St. Paul City Council vice president: Police may have violated separation ordinance
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On Tuesday, agents from Homeland Security Investigations, which is a part of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, took at least two people into custody at a St. Paul home.
As a crowd of protesters gathered, law enforcement — including the St. Paul Police Department — used chemical irritants and fired less-lethal projectiles into the crowd.
St. Paul City Council Vice President Hwa Jeong Kim was at the scene on Tuesday. She represents the ward bordering the one where this took place, and spoke with MPR News host Clay Masters about what she saw.
What can you tell us about what you've actually just been told about the purpose of this operation today?
The purpose of HSI was to violently extract someone from our communities, as we've seen from them time and time again.
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Mayor Melvin Carter said the city was not informed about it. So what do you know about when and why St. Paul Police officers actually got involved?
Allegedly, what I heard, was that our St. Paul Police Department engaged when there was a call that one of our peaceful protesters and constitutional observers had assaulted a federal agent.
Can you kind of describe what you saw when you arrived at the scene and the timing of it all?
I was there early and watched it unfold. It was pretty tense to begin with, and as more constitutional observers and peaceful protesters arrived, HSI and even our St. Paul police started showing up in greater numbers, and that created a very tense situation.
The house was blocked off, and myself and other folks that were present were there to observe, and then were given instructions — very vague — to move to a certain side, and then were indiscriminately tear gassed by the St. Paul Police Department. They set a boundary around the area and didn't let protesters or observers into it.
St. Paul has had a separation ordinance in place since 2004. That ordinance bars city police from enforcing immigration law or assisting ICE with immigration operations. Do you think St. Paul Police violated this ordinance today?
I don't have a legal opinion on that, but from what I personally witnessed and experienced for myself as an individual and as a taxpaying citizen, I believe that to be true.
Did the use of force by St. Paul police today meet the needs of the moment? Based on what you know?
Absolutely not. They were indiscriminately pepper spraying, tear gassing. At one point they had filled the whole street with tear gas. It looked like fog, and they were indiscriminately shooting, through the tear gas fog, non-lethals [projectiles], one of which I was hit by.
Are you okay?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It hit someone in front of me and hit me, and I'm very fine. Thank you.
Now, if federal enforcement actions draw protesters, and protesters draw St. Paul Police, is this a scene we can expect to see repeat itself over and over in the city, or is there another way for it to go down?
Essentially, there has to be another way. And, as a legislator in this city, I'm committed to ensuring that something like this does not happen again, and that our St. Paul Police separation and our separation ordinance are much clearer. It appears that we need to be much more specific and have stronger enforcement around that law.
But, I think, for me today, what I saw for myself, is that no one is coming to save us but us. We need visionary politics, collective strategy, compassionate communities now more than ever. And our police and politicians and HSI and our federal government, they don't keep our cities safe. But it's everyday people who showed up that did. And so I think my message to folks is, if you have citizenship privilege, please lock in. Get trained, understand what your rights are, and become a constitutional observer.
What next steps do you think the city council needs to take in response to what happened Tuesday?
Well, [Tuesday], we have Truth in Taxation. I suspect a lot of folks will be coming. It's been a very tight budget. A lot of municipalities across the country are feeling the crunch from the federal government, but I don't think it's fair to say that we have a tight budget. And we spend money on things like this, where we saw SPPD indiscriminately pepper spraying constitutional observers and peaceful protesters. Not at this time; it seems like a silly, a poor use of our taxpayer dollars. And in terms of moving forward, I'm looking forward to working with the new Mayor-Elect Kaohly Her on strengthening protections for immigrant communities.
