Pastor Doug Pagitt discusses how the resistance community he works with has been doing since the dark days of the ICE invasion in the Twin Cities in January. He talks about the Department of Justice’s recent federal criminal charges against 15 Minneapolis residents in connection with anti-ICE protests in Minneapolis-St. Paul earlier this year, accusing them of “conspiracy to impede or injure federal officers” and of allegedly “violently” impeding immigration enforcement in the Twin Cities.
SCOTT HARRIS: Right now, I’m very happy to welcome back to our program Pastor Doug Pagitt, executive director of the Minneapolis-based national organization Vote Common Good. And Pastor Pagitt has been on the front lines of recent dark conflicts in the streets of Minneapolis and St. Paul. And we’re happy you could join us again this evening, Pastor Pagitt, to talk about what’s going on in your city.
PASTOR DOUG PAGITT: Well, Scott, always a pleasure to be with you and to think about your listeners and to have a chance to talk about what’s going on.
SCOTT HARRIS: Say a brief word if you would about Vote Common Good and the work you do there and then certainly we’ll get into the more recent things that you’ve been involved with.
PASTOR DOUG PAGITT: Yeah. Well, thanks. Always glad to talk about that. Vote Common Good. We try to help faith voters across the United States, especially Christian faith voters, know that they have a place in the Democratic party. And for a lot of those people, a lot of religious people in America have defaulted to voting for Republicans. Sometimes we joke, it’s like somebody went to church to find Jesus and they came out of Republican and they’re not sure what happened. But over the last 40 or 50 years, it’s been this really hard swing. I’m often reminded how 63 percent of white evangelicals voted for Jimmy Carter in 1976 in the presidential election and yet 16 percent voted for Hillary Clinton. So something dramatic happened in those intervening years. But some presidential candidates do better. Barack Obama did pretty well. Joe Biden did the best and then it been ups and downs. So we try to help those voters know that they can find a place in the Democratic party.
And we help the Democratic party know how to reach out to faith voters. So we traveled the country, we train candidates. I was in Michigan last week with a Michigan Democratic Rural Caucus. I worked with the DCCC. I was there a couple weeks ago training red and blue flip candidates who are in congressional races that we expect to flip and work with the DNC; work with some folks that people might know around the country; the Talarico campaign and others. So yeah, that’s the kind of work that we do. And I live here in Minneapolis, so I’ve been very involved as a pastor myself here in Minneapolis over the years and then in this more political and activist work as well.
SCOTT HARRIS: Yeah. We were very fortunate to be able to talk to you about the work that you were doing in the Twin Cities during the Trump regime’s deployment of thousands of ICE agents and other federal immigration law enforcement that brutalized Minneapolis and St. Paul residents that of course ended with tragic ICE shooting death of two American citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti. These were very, very dark and dangerous days and you were on the front lines with others across these cities, this really violent crisis. And the residents of the Twin Cities really stood their ground nonviolently resisting tyranny, but it’s safe to say that many people in Minneapolis and St. Paul were really traumatized by these events and are likely still recovering and in a healing process. I want to talk about some recent developments, but maybe you could just talk about that for a bit because your cities have been through something like no other city has been in recent memory.
PASTOR DOUG PAGITT: Yeah, thanks for thinking about us that way. It really is a traumatic experience for so many people. You know, Scott, it’s kind of hard to say it this bluntly sometimes. But you know, there’s a lot of conservatives who promised America that if the federal government were to take up arms against the citizens, they were going to use their Second Amendment rights and their call to action and call to arms to step out and help save the American people. They’ve been promising that for generations. It happened in our city, it happened in Los Angeles, it happened in Porland, it happened in Chicago, happened in Charlotte, North Carolina … they’re nowhere to be found.
No one spoke up when Donald Trump said that Alex Pretti deserved to be shot and killed, shot in the back while lying on the ground because he was carrying a concealed weapon. The NRA stayed silent. So all these people that I think have been lobbying for more guns on our streets and putting our children at risk and stopping the limitation of assault rifles, that whole movement became absolutely silent, stayed home and in fact told the rest of us to comply or die.
So that’s heart-breaking in its own right, but watching federal agents storm our streets really did traumatize a lot of people. And there’s many trauma responses. One of those trauma responses is to not wait for anybody else and to step out yourself and to protect your city. So that happened all across our city. And it’s still happening till this day. Folks who ICE is targeting unlawfully to get to work, to go to school, to go shopping, to pay their rent. There’s still an awful lot of positive things going on.
And then as I’m sure you were already talking about on the show, now the federal government is attacking another group of people here, protesters or journalists. They are targeting everyone. And again, the civil libertarians in our world told us that if the federal government were to ever come after our rights, our First Amendment rights, freedom of speech, freedom of press, our Second Amendment rights to bear arms, that they were going to be there for us.
And unfortunately, the conservative movement in the United States has completely found itself to be void of fulfilling any of its promises. And all it has done is to bring such harm and darkness. And look, I mean, I’ve been working for years to get Democrats elected, but there’ve been times where I’ve said, there’s some Republicans or some conservatives that we could pull into the cause. And now it feels like, boy, if they’re going to come into the cause, they have to leave that old stuff behind if they’re going to join into this movement to try to protect civil rights.
And when the federal government now is bringing up charges against protesters and not charges against the federal agents who shot and killed two citizens on our streets—that just tells you that they’re not seeking justice. They’re just seeking political retribution and political harm.
