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Somali St. Paulite Sent to Guantanamo
The horror of this country's ongoing war against immigrants—the compounding cruelties and mounting injustices—is genuinely hard to wrap your head around. Like, take the case of Adam Abdullah, a Somali man who was stopped by federal agents in St. Paul last December and now, for some reason, has been sent to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.
This is a man who, as Matt Sepic reports for MPR News, has no criminal record, who arrived in the U.S. seeking asylum in 2023, and who has a work permit and Social Security number. He had been working as a mechanic in the Twin Cities and had been appearing for his scheduled meetings with ICE before he was stopped in his vehicle on December 12. And Abdullah tells MPR there are eight people from Somalia at Guantanamo, "including several arrested in the Twin Cities."
What the fuck is the point of this? What is wrong with this country?
Immigrant Businesses Still Struggling Post-OMS
While we're on the subject of senseless harm being done to immigrants, there's this report from Minnesota Reformer about how immigrant businesses are still waiting for customers to return post-Operation Metro Surge. Reporter Atra Mohamed spoke with people like Luis Tamay, owner of El Chuchi Market on Lake Street in Minneapolis, who says that the challenges predate the winter's immigrant violence; his community felt the crackdown beginning with Trump's second inauguration, and Trump-imposed tariffs added to the stress.
The surge turned those struggles into a full-blown crisis, and Tamay and other small business owners say they're still waiting for business to return to pre-OMS levels. Ahmed Said, who owns a shop at Minneapolis's Riverside Mall, says he hasn't had more than four customers a day since December.
“That is less than what I used to see in an hour. It is very hard to continue at this pace, and I do not want to walk away from the business I have been building for 14 years,” Said tells Mohamed.
Chicken Chain Chaos; Fair Fry Fracas
I know chaos doesn't quite work up there, just let me have this!
Did you know Chad Davis is not just an excellent photojournalist but also an astute watcher of the goings-on related to odd and possibly fake Uptown restaurants? Well, a few days ago, Davis shared an update from Harold's Chicken Shack that made it look like the Chicago-based chain was not opening a rumored Uptown location. HOWEVER, there was an update Wednesday: Harold's says that this Thursday it will open its biggest location ever at 1430 Lagoon Ave.
The rub (chicken wing term) is that the fate of the brand's ownership is in court following the death of CEO Kristen Pierce-Sherrod, and as a result, there are both "authorized" and "unauthorized" Harold's locations. (The Chicago Tribune already used the perfect headline, "chicken coup," in its story.) But uh... nobody really knows who owns Harold's, it seems like. Anyway, a Harold's, which is affiliated with someone, opens tomorrow!
Over at Bring Me the News, Mary McGuire has the salty scoop on this year's "Fresh French Fries drama." Apparently, folks on social media were complaining that the State Fair staple's offerings tasted "wrong," as one guy, Paul Daniel, wrote. "Not bad. Just not them.”
Fairgoers were right, it seems. “Here’s what happened: While our potato variety stayed the same, we sourced a portion of our supply from a different growing region to help address an issue from recent years with small potatoes (small/stubby fries),” Fresh French Fries co-owner Dan Wozniak writes in an email to Bring Me The News. He pledges that they'll be as good as you remember come 2027.
A Future for the Woman’s Club Building
For MSP Mag, Alexandra DeYoe writes that the historic Woman’s Club building at 410 Oak Grove St. in Minneapolis has been purchased by "Twin Cities-focused developer" First & First.
“It's just a one-of-a-kind building. It overlooks the park. It's got some really uniquely beautiful spaces," F&F President Peter Remes says. "And we were just drawn to the aura and the architecture of the building.”
DeYoe writes that the goal is to restore the building for "future public enjoyment," which almost certainly means a private event/wedding center. And The Woman’s Club is still leasing a part of the building, just not the entire building, as it previously had.
