Folk-punk-ish band The Taxpayers have released a new split 7" in collaboration with Ryan Ryan Cassata" “Power Trippin Dipshits” &b/w “We Don't F*ck With Cops” -- out now digitially with all proceeds to be donated to The Open Market MN and Rent Relief for Immigrant Students in Minneapolis, MN. Vinyl is forthcoming via Ernest Jenning Record Co.
The bands will also play a release show in Minneapolis on April 3 at Underground Music Venue, with proceeds from that event to benefit Twin Cities Trans Mutual Aid network.
Rob Taxpayer gives some added context in this (abbreviated) statement:
Hello from occupied Minneapolis!
As I write this, over 2,000 masked gunmen calling themselves “federal agents” rove through neighborhoods of my beautiful city, abducting people off the streets, kidnapping children as young as 2, gassing entire neighborhoods, and shooting US citizens in the back for filming them. Every 15 minutes or less, violence erupts. They slam us to the ground, pepper spray us in the face, break our ribs, and disappear us into the Whipple federal building, some of whom are never seen again.
Yet, for all their furious anger, incompetence, and seeming impunity, they are losing. They have lost public support, even among some conservatives. Moderates are calling for abolishing ICE. For every successful abduction, we foil another 10. Our marching bands keep them awake in their hotels at night. When they walk to their vehicles in the morning, their tires have all gone mysteriously flat. Their religious leaders have denounced them.
And they are not losing against a funded, hierarchical military organization. They are losing to The People. We are grandparents, soccer moms, dishwashers, teenagers, nurses, teachers. We are leaderless and we are fucking UNITED. Seasoned war reporters and military veterans have marveled at the extent of our nonviolent organization.
There are many heroes in the battle of The People of Minnesota Versus ICE. But here are two doing important work: Open Market MN, which operates a free, volunteer-run grocery store in Saint Paul, and Twin Cities Trans Mutual Aid, which distributes donated funds directly to the trans community in Minnesota. Both did their work long before ICE arrived and will continue long after.
I am particularly appreciative of the Open Market because they are giving us the means to feed families unable to leave their homes to go to the grocery store, to go to work, to go anywhere, without fear of abduction.
I deeply want to tell you about some of the wonderful people impacted by all this, but infuriatingly, I have to be incredibly vague so as not to put them at risk. Suffice it to say, they are fucking awesome human beings doing incredible things under impossible circumstances, and we are lucky to count them as community members.
