Mayor Jacob Frey agrees with Gov Tim Walz that Minnesota is at a Fort Sumter moment

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey sat down with The New York Times and was asked if he agreed with a recent comment made by Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, who suggested that the weeks of protest in their state could be a Fort Sumter moment. If the protests against federal immigration enforcement are representative of a moment like that, it could mean the beginning of a new American civil war.

"Governor Walz gave an interview this week to The Atlantic where he compared what is happening to your city to that first battle of the Civil War at Fort Sumter. And I'm just wondering what you make of that comparison," Frey was asked.

"It's terrifying," Frey said. "I don't think he's saying that the Civil War is going to happen. I think what he's saying is that a significant and terrifying line is being crossed, and I would agree with that. We can't go down that route."

In his interview with The Atlantic, Walz had said, "I mean, is this a Fort Sumter?" He was referring to the clash between Minnesota anti-ICE agitators and federal immigration enforcement agents. Agitators have been stalking, harassing, and obstructing law enforcement and both Walz and Frey have encouraged them to continue to do so. 

"It’s a physical assault. It’s an armed force that’s assaulting, that’s killing my constituents, my citizens," Walz said. Two agitators were shot and killed by immigration enforcement officers when those agitators obstructed arrests.

When President Trump was asked if he agreed with that characterization or feels like there's a civil war brewing, he said of Walz,"Does he know what Fort Sumter was, or do you think somebody wrote it out for him? This is, I was elected on law and order. I was elected on a strong border. We had a border that allowed 25 million people to come in. Many were murderers."

Frey tempered Walz's remarks in speaking to the New York Times, saying, "We need to unify as a country, and I think that's exactly what so many people are calling on us to do right now. A lot of it is also recognizing the history from which we've come and not to turn our back on it.

"It's the, one of the oldest cliches in the book to see, you know, we're a country of immigrants, and you come to this country with a recognition that there is that kind of freedom and the sort of stability where you don't have a fear of a war being fought based on a different ideological perspective.

"So I think it's on all of us to stand up right now to do right it's on us as Democratic mayors to show that democratically run cities can work," Frey continued. "It's on us to take care of these basics and do them very well, and it's on the whole country again, to love this nation more than you love your respective ideology.

"Things have gotten so unbelievably political and ideological over the last 15 years. Politics has changed dramatically since I first entered it, and it's not like I've been in politics my whole life, and we need to find a way to prevent this pendulum from violently, swinging back and forth."