Schatz Condemns Minneapolis Shooting: We Will Not Tolerate Tyranny

WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai'i) spoke today on the Senate floor about the killing of Alex Pretti by federal immigration officers in Minneapolis this past weekend. Schatz highlighted the widespread condemnation of the incident from across the political spectrum and society, noting that a collective responsibility to protect freedom and liberty has been a core American ideal since the nation's founding.

"Tyranny is tyranny, and the people of this country - whatever our other differences - don't want anything to do with it," said Senator Schatz. "There is a reason that a broad coalition of unlikely partners quickly converged in the wake of the tragedy - and it wasn't some organizing strategy. This was organic, across the country and certainly across the great state of Minnesota. It was liberals. It was conservatives. It was gun owners. It was clergy members. It was business executives. It was libertarians. It was Trump voters. Why the new unity? Because people from different places and persuasions, faiths and financial situations, understand that at least on the very narrow question of freedom and liberty, our fates and our futures are intertwined. No one is free until everyone is free."

A transcript of Senator Schatz's remarks is below. Video is available here.

Tyranny is tyranny, and the people of this country - whatever our other differences - don't want anything to do with it. You might be liberal; you might be a conservative. You might be for immigration, or you might be against it. You might think that guns should be more readily accessible, or you might think that guns should be harder to purchase. But when the United States government is killing your fellow citizens in your name, none of that matters. Because tyranny is tyranny, no matter the tyrant. Overreach is overreach, regardless of cause. And state violence is state violence, and it is against everything that this country stands for.

There is a reason that a broad coalition of unlikely partners quickly converged in the wake of the tragedy - and it wasn't some organizing strategy. This was organic, across the country and certainly across the great state of Minnesota. It was liberals. It was conservatives. It was gun owners. It was clergy members. It was business executives. It was libertarians. It was Trump voters. Why the new unity? Because people from different places and persuasions, faiths and financial situations, understand that at least on the very narrow question of freedom and liberty, our fates and our futures are intertwined. No one is free until everyone is free.

In my Jewish tradition, during Passover Seder, it's customary to recount the story of the Israelites' exodus from Egypt. And the reason the story is told anew every year is to remind us that the struggle for freedom is not confined to the past and limited to others, but instead has to live inside of all of us. The Haggadah says, "We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt, and the Lord, our God, brought us out of there with a strong hand and an outstretched arm." Not they, but we - the point being that however many generations removed we are from that story, we're still obligated to see ourselves as though we were personally freed from slavery in Egypt. No one is free until everyone is free.

Our founders knew that too. The Constitution deliberately begins with, "We The People." The Declaration of Independence promises equality and certain unalienable rights that "we hold to be self-evident." A collective responsibility to protect freedom and liberty is central to the American experiment. It always has been. Which is why, in the summer of 1963, sitting in a dark jail cell in Birmingham, Alabama, in the throes of the battle for civil rights, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly." No one is free until everyone is free.

That same spirit of solidarity has united people for generation. In Hawai'i, it was the sugar plantation workers in the 1940s - tired of being overworked and underpaid - who organized across ethnic lines for fair conditions. Up until that point, they had been divided by the plantation owners into separate camps - Chinese camp, Japanese camp, Filipino camp, and so on - and paid different rates for the same work. And so they came together, vowing to treat an injury to one as an injury to all. They went on strike and won, altering the trajectory of workers in Hawai'i to this day. An injury to one is an injury to all. No one is free until everyone is free.

If there's a lesson in the collective outrage and widespread condemnation of ICE's conduct, it's that people don't want state-sponsored violence on their streets in their names. It's not a question of whether you voted for Trump or Biden. It's not a question of whether you agreed with Joe Biden's immigration policy. The idea that immigration enforcement has to be accompanied by enthusiastic cruelty is so far out of the mainstream of American society. Nobody wants this, save for a handful of people intoxicated by power and deluded by their own fantasies.

Thuggery is not strength. Strength must be used to protect people, to give voice to the voiceless, and make people feel safe. That is impressive and noble and important, precisely because it's harder to practice and harder still to come by. But that's what makes the response in Minnesota - of ordinary Americans taking it upon themselves to stand up for their neighbors - so extraordinary.

And I want to read a bit of what Adam Serwer observed in The Atlantic about the mistaken assumptions that fed this administration's brutality. He wrote, "The secret fear of the morally depraved is that virtue is actually common, and that they're the ones who are alone. In Minnesota, all of the ideological cornerstones of MAGA have been proved false at once. Minnesotans, not the armed thugs of ICE and the Border Patrol, are brave. Minnesotans have shown that their community is socially cohesive-because of its diversity and not in spite of it. Minnesotans have found and loved one another in a world atomized by social media, where empty men have tried to fill their lonely soul with lies about their own inherent superiority. Minnesotans have preserved everything worthwhile about 'Western civilization,' while armed brutes try to tear it down by force."

Look, I get that we're all divided and distracted and exhausted and that it's not going to resolve overnight. But in the wake of the tragedies in Minneapolis, a bright red line has emerged. We can argue about everything else, but we will not tolerate tyranny.

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