We spent time in southern California. I could write about walking along beaches, warm sunsets, and missing bitter cold back here. Perhaps I will. But today, I must join my voice to the resistance.

What is happening to fellow human beings, sometimes for no offense other than having dark skin is horrific, indefensible, and wrong on a thousand levels.

Much is being said and written. Perhaps it is prideful of me to think the voice of one old farmer in Brown County matters. For what it’s worth, I must join the protesters and say, “This is wrong.”

“Obama deported people, too.” As a tool of immigration control, applied legally and humanely, deporting certain individuals has a place. What’s happening now is most often illegal and regularly sickeningly inhumane.

During our California days, as we met people, it would come up that we were from Minnesota. We would get a response like, “Oh. I’m sorry.”

Once again, our humble state is the center of the news universe. I check in to BBC News, and there we are. I should add the BBC reporters are shocked by what has happened to the United Kingdom’s one-time ally.

ICE has been in Sleepy Eye. They were hassling an older Hispanic man. When Sleepy Eye Police showed up, the ICE agents loaded into four vehicles and left town. It is possible the outcome would have been different were it not for our officer’s presence.

ICE is in Willmar, St. Cloud, Mankato, but Minneapolis remains the epicenter, both for abductions and protests. I have friends there who have been part of the protests. It shouldn’t be true, but one takes part in a legal protest at some risk right now.

I admire my friends and the thousands standing in the cold. Those hardy souls are trying to save our country. That sounds like hyperventilating to say that. But this is totally a moment that will define who we are and who we will be. Will we go further down this dark path?

Children being taken. Churches, schools, hospitals, no longer protected. House doors rammed open, car windows smashed, people dragged out of both. No warrants required. Skin color allowed to stand for cause. Shipping people around the country to be detained in terrible facilities. Poorly trained forces with arsenals, masked with no identification.

Certainly, Americans haven’t always been angels. Thousands of civilians have been killed by our military. But as for Americans mistreating men, women, and children on our soil, this stands out. Treatment of Blacks in the Jim Crow south is the only thing close.

As far as men in authority running roughshod over human beings, their rights, and the constitution, we are in a watershed moment. Things could get better. There is no guarantee of that. We know from history, things could get worse.

Martin Luther King said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” With apologies to Dr. King, I no longer believe that. Seventy years on this planet has shown me too much evidence that human beings can be pretty crappy to others. Especially men in power.

A thousand points of light can be snuffed out by one evil act.

Our time in California was spent from San Diego to Los Angeles. It is only a slight exaggeration to say that everybody we saw who was doing any kind of work was Hispanic.

Knowing what was going on back here, I wondered if Minnesota with its relatively small non-white population is a warmup act for the big show?

Or would the resistance in that big state overwhelm ICE?

If Stephen Miller is going to make this the white “Christian” nation he pines for, such an operation is in our future.

The superintendent of Sleepy Eye Public School said, “Any outside agencies are prohibited from entering our school without permission or a valid warrant or court order.” That statement would have meant something a couple months ago. Now ICE is entering schools, homes, and businesses without permission, warrant, or order. It is only illegal if someone makes it so. That’s what the government used to do.

Most people I know oppose this. The majority of Americans do. But enough are OK with it that it continues. I have thought about how one can be okay with this, the largest program of authorized abuse of civil and constitutional rights in my lifetime.

There are a set of people who will never challenge Donald Trump. That is clear now. I can’t understand it, but it just is. I think in many cases, they know this is wrong inside of them. I suspect that is true for many Republican members of Congress. It’s a type of loyalty, I guess.

What about others? You don’t have to search to know stories of ICE acting illegally and inhumanely. I get things on my phone, but old-fashioned newspapers and radio are filled with them. I guess it’s possible to not know what’s going on.

There are so many untruths.

“They are detaining the worst of the worst.” A few criminals run on a loop in administration talking points. Most of those abducted are workers who are contributing to their communities. This remains true. Immigrants commit crimes at a lower level than other citizens. Look it up.

“They’re here illegally.” First, migration is not a crime. Being undocumented is a civil issue. Using mass detention as a form of immigration processing violates international law.

Beyond that, many are here legally in some stage of applying for refugee or immigration status. The administration has arbitrarily ended programs that Congress created. If we had a functioning Congress, they would not allow that.

“ICE is protecting children by apprehending them.” I suppose someone somewhere believes that.

I remember hearing Kristi Noem say that Renee Good had driven over an agent and Alex Pretti had drawn a gun on agents to massacre them. Within hours the world knew those were not true. There was no retraction by the administration. There is never a retraction.

Among the lies, there are the golden oldies. The 2020 election was stolen, despite there being no evidence. And January 6th didn’t happen, even though we all watched it.

I read this. A reporter asked A. J. Muste, a clergy man and pacifist, who protested the Vietnam War, “Do you really think you are going to change the policies of this country by standing out here alone at night in front of the White House with a candle?”

Muste replied softly, “Oh I don’t do this to change the country. I do this so the country won’t change me.” Maybe that’s all we can do.

— Randy Krzmarzick farms on the home place west of Sleepy Eye, where he lives with his wife, Pam.