There are moments in a country’s life when everything stops feeling theoretical.
When danger shifts from something you read about to something you feel in your bones.
When the line between “unthinkable” and “here” dissolves.

This is one of those moments.

I came across a video last night — shared by CoachD_Speaks, a creator whose clarity I trust — and it didn’t just hit me. It cracked something open.

A young woman speaks the truth most Americans are afraid to say out loud.

A young woman in her apartment, holding her phone with a trembling kind of control that is hard to fake.
No theatrics.
No performance.
Just raw truth under pressure.

Her neighbor has been missing for two months.
Her car is still there.
Her family can’t find her.
No one has answers.

I don’t know this woman’s city.
I don’t know her neighbor’s name.
But I know this:

She isn’t describing Minnesota — not with that timeline — but her story fits the pattern unfolding across the country.

Disappearances.
Detentions.
Silence.
No answers.

This is what it looks like when a government begins turning inward on its own people.

And that is exactly what unfolded in Minneapolis this week.

The Murder That Broke the Room

On January 7, Renee Nicole Good — a 37-year-old mother, poet, human being — was shot and killed by ICE agent Jonathan Ross.

You don’t need commentary or analysis to understand the horror.
You only need to know this:

She said, “I’m not mad at you.”

A sentence meant to calm the moment, to reach someone’s humanity.
And seconds later, she was dead.

The state’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension was blocked from investigating.
Federal officials declared the shooting “justified” before her body was even removed from the vehicle.

This isn’t law enforcement.
This is authoritarian muscle memory.

And the federal response made something else clear:
They weren’t protecting the public —
they were protecting themselves.

Minneapolis Is Under Occupation — By Their Own Words

Governor Tim Walz used the word explicitly:

“Occupation.”

Not metaphor.
Not exaggeration.
A legal and political description of federal agents operating without consent or coordination.

Nearly 3,000 federal agents are now deployed in the Twin Cities.

Compare that to:

~600 MPD officers
~900 state patrol across the whole state

This isn’t support.
This isn’t backup.
This is control.

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said it plainly:

“This footprint is five times larger than our entire police department.”

When the federal presence dwarfs local law enforcement, that’s not partnership.
That’s domination.

And people feel it — not politically, but physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
This affects the body.
The air shifts.
This isn’t normal.

The Prosecutors Who Refused to Be Complicit

Six senior federal prosecutors in Minnesota — including respected veteran Joseph H. Thompson — resigned this week.

Why?

Because the DOJ:

refused to open a civil rights investigation
blocked the state from investigating
and instead ordered a probe into Becca Good, the widow of the woman who was killed

When career public servants walk away in protest, something foundational has broken.

This is what internal collapse looks like:
Not chaos in the streets —
but institutional conscience cracking from the inside.

Governor Walz’s Message: Do Not Look Away

In his January 14 address, Governor Walz said something I can’t shake:

“Help us create a database of the atrocities against Minnesotans — not just to establish a record for posterity, but to bank evidence for future prosecution.”

He didn’t tell people to quiet down.
He didn’t tell people to trust the system.
He didn’t try to soothe anyone.

He told them to record.
To witness.
To document.

Because the federal government is actively preventing the state from knowing the truth.

That alone should terrify everyone.

The Insurrection Act: A Line No President Should Cross

This morning, January 15, President Trump posted:

“If the corrupt politicians of Minnesota don’t obey the law… I will institute the INSURRECTION ACT.”

Invoking the Insurrection Act would:

federalize the Minnesota National Guard
remove the Governor’s command
place state troops under presidential authority

That’s not peacekeeping.
That’s not order.
That’s not stability.

That is a constitutional standoff, happening in real time.

Directed at American citizens on American soil.

Righteous Anger Is Wellness

This is CherryCoBiz, and wellness is part of my mission — but wellness is not silence.

In trauma psychology, suppressing anger in the face of injustice creates moral injury — a deep wound to the spirit.

Anger is not the enemy.
Anger is evidence that your moral compass is still intact.

The young woman in the video said:

“If you’re not angry, I don’t think you have a place on this earth anymore.”

Not everyone will say it the same way.
But the truth underneath is simple:

If you feel nothing in a moment like this, something inside you has shut down.

Anger is clarity.
Anger is data.
Anger is a compass.

And right now, righteous anger is a form of survival.

Active Witnessing: The Civic Duty of a Collapsing System

So what do we do?

We document.
We pay attention.
We refuse to let forced amnesia do the work of authoritarianism.

Because everything this government is doing relies on one thing:

That people stop looking.

I won’t.

Understanding your right to document federal and local agents.

I won’t escalate.
I won’t take the bait.
I won’t hand them the justification they’re begging for.

But I will record.
I will archive.
I will stand witness.
I will stay human in the face of inhumanity.

This is not left vs. right.
Not ideology vs. ideology.

This is a government turning inward —
and a people refusing to disappear.

I’m not afraid to admit it anymore.
I’m afraid of what it means.

And that is exactly why I will not look away.

P.S. — A