Yohuru Williams, Distinguished University Chair and professor of history at the University of St. Thomas, appeared in national and regional coverage analyzing the surge of federal immigration enforcement in Minnesota.
In PolitiFact, Williams pushed back on claims that anti-ICE protesters are paid agitators, emphasizing that most demonstrators are local residents responding to concerns about federal overreach.
From PolitiFact:
With throngs of people in Minnesota protesting the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement surge, President Donald Trump and some of his allies repeatedly described the protesters as paid.
“The thugs that are protesting include many highly paid professional agitators and anarchists,” he said Jan. 18 on Truth Social.
“They’re paid agitators and insurrectionists,” Trump said at a Jan. 20 press conference.
The next day in Davos, Switzerland, Trump said the "fake" protests were "done by agitators and professional insurrectionists. … They’re professional troublemakers.” ...
Experts told us that the majority of protesters are locals showing their dissent. We found a large volunteer protest movement in the Twin Cities.
Yohuru Williams, a historian and director of the Racial Justice Initiative at Minnesota’s University of St. Thomas, told PolitiFact in an email that “most protesters are residents of the state who are concerned not only about the presence of ICE in the state but also the president’s usurpation of power.”
He also joined an MPR News expert panel to discuss the broader moment, including heightened enforcement, protests, fatal shootings involving federal agents and growing tensions between state and federal authorities.
From MPR:
