How a Minneapolis federal building’s namesake is inspiring resistance to the ICE actions happening inside

By Elise Hammond, CNN

(CNN) — Federal officers in tactical gear line up at the driveway of a large block-shaped building wedged between the city limits of Minneapolis and St. Paul. Across from them, a crowd of protesters yell at the officers and sometimes try to block cars driving in and out.

The Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building has served as the backdrop for the ongoing tense dance in the Twin Cities since federal agents shot and killed Minneapolis resident Renee Good earlier this month. Its stark brick structure is home base for the immigration proceedings at the heart of the crackdown in the state, prompting fear and anger.

The man behind the name — Bishop Henry Benjamin Whipple — would be standing outside with protesters if he were still alive, one historian and scholar said.

Whipple, Minnesota’s first Protestant Episcopal bishop, was known for advocating for the welfare of Native Americans and was a well-connected leader who stood up to government officials on their behalf throughout the mid-to-late 1800s, according to historians. While his legacy reflects his advocacy for those in the minority, it falls short of altruism and the building bearing his name perches on sacred land also known for its traumatic and violent history toward Indigenous peoples.

Now, the building bearing his name is where many people are temporarily detained after being swept up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. Others are called to appear there for asylum and deportation hearings and other proceedings that have become increasingly confusing for migrants in the second Trump administration.

A lasting social justice legacy

Though Whipple, who died in 1901, began his term as bishop more than 165 years ago, some say he has influenced the protests and social justice efforts present in the city today as activists respond to President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.

Whipple “arrived in a Minnesota that was deeply racially divided at a national moment that was full of lots of conflict and tension,” said Craig Loya, current bishop of the Episcopal Church in Minnesota. “He spent his whole ministry, oftentimes at great personal cost, standing with Jesus on the side of those who were marginalized and excluded.”

That imperative of standing with vulnerable people is something Loya said he thinks his congregation has carried on through the decades. Whipple was a “missionary bishop,” according to Michael McNally, the director of American Studies and professor of religion at Carleton College. Whipple and settlers were the newcomers in Minnesota. In the 18th century, the Dakota were living in the southern part of the state, and the Ojibwe were in the north, McNally said.

The bishop wanted to extend the gospel to them and along the way developed a reputation as a well-connected person who would advocate for the tribes at a time when the White population wanted to remove them, McNally said.

“Part of his story and his myth is that he was given a name that translates to a ‘straight tongue’ because Ojibwe and Dakota leaders saw him as sort of worth their trust, but he also had a big network of people, and he was a very sort of powerful voice in DC and other places,” McNally said.

A complicated legacy

While Whipple is best remembered for advocating for Native Americans, his attitude towards them was “paternalistic,” McNally said. Though he thought the Indigenous peoples could be neighbors with the White settlers, Whipple believed they had to assimilate to White culture to do so, he added.

At the time, Whipple made it his aim to understand and advocate for Indigenous peoples’ best interests — or rather “what we thought their best interests were,” he said.

The result, McNally said, were Indian boarding schools in large part created by Whipple, where Native American children were forcibly taken, stripped of their culture and sometimes abused, he said.

“I think he’d be out in the parking lot of the Whipple office building complaining about what’s going on in there. But that doesn’t mean that he’s an uncomplicated person from the past with a real problematic legacy in terms of the boarding schools,” McNally said.

What Would Whipple Do?

In 2019, there were efforts to remove Whipple’s name from the federal building, but not because of his complicated history, according to the campaign’s leaders. Religious and community activists argued that he would have been opposed to what was taking place inside.

The movement, known as “What Would Whipple Do?” was led by the Episcopal Church in Minnesota, the Minnesota Council of Churches, and the Interfaith Coalition on Immigration. The group said federal immigration officials were sending detainees from the Whipple building to Minnesota county jails, according to a letter sent to the federal government requesting the name change. They also claimed that a “well-oiled, ruthless, and inhumane deportation machine” was being run out of the federal building.

“It came up because… Whipple never would have wanted his name on a building where these bad things are happening, because he was an advocate for people,” said Kathleen Motzenbecker, the refugee services director at the Minnesota Council of Churches.

The building was named after Whipple when it opened to the public in 1969 at the initiative of then-Sen. Walter Mondale of Minnesota, someone Motzenbecker said was respected on both sides of the aisle and knew both the significance of the land and the importance of the bishop’s legacy. Any push to rename the building now would likely take an act of Congress, according to a government report.

‘Still going strong’

But things have changed since the initial “What Would Whipple Do?” movement, with community and religious organizers like Motzenbecker saying the situation is even more urgent now than it was in 2019. The network of resources she said was strengthened by the campaign years ago is now in overdrive trying to help people.

“There’s a paramilitary group yanking people out of cars, armed men with masks. There’s arrests before people get re-interviewed,” she said, adding that the new intensity is a product of a new initiative to reexamine the pending cases of legal refugees, on top of increased enforcement of illegal immigration policies. “That was not happening in 2019.”

Federal agents surged to the city earlier this month and were met by demonstrators condemning President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement crackdown.

