Minnesota movement for divestment from Israel resists repression

Minneapolis, MN — On Saturday, March 1, more than 60 Twin Cities community members gathered to attend a “State Board of Divestment” speak-out event hosted by the Minnesota Anti-War Committee in a Minneapolis community center.

Minnesota’s State Board of Investment (SBI), a large public fund managed by state officials Governor Tim Walz, Attorney General Keith Ellison, State Auditor Julie Blaha, and Secretary of State Steve Simon. It currently invests approximately $5.4 billion in apartheid Israel, Israeli companies, weapons manufacturers that sell to Israel’s military, and other companies that prop up Israel’s apartheid system.

Over the past two years, the SBI’s public meetings have seen increasingly large turnout from the Palestinian community, anti-war movement, and union members whose pensions are paid out via the SBI’s fund, all demanding divestment from Israel.

The SBI’s next public meeting, scheduled for March 5, was recently rescheduled with less than a week’s notice. The previous meeting saw unexplained changes to the format and rules of the meeting, and did not allow community members to speak. The SBI has not provided a new date for its required quarterly meeting.

The State Board of Divestment event was structured like a mock SBI meeting, with the emcees calling up speakers who had previously signed up to speak to the SBI’s board to give their testimony to a camera in place of the absent board. The Anti-War Committee plans to submit the film to the SBI.

Emily Newberg, a member of the Minnesota Anti-War Committee, opened the event by saying, “Before the December meeting it was announced that the SBI were switching to a hybrid option without giving a reason why. And they said that any comments that folks wanted to make would need to be sent in advance. A hybrid option, of course, means a choice between in-person or online and does not indicate that the community will not have a chance to be heard. Ater allowing only 35 people into the building, another rule we weren’t made aware of ahead of time, we soon learned that the SBI meeting was not itself in person. The 35 of us were ushered into a room where we were sat in front of a TV screen showing the shameful faces of the members of the SBI holding a closed, but televised, meeting.”

Speakers from AFSCME 3800, the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers, and a variety of community groups like the Minnesota BDS Community and Jewish Voice for Peace were called to the mic to give testimony to the absent board.

Sorcha Lona, a rank-and-file member of Teamsters 638 and Minnesota Workers United, a group of progressive rank-and-file unionists, addressed her comments to Keith Ellison and Julie Blaha. She spoke about how Ellison and Blaha had met with members of Minnesota Workers United twice over concerns about the investment of union pension funds in apartheid Israel, but that the meetings had not gotten results, saying, “It didn’t feel like we were talking to an ally of labor, it felt like we were bargaining with a greedy and selfish boss. I would like an explanation as to why investing in a pariah state committing genocide is responsible money management, while [Israel’s] credit rating is in a freefall.”

Wyatt Miller, a member of the Minnesota Anti-War Committee, addressed his comments to Governor Tim Walz, former vice presidential nominee for the Democratic Party in the 2024 presidential race. Miller said, “Trump’s inauguration represents the possibility of the situation getting even worse for Palestinians. Trump’s proposal for the U.S. to ‘take over’ Gaza and ethnically cleanse its over 2 million people, while unlikely to succeed, appears to hint at his administration greenlighting a renewed Israeli onslaught on Gaza – In other words, Governor Walz, your political legacy as someone who refused to divest Minnesota from Israel, is entirely in the hands of President Trump.”

The event was concluded by Minnesota Anti-War Committee member Andrew Josefchak thanking attendees and speakers for coming and then saying ,“But it’s bullshit that we even had to host this event today. We started organizing this event over a month ago, because we knew it was almost certain that the SBI would once again try to shut us out of their meeting, and unfortunately, we were correct. And I think we have to start being honest with ourselves and calling the SBI’s maneuvers what they are: political repression. It may not be cops cracking skulls with riot batons, but it’s a soft, insidious kind of political repression that is clearly intended to make it more difficult for anyone in this state to organize towards divestment.”

Josefchak continued, “And the thing about political repression is that the only way to respond to it, besides giving in to it and just slinking into the shadows and letting the movement die, is to fight it head on. The SBI has picked the fight, are we gonna fight back?” The crowd responded with a cry of “Yes!” and “Free free Palestine!”

#MinneapolisMN #MN #AntiWarMovement #Palestine #MNAWC