Messaging Guidance for Assault on Minnesota and Funding Fight

UPDATED 2/19/26

Minnesota Background

On January 24th, after an extraordinary day of Truth and Freedom where Minnesotans demonstrated courage, compassion, and community, masked militia executed Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse caring for his neighbors. This follows weeks of escalating violence by the regime against immigrant Minnesotans and people of good conscience acting in solidarity to protect them, including the murder of Renee Nicole Good.

Minnesota Narrative

Minnesotans across races and origins, faiths and genders, are demonstrating that the brave of us stand with and for each other. But this cowardly MAGA regime has escalated their attacks, assaulting families in the streets, invading homes, kidnapping children, and now killing Alex Pretti and Renee Good as they were looking out for their neighbors. Their end game is clear: they want to control and silence us, even demanding voting rolls so they can remain in power no matter the will of the people. Through it all, everyday Minnesotans are showing how we free America by organizing mutual aid for families forced into hiding, standing guard on streets, and turning out in the thousands until all masked militia are removed from our communities and we make ours a government of, by, and for the people.

Funding Fight Background

In 2025, MAGA Republicans in Congress passed their MAGA murder law to devastate American families, undermine our freedoms, and threaten our futures. Our leaders must vote NO on funding the MAGA regime’s war against Americans, so we can #FreeAmerica from this rule of the bullies, for the billionaires.

Funding Fight Narrative

Americans across races, places, and parties value our freedoms – but Trump and MAGA are running a regime of the bullies, for the billionaires. Our leaders must refuse to finance MAGA’s war against Americans and block them from invading our cities, stealing our healthcare and taking food from kids. The brave of us must free America from this cowardly regime and protect our freedoms, our families, and our futures.

Additional Talking Points

  • Over the weekend, Minnesotans from every walk of life showed us how we achieve freedom, with 75,000 marching and over 1,000 businesses shutting down to demand ICE and the regime end their campaign of abductions and murders.
  • Masked militia, whether ICE, DHS or CBP, do not belong in our communities, let alone armed and willing to commit murder.
  • The MAGA murder regime is abducting our loved ones and killing our neighbors in pursuit of endless power and money, attacking our freedom to seek a better life and come home safely to our families.
  • We will not enable the hostile takeover of our government
  • We will not be complicit in the abductions of neighbors, stealing healthcare from seniors, and taking food from kids.
  • No funding for fascism. No dollars for dictatorship. No bankrolling billionaires.
  • This MAGA murder regime is trying to rob our families of everything we’ve created to care for each other to finance abducting our neighbors and to line the pockets of their billionaire backers. We must #FreeAmerica of this regime of theft and destruction.
  • This MAGA murder regime is taking away our freedom to care for our families and have them come home safely. We must #FreeAmerica of this regime of the bullies, for the billionaires.
  • This MAGA murder regime is forcing us to struggle, while they hand everything we’ve created to care for each other to their billionaire backers.

Do

Don’t

Because

Do say “This endangers our families, our freedoms, and our futures.”

“This is a direct threat to our lives.”

Don’t say “This will not make us safer.”

“This does not help our security.”

Negating the opposition’s claims merely brings them top of mind. We must say what these actions DO, not what they are not.

Do focus on the people harmed and the horrific actions of the regime, saying, for example, “ICE executed two Minnesotans as they bravely stood witness to the MAGA murder regime’s assault on our immigrant neighbors.”

Don’t say “This wasn’t self defense” or engage in arguments over whether Alex Pretti had a gun, whether it was legal to carry one, etc. Avoid getting into details about what this was not.

Do not accept the opposition’s frame or repeat the opposition’s claims even to negate them. This merely provides them more airtime and possible credibility.

Do present concrete action: Arrest ICE agents, remove ICE from communities

Don’t offer condemnation without a clear demand.

Giving a clear, constructive way to take action builds a sense of agency.

DO call our funding fight demand drawing the line against a hostile takeover of our government, refusing to fund a war on Americans. Use phrases like:

“Say no to this hostile takeover of our government”

“Refuse to fund a war against Americans”

“No funding for fascism. No dollars for dictatorship. No bankrolling billionaires.”

DON’T use our opposition’s frame of “government shutdown,” or play into the conversation of which party would be responsible for “shutting down the government.”

Currently, the conversation about the funding fight centers around questions like “will Democrats shutdown the government?” and hypotheticals that are no longer appropriate to the situation we find ourselves in, that do not face the fascist power grab we are living through. A conversation about a government shutdown legitimizes this regime as a normal, functioning government and presumes lawmakers’ job is to keep the trains running, even as said trains run people over.

Instead, our leaders need to set the terms of debate and seize the moral high ground by framing the funding fight as a refusal to be complicit in this regime and the chance to stand up for our freedoms, our families, and our futures.

For general guidance on talking about political violence, see here.

Talking point for if protests occur and property gets destroyed:

  • We may have concerns about seeing things taken or broken, but there is no object on earth of the value of a human life. Focusing on things and not people is a distraction from what matters and a barrier to pursuing freedom and equal justice for all. We cannot, in good conscience, prioritize objects while our neighbors and family members are abducted from our communities or even killed in our streets. Until we see and value immigrants and people willing to stand with and for them as equally worthy of respect as everyone else, people who value our freedoms should be outraged.