Protests intensified after Good, a 37-year-old mother, was fatally shot by an ICE agent on January 7. Since then, demonstrators have been denouncing the agency and its use of force, leading to tense standoffs between officials in riot gear and protesters – many of them in front of the Whipple federal building. Other loosely organized groups have made an effort to follow and document immigration enforcement efforts and warn neighbors about where operations are taking place.

The group of advocates pushing for the Whipple building to be renamed did not stop fighting, even if the movement died off. Loya said it has evolved to respond to new, more pressing threats, taking the form of direct services and financial support for immigrants and refugees. A vigil is held every month by the Minnesota Interfaith Coalition outside the building. In that respect, the bishop said the movement “is still going strong.”

“Even if we succeed in getting Bishop Whipple’s name removed from the federal building, the injustices taking place there remain. And whether Bishop Whipple’s name is on that building or not, we will continue to do everything we can to stand up with immigrants and to witness against the cruelty that is taking place inside,” Loya said.

A long history of advocacy

For the Episcopal Church Whipple once led, fighting for immigration and human rights continues. In addition to belief in the scripture, the church has been standing on the foundation of principles laid by Whipple, Loya said.

The church has established a network of resources for immigrants and refugees and has been involved in legislative efforts for more than 60 years, said Loya. Through its Office of Government Relations, the church supports ongoing efforts to create comprehensive reform, refugee resettlement and pathways to citizenship, according to the church’s website.

Using the political and legal system to fight for social justice was a key part of Whipple’s legacy, too, McNally said. The bishop was known to call on leaders in Washington, DC, New York and Philadelphia as well as influential people in Episcopal networks to advocate for his cause, he said. He also became a well-known consultant on Native Americans and served on commissions to try to address corruption in government organizations that dealt with policy around Indigenous peoples.

Whipple persuaded President Abraham Lincoln to commute the sentences of the more than 300 arrested Dakota leaders after the US-Dakota war in 1862. Still, 38 were executed with little to no judicial process.

Fort Snelling, where the Whipple building now sits, played a key role during and after the conflict. Weeks after the end of the war, more than 1,600 Dakota people, mostly women, children and the elderly, were marched hundreds of miles to a concentration camp nearby, according to the Minnesota Historical Society, and as many as 300 people died while they were detained over that winter.

Several years later in 1871, Whipple went to bat again for the rights of the Ojibwe and Dakota people when the US wanted to end treaties with Native Americans, McNally said. As a consultant, he advocated to retain a treaty-based approach but said the government should no longer treat Native American tribes as independent nations. In the end, as Whipple desired, Congress passed the Indian Appropriations Act, essentially placing tribal nations under the control of the United States, according to the National Museum of the American Indian.

Loya acknowledges Whipple’s “complicated legacy” as he works to carry on the mission as his successor. He said Whipple was “standing with the vulnerable in the best way that he was capable” and that he too will “do that in an imperfect way.”

A federal building constructed on tribal lands

Ramona Kitto Stately, a member of the Santee Dakota Nation, knows the lands surrounding the Whipple building well. They are part of her family history.

The area of Fort Snelling encompasses not just the federal building, but the historical fort for which it is named, a state park and the airport. It is also the place of the Dakota people’s creation story, and they have lived in the river valley for more than 1,200 years, according to Kitto Stately. In the Dakota language, it’s called the Bdote — a word to describe the energy of where the Minnesota and Mississippi rivers converge, she said, the most sacred site to the Dakota people.

Kitto Stately is the project director for the nonprofit We Are Still Here Minnesota, a group that wants to expand education about Indigenous peoples. The Bdote – the sacred land – includes the federal building and the land surrounding it on both sides of the river, she said.

The current immigration actions at the site are triggering, Kitto Stately said.

“We have a word in our Dakota language, because we have been through this, we have had people make us carry papers, people who have stolen our children, people who have just disappeared like our missing and murdered Indigenous women. It’s something that we have constantly stood against. We even have a word in our language for these men that come and snatch people. We call it ‘wicayuze,’” Kitto Stately said.

“It means ‘men snatchers’ and so when we look at our history and we connect it with our language we already know that this has happened in our past. We already have a name for them,” she said.

The Dakota and other Indigenous peoples in Minneapolis have not been silent about the ICE actions in the city. Kitto Stately said there is a group involved in peaceful protests and which has been present outside the only inner-city reservation, a 212-unit housing development called Little Earth. Enhanced security measures are in place around casinos and large event spaces owned by Native Americans, she added.

Last week, the Native American Rights Fund said in a statement that it stands “with our neighbors —whatever their country of birth — who are getting ripped away from their families or violently apprehended for their lawful efforts to protect their communities” and called for an end to ICE’s campaign.

Recent reports of Native Americans being stopped at their homes and workplaces and being questioned or detained by federal agents, has revived historic trauma, Kitto Stately said.

Especially in Minnesota, the fear of being arrested and taken to the Whipple building — the very site of the Dakota people’s forced encampment years ago — is present in the community, she said.

“I mean, who’s more of a citizen than a Native American person with tribal ID,” she said.

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