Up to 500 supporters of President Donald Trump protested outside Minnesota's fenced-off State Capitol on Wednesday as chaos continued in Washington D.C., and soon planned to make their way toward Gov. Tim Walz's residence.
Minnesota state troopers guarded entrances to buildings on the Capitol complex, but the opening hour of the demonstration was heavy on speeches and chants in opposition to both the outcome of the presidential election and emergency measures implemented in Minnesota to stop the spread of COVID-19.
By the time a handful of protesters made it to the Summit Avenue residence, a line of State Troopers in riot helmets stood behind a fence guarding the home.
"Recall Walz!" the group repeatedly chanted.
"Just like the Nazis in Germany, you wear brown shirts," one man wearing a backward camouflage Trump baseball cap yelled at the troopers. "I hope you know that you've taken an oath to uphold the constitution and that you do not belong, you are not his personal bully squad!"
Before setting off for the governor's residence, speakers at the top of the hill ratcheted up rhetoric to urge charges of treason against those who stood in Trump's way.
Alley Waterbury, a Woodbury activist who served as emcee, led prayers and chants of "four more years," saying afterward that "we want Trump in there."
Waterbury was indicted on a charge of lying to an FBI agent, she said, an experience she said later drew her to follow Trump.
Waterbury laughed as she told the crowd that House Republicans in D.C. were ordered to take cover. The news was met with cheers.
The relative calm in St. Paul was in contrast to clashes in Washington, D.C., between pro-Trump supporters and law enforcement that unfolded as the congressional process got underway. In Washington, Trump supporters breached security at the U.S. Capitol, forcing House and Senate recesses not long after the certification debate got underway.
In St. Paul, protesters hoisted Trump flags and homemade signs that bellowed "Stop The Steal" and "Do Not Certify." Others walked around with recordings of past Trump speeches playing on their phones, at times hooking them up to speakers. At least one protester waved a large flag in support of the III% militia movement.
Waterbury returned her focus to Walz urging him to talk to her about his restrictions.
"If you don't open our state back up we will do whatever we need to do because we've got nothing left to lose."
She said inaction would also "make us do things we don't want to do"
Another speaker described the current state of play: "This is 1776 … the time for talk is over. It's done. My brothers and sisters in Washington are doing it right now. … Be on the right side of history because we are about to make it. … lets pray our elected officials have a change of heart in the last second or we are going to change it for them."
A state court judge who approved Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon's agreement to waive witness requirements and extend the deadline for counting mail ballots was singled out for ire. State Reps. Eric Lucero, R-Dayton, and Steve Drazkowski, R-Mazeppa, stoking chants against the judge, who was appointed by ex-DFL Gov. Mark Dayton and was a staffer for Democratic U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar.
Lucero, a plaintiff in a lawsuit that drew a favorable ruling from the Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, said he was considering drafting articles of impeachment against the judge.
A newly formed group called Hold The Line organized the event. Becky Strohmeier, of Bloomington, started the group a day after Election Day last year, she said.
"We just have a lot of patriots," she said. "I've never met two of them who were exactly the same."
She added: "We're not just going to let our election get stolen by blatant fraud and cheating,"
About 20 people in the crowd of roughly 500 were clad in camouflage and openly carried rifles, pistols and other firearms. They were there as part of the state chapter the Three Percenters Original.
The state leader of the group, an Iron Range man who identified himself only as Matt, said the group followed Trump's call to assemble on Wednesday to protest election fraud.
Matt said his group would not take action if Biden was confirmed as president, however, adding "the president is the president no matter who that is. … We don't care who is president as long as the president abides by the constitution."
Matt said his group believes constitutional rights are "systematically being stripped away" but he does not believe the nation is at a line at which force is needed.
"I think that's something that will have to be done in my lifetime to try to preserve what our Founding Fathers envisioned … but there is no line drawn. I can't say what that is at this point, hopefully that will never have to be done; hopefully we just get people in office who want to follow the Constitution."
Matt disagreed with any labeling of his group as a militia, calling it a misconception. He also sought to distance it from the Boogaloo movement. On Wednesday, a smaller group of attendees wore the Hawaiian shirts and military-style garb popular with that movement.
"We're here because the president who we support has called patriots to the Capitol," he said. "We're here to follow suit in our own state."
"We need to stay on our game," Waterbury said.
Waterbury later called on the crowd to continue mobilizing each weekend to drive to lawmakers and other public officials' homes to protest.
"This should be what should be here every flipping Saturday until we get our state back," Waterbury told the crowd. She said some people have called her Facebook posts conspiracy theories and said she has been scaring people.
"Are you frickin' scared?" Waterbury asked. "No!"
"Are you going to fight back?" she yelled. "No!"
Stephen Montemayor • 612-673-1755
Twitter: @smontemayor
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