Opinion | This ‘ordinary guy from Northeast’ joined an ICE protest. It cost him a shattered jaw.

Opinion editor’s note: Strib Voices publishes a mix of guest commentaries online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

•••

Leon Virden of northeast Minneapolis got a call that Saturday morning from his son, who lived in south Minneapolis.

A protester had been killed near a donut shop on Nicollet Avenue. The people were rallying in the area.

“If my sons were going to be there, I would too,” he said.

Perhaps Virden, 73, was thinking about his youth, growing up in southeast Minneapolis and attending Marshall High School, when he took part in protests against the Vietnam War, even though three of his brothers were combat veterans of that war. He remembers a few brushes with the law as the people barricaded streets and confronted police.

When Virden and another son arrived near the scene of the killing of Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse who worked with veterans at the Minneapolis VA, they found Nicollet Avenue filled with Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. Tear gas was in the air. The crack of flash-bangs could be heard up and down the street. People who got too close to the masked, gun-toting federal agents were sprayed with chemicals — including one of Virden’s sons.

Suddenly a tear gas canister was tossed from the federals toward the protesters in the alley. It bounced up to the crowd, and one man tried to kick it back toward the ICE men, but missed. With some thoughts of kicking the canister himself, Virden stepped around a dumpster.

A flash-bang device landed at Virden’s feet and exploded with a blinding flash and an intensely loud bang. As it blew up on the ground, a piece of shrapnel flew up and hit Virden on the right side of his face, leaving a small hole below his ear and shattering his jaw.

Virden staggered, but didn’t go down. One of his sons grabbed him and helped him back to the car. At home on Pierce Street, Virden’s daughter-in-law, a nurse, took one look and said it was time for the hospital.

Doctors operated immediately, cutting an incision along his jawline to install three metal plates to hold the bones of his jaw in place. His mouth was a maze of bands and wires to hold it all together. Fifteen stitches stuck out from his jawline.

A few days later, he tried talking as a reporter asked him what happened. He was taking Tylenol for the pain. “They gave me that Oxycodone, but I didn’t like it, so I’ll stick with Tylenol.”

“Naw, I’m just an ordinary guy from Northeast.”

•••

Alex Pretti and Renee Good were just ordinary people from Minneapolis. They were out on the street trying to help their neighbors. They saw evil and tried to prevent it.

Their deaths as martyrs for justice and fairness immediately brings out in some of us a need for revenge. But neither of them would have wanted that. They only wanted to confront a government-orchestrated assault on the people of Minnesota, an assault with Gestapo-like terror and brutality.

There were other surges across the nation in recent months aimed at arresting illegal immigrants. They came and went. No worldwide headlines resulted.

The entire attack on Minneapolis was an effort by the Trump administration to show Minnesota who was boss. Minneapolis is known as perhaps the most liberal city in America, sharing that honor with Portland. It was a thinly veiled political move. But the feds didn’t know what they were taking on. It was a tragic case of sending poorly trained, quasi-legal agents — provided with guns, other weapons and masks — to a place where they were not welcome. Instead of showing who’s who, they ran up against a stone wall of civil disobedience.

Minneapolis has a vibe. Oh, in many ways it’s like any other big city with crime, discrimination, broken sewer lines. It’s where bridges fall down and George Floyd was killed for passing a counterfeit bill. But it’s also a place where people make an honest-heart effort to treat other people with kindness and support, no matter what their background. The vibe of Minneapolis is in the neighborhoods and the neighbors.

Leon Virden called the federal agents the “anti-Christs.” It’s an interesting comparison to a figure in human history who stood for love, peace, kindness, equality, joy and forbearance — none of which the government forces brought to Minnesota.

I guess there’s a tendency now for Minneapolis to feel pretty good about itself. The president has been quiet. The Department of Homeland Security director has been shown to be a cult follower and a liar. The agents of terror are going home.

Of course, the battle has been won but the war goes on. Minnesota cannot rest on its laurels, but only double down to show the world a place where goodness still rules.