The Scoop
SWAE Newsletter - May 2026
Dear Friend,
You are invited to our next monthly gathering:
Community As Resistance: Reflections on the Sixth Anniversary of the Murder of George Floyd
Thursday, May 21st
7-9pm
Meraki Community Space
100 W. 46th Street
RSVP
Light Refreshments (feel free to bring something to share, potluck-style)
The gathering includes primarily small group conversation – come ready to talk and listen. We will hear from Special Guest Jeanelle Austin, Executive Director of Rise and Remember, and see photos of the 2020 Uprising by KingDemetrius Pendleton.
How are you doing, friend? How are we doing? Ahh, well. It is hard to say. It is finally spring.
During Operation Metro Surge, between December 1st and February 12, federal agents employed racial profiling and terrorism to violently and unjustly abduct 3,789 people in Minnesota out of their cars, homes, workplaces, and at bus stops. We know 70 children are included in that number. Today we see reduced but continued ICE presence and the continued abduction of our neighbors.
We are in a liminal space, where we have not lost, but we have not won, either. How do we continue to resist?
Many of you joined us at the May Day Parade in the Powderhorn neighborhood in Minneapolis on Sunday, May 3rd. Known as the “holiest day of the year in South Minneapolis,” it was the party in the streets we longed for all winter. Thousands of people lined the parade route and then gathered at Powderhorn Park. Children swarmed the playground; the food truck lines got long; families mingled and enjoyed the sun; we cheered at the Tree of Life Ceremony. We reveled. We were moved to tears watching the group of giant walking whistles and monarch butterflies dancing. Why did the May Day Parade feel especially poignant this year? Why did it feel so deeply meaningful to be together, taking up space, in public?
Back in 2019, writer and activist Rebecca Solnit wrote:
Only citizens familiar with their city as both symbolic and practical territory, able to come together on foot and accustomed to walking about their city, can revolt. Few remember that “the right of the people freely to assemble” is listed in the First Amendment of the US Constitution, along with freedom of the press, of speech, and of religion, as critical to a democracy. While the other rights are easily recognized, the elimination of the possibility of such assemblies through urban design, automotive dependence and other factors is hard to trace and seldom framed as a civil-rights issue. But when public spaces are eliminated, so ultimately is the public; the individual has ceased to be a citizen capable of experiencing and acting in common with fellow citizens. Citizenship is predicated on the sense of having something in common with strangers, just as democracy is built upon trust in strangers. And public space is the space we share with strangers, the unsegregated zone. In these communal events, that abstraction “the public” becomes real and tangible. Such events require the actual space and a public that can and does exist in it, and the gestures that cultivate such places and sensibilities keep alive something profoundly necessary.
And so as we approach the sixth anniversary of the murder of George Floyd, we are thinking about the concept of Community As Resistance. Taking up space. Being in public. Trusting each other.
George Floyd Square at 38th and Chicago is an incredible testament to public space, and to community as resistance. The neighbors at George Floyd Square were making “neighborism” a way of being years before the ICE surge. So many people have cared for and cultivated space at this intersection. It is both a memorial and a call to action.
At our SWAE gathering this week, we’ll hear from the esteemed Jeanelle Austin, Executive Director of Rise and Remember, formerly known as the George Floyd Global Memorial. We’ll think about our own place in Minneapolis, reflect on the murder of George Floyd, and consider how our social and political awareness has changed over time.
We leave you with some of our most well-worn chants, shouted everywhere from GFS, to the Capitol, to the Streets. As familiar as religious blessings:
Who keeps us safe? We keep us safe.
Show me what democracy looks like! This is what democracy looks like.
Show me what community looks like! This is what community looks like.
What’s Next for SWAE
You can print out our 2026 SWAE calendar here. And subscribe to our Google Calendar or iCal.
SWAE Monthly Gatherings Thursdays 7-9pm: May 21, June 25, July 23, August 27, Sept 24, Oct 22. Meraki Community Space. Gatherings are about civic engagement, community-building, and working toward an equitable, connected Minneapolis. In a warm and welcoming space. Open to all. RSVP.
Rise and Remember Festival May 23-25. 38th and Chicago. Join us to commemorate the 6-year Angelversary of George Floyd, remember all stolen lives, and continue the fight for racial healing, justice, and equity. Plan Your Visit or Volunteer.
Monarca Democracy Defense Training June 1, 6-8pm in the Fulton neighborhood. RSVP here.
Violins of Hope Sunday, June 7, 3-4:30pm. Join SWAE Members Eva Neubeck and Raycurt Johnson as Eva shares the extraordinary journey of recovering her family’s violin, taken during the Holocaust. Raycurt will play the family’s recovered instrument. RSVP here.
Learning from Place: Somali South Minneapolis Tour July 16. 3-6pm. $35. RSVP here. We will go as a group.
Sincerely,
Elianna Lippold-Johnson and Kristen Ingle