Ever since the Trump administration announced in December that it was sending thousands of ICE agents to Minneapolis to find and remove undocumented immigrants, indie booksellers in the Twin Cities have stepped up to resist, handing out free whistles and anti-ICE signs to customers, and participating in a state-wide general strike on January 23 and a national strike on January 30.

Booksellers are also supporting families, schools, and mutual aid organizations in more commonplace ways. Wild Rumpus is conducting a book drive for local public school students and educators; the Red Balloon Bookshop is partnering with 25 schools and organizations to put Spanish-language books in the hands of Latinx families; Moon Palace Books just wound up a diaper and menstrual supplies drive benefiting Community Aid Network; Black Garnet Books is teaming up with that same organization to provide board and picture books for young children, delivered to immigrant families along with food and supplies; Inkwell Booksellers is conducting a food and cleaning products drive for immigrant families of students at a nearby school; and Big Hill Books is planning an outdoor bake sale/dance party on February 22, as well as a used book sale March 7–8 billed as “Spring Cleaning: Melt the Ice,” to benefit immigrant families of students at neighborhood schools.

“The past six weeks have taught me that selling books right now is far less important than building up our community,” says Big Hill Books owner Beth Thompson. “This is a lightning-in-a-bottle moment for us to act—not just booksellers but all small businesses.”

Comma: A Bookshop has been putting money down to support immigrants: after Renee Good was killed on January 7, it donated 100% of that day’s proceeds to the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee; after Alex Pretti was killed on January 24, Comma donated 50% of that day’s proceeds to Unidos Minnesota. Comma also recently raised $6,000 to help an immigrant family with three children living near the store who had been detained and sent to Texas. “They’re back,” says owner Victoria Ford, “but they missed work and are in a hole financially.”

On February 28, approximately two dozen indies around the state are planning Authors for Minnesota Day, during which more than 50 authors—including Allen Eskens, William Kent Krueger, and Curtis Sittenfeld—will give signed copies of their latest releases to anyone at the stores who makes a donation to the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota or the Women’s Foundation of Minnesota Immigration Rapid Response Fund.

Drury Lane Books in Grand Marais, 260 miles north of the Twin Cities, is participating, because customers “are focused on the issue, and the two organizations receiving donations are organizations we want to support any way we can,” says manager Gwen Danfelt. Drury Lane recently donated 25% of its January 24 sales to the Immigrant Defense Network.

“
Selling books right now is far less important than building up our community.
”

It’s not just Minnesota bookstores pitching in. After declaring on social media in the wake of Pretti’s death that it “stands in solidarity with the people and businesses of Minnesota,” Thank You Books in Birmingham, Ala., donated 10% of its sales from the last week of January to the Hispanic and Immigrant Center of Alabama. Referring on social media to Thank You’s action and to “ICE’s assault on our Minneapolis friends and neighbors,” The Book & Cover in Chattanooga, Tenn., also donated 10% of sales that week to La Paz, a local Latinx advocacy organization. And Greedy Reads in Baltimore donated 20% of that week’s sales to the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota.

On January 24 in Salisbury, N.C., South Main Books owner Alissa Redmond announced that she would be closing her doors “until our neighbors across America can safely get to and from work and back to the business of living again,” adding, “We refuse to participate in an economy that condones state-sanctioned murder.”

Redmond tells PW the decision to close the store “was not a financial decision at all”—last year was the best year yet in its six-year history. “We are not in a good place as a nation, and I need to gauge where my community is at and if there still is space for me here.”