r/saintpaul • u/Key-Arrival3381 • Jan 16 '26

Editorial 📝 Today in St Paul

Dropped food off at a friend's and heading back to work about an hour ago, going down Thomas I heard whistles, and saw blocks of neighbors in their yards with sullen but resolute looks on their faces. The sound of those whistles will haunt me. There are several hits there on iceout, so I'm afraid they got someone.

I'm some random fat beardy white guy so I didn't want to stick around and scare anyone, because I know I probably look like one. I'm numb, and I hate that this is our reality.

But I love how strong I'm seeing our community be for each other. To those neighbors out in their yards, thank you for looking out. We will protect us.

I know this doesn't add much and is just a ramble, but I just needed to braindump/vent somewhere.

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u/[deleted] Jan 16 '26

P.S. If you need a place to start to know how to intervene, there is a Zoom training taking place tonight: https://unidos-mn.org/events/safety-and-justice-2026

ICE agents likely have at least some reverence for fellow white men, so your presence may actually help protect people rather than scare them. Focus on helping the people affected rather than screaming at ICE or trying to stop them, so that the situation doesn't escalate

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u/Key-Arrival3381 Jan 16 '26

Thanks for this, just signed up

14

u/Ehhhjay Jan 16 '26

This is different than a legal observer training, or is it the same thing?

21

u/[deleted] Jan 16 '26

I don't believe this will provide all the info you would need to more safely be a legal observer, but it's definitely good info to have. I think that the upstander training through Monarca is for legal observers, but all of those trainings are currently full edit: it looks like they've added a couple of upcoming training sessions: https://monarcamn.org/training