The racial justice movement after George Floyd

An interview with Black Lives Matter Minnesota’s Trahern Crews

By Cole Miska

Contributing Writer here has been a great deal of change in the racial justice movement in Minnesota in the past decade, following the murder of George Floyd three years ago.

Trahern Crews, who founded Black Lives Matter Minnesota (BLM MN) in the mid-2010s, said he started receiving calls “from people who didn’t really protest” the day after Floyd’s murder. He immediately began organizing, starting with a protest at 38th and Chicago, the site of the killing, which later became known as George Floyd Square (GFS).

Crews called the massive scale of the George Floyd protests “hard to manage.” While the group had previously made national headlines with protests after the police slaying of Marcus Golden in 2015, Crews estimates somewhere between

15 to 26 million people participated nationwide in the protests following Floyd’s death.

“Even today, there’s mes- sages still coming up from 2020 that we’re just now able to respond to,” Crews said. “Nothing could prepare you for something of that magnitude.”

Crews said that public support has increased for BLM since the protests, remaining above 50 percent and peaking at around 75 percent. He also noted that a Pew Research poll placed the BLM national organization at the top of the list of organizations that Black Americans saw as helping them most in recent years. He believes that BLM MN has “created an appetite for social justice in Minnesota.”

Toshira Garraway Allen, who works closely with Crews, also said support has risen for the racial justice movement since the murder of Floyd.

“Since the uprise and the killing of George Floyd, I feel that our fellow community members are listening more and have begun to believe our families and community a little bit more when we say that we have been brutalized and hurt by law enforcement,”

I think the focus isn’t just police brutality. Now, it’s police brutality and economic justice, and also dealing with what’s happening inside the jails and prisons too.

Garraway Allen said. “The politicians and people sitting in seats of authority still have a lot of work to do with building relationships with our community and impacted families.”

Three years on, Crews said tactics have changed. Many who were active in the protest movement have switched their venue from the streets to the legislative chamber. Black Lives Matter MN activists have also broadened their focus on what issues they fight for.

“I think the focus isn’t just police brutality. Now, it’s police brutality and economic justice, and also dealing with what’s happening inside the jails and prisons too,” Crews said.

He said there have been some successes, although he believes a lot of things still need to change on a legislative

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