Rally-goers held signs criticizing billionaire Elon Musk at on Feb. 18, 2025. Photo by Michelle Griffith/Minnesota Reformer.
Hundreds of grassroots supporters with Minnesota’s labor unions and progressive faith groups gathered at the Minnesota Capitol Tuesday, calling on state and federal officials to fight the Trump administration’s rapid dismantling of swaths of the federal government in anticipation of further tax cuts for the wealthy.
Speakers at the rally, organized by We Make Minnesota — a coalition of labor and community groups — said Minnesotans need to come together and organize against President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk and their agenda to cut funding for essential services.
“We gotta stand up against these people. They are the money, but we are the many and we are gonna beat them,” Attorney General Keith Ellison told the rally-goers.
The rally comes as the Democratic rank-and-file’s increasing impatience with the party’s D.C. establishment and perceptions that they haven’t done enough to stop or stall Trump and his agenda to cut services and trillions from the federal government. Gov. Tim Walz joined other governors during a phone call last month with Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, imploring him to be more aggressive in fighting back against Trump.
Democrats in Minnesota, long a beacon of Midwestern progressive organizing, are now attempting to gather popular momentum against the Trump-Musk maelstrom.
Attendees chanted “Musk must go” and “tax the rich,” during the rally, and many held anti-Musk signs in the rotunda of the Capitol.
Ellison on Tuesday presented himself as the bulwark between working-class Minnesotans and the Trump administration, touting the multiple lawsuits he has filed against the federal government so far. Minnesota has been a party to at least six lawsuits against the Trump administration, challenging Trump’s executive orders on birthright citizenship, federal spending and restrictions on gender-affirming care.
“This fight will not be won in a courtroom,” Ellison warned, however. “It’s got to be the people.”
Teacher Sarah Lancaster, who won Minnesota Teacher of the Year in 2022, called for higher taxes on the wealthy to pay for more education funding.
“As a teacher, I strive to provide an equitable education for all students in my classroom, but I also question why the age-old trend of rising inequality continues,” Lancaster said.