SCOTT HARRIS: Absolutely. And well said. Pastor Pagitt, as you just referenced a moment ago, earlier this month, the Department of Justice charged 15 Minnesota residents with conspiracy to impede or injure a federal officer after they participated in protest against ICE mass deportation raids in January. Some observers say this is an effort by the Trump administration to criminalize dissent and impinge on free speech. I know that’s your interpretation from what you said a moment ago. Tell us about these arrests and what’s the buzz about this in the Twin Cities, Minneapolis and St. Paul?
PASTOR DOUG PAGITT: It’s interesting. And of the 15 who’ve been charged and they’re likely going to try to charge others. Again, this is the same Justice Department that at the command of the president pardoned people who attacked and beat police officers in January of 2021. People who literally assaulted federal police officers were pardoned. And these people who chose to follow ICE agents when they’re doing public work on our public streets are considered people who should be charged with crimes for harming officers.
One of the questions that was asked when these arraignments charges were announced was what agents were harmed? And there weren’t any. I can tell you a number of citizens who were harmed. I can tell you a number of people who were shot at, who were killed. Can’t name one federal ICE agent who was harmed in the act of the duty. I saw a few of them slip on the ice and fall. Maybe that was the fault of protesters as well for making these folks have to get out of their vehicles while they run with their masks on.
But we don’t know who those federal agents are, Scott, and I’m not just trying to be sassy about this. We literally don’t know who they are because they were unnamed and uncredentialed. No badges, no nameplates, no identifications whatsoever, simply young men with masks on their faces claiming to be federal agents.
And I know some of the people who’ve been charged with these crimes, some of them, they want to take it on. They’re like, “Come and get us. Let’s go to court. Let’s bring up the evidence, prove your case.” And I know others are very scared and not everybody who chose to risk their own reputation, their own money, their own health, their own well-being to go out on the streets and to protect their citizens against a rogue government did it for the same reasons. And not everybody did it with the same level of confidence or of willingness to be pursued again by this federal government.
But that’s what we’re going to get out of the Trump administration. You’re going to get a series of retributions and charges. And there’s never been an administration that has pardoned more criminals than this one and yet they want to turn citizens into criminals and criminals into pardoned people. So we’re living in an upside down world. It’s not going to last long.
And look, I’m not being charged. I can’t speak on their behalf, but I am highly confident that when these cases are brought to court, these people will not be found guilty of putting federal agents in harm’s way. And if the federal government wants to try these cases, I hope they do. And when this has to be brought out in court before a jury of these people’s peers here in Minnesota and see how a reasonable person would conclude whether these people are violating the law or exercising their freedom of speech and their freedom to assemble and their freedom to protest their government and freedom to raise a hearing with their government, I think they’re going to win those cases.
SCOTT HARRIS: Thank you, Pastor Pagitt. Just a last question before we’re out of time here. How has the community come out in support of these 15 individuals who’ve been charged and you say there’s likely to be more charges against others. What kind of solidarity is being expressed to help in terms of lawyers and representation to push back against these charges?
PASTOR DOUG PAGITT: Yeah, I don’t know. I mean, I know people are keeping some of this. Some people are keeping it quiet. Some people are speaking out. Again, it really lands differently on different people. I know there’s the pro-democracy movement in the United States is growing every day and is stronger and there are lawyers all over the country who want to help people in situations like this. And so I don’t know the details, but I know that folks are offering their services to these people who need to be defended because look, it’s very expensive to be charged with a crime, especially a federal crime.
You don’t have to hire an attorney, but you really ought to hire an attorney. Everyone knows that. And that obviously becomes very expensive very quickly, which unfortunately is what the Trump administration is seeking to do. They’re seeking to bury people in debt and to put fear into them. And not everybody has the confidence to go bankrupt the way Donald Trump does. Not everyone has the confidence to end up penniless and to not repay your loans like Donald Trump does. So a lot of these people are nervous about the financial costs that it could be for them. I know there are people who are offering those services and I hope it becomes a time when the pro-democracy movement continues to rally around the people of Minnesota just like they did in January and unlike all these cosplay First Amendment and Second Amendment right activists did when the time came for them to step up.
I think the pro-democracy movement people help support these cases and lawyers are going to be at the ready to protect the civil rights of these people.
SCOTT HARRIS: Well, thank you for spending time with us tonight and all the important work you’re doing in the Twin Cities. And as we conclude here, are there any websites you’d recommend for our listeners who want to make sure they support any way they deem appropriate the people of Minnesota and St. Paul as they’re continuing to go through this kind of federal government targeting.
PASTOR DOUG PAGITT: Yeah. People can find our work at votecommongood.com and we’re some version of those words on social media, “vote common” or “vote common good.” And there are a number of groups in Minnesota. I know the ACLU keeps a really nice list of groups that you can reach out to here locally. They’ve done a really admirable job of keeping track of that. So I would direct people toward the ACLU of Minnesota if they’re interested in seeing what else is going on.
SCOTT HARRIS: All right. Well, thanks for all you do and for making time for our listeners this evening. Appreciate it, pastor.
PASTOR DOUG PAGITT: Oh, thank you. Always good to speak with you.
SCOTT HARRIS: Take care. Goodnight. That’s Pastor Doug Pagitt, executive director of the Minneapolis-based national organization, Vote Common Good.
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