0:22:37.959 Yeah. 0:22:38.200 --> 0:22:42.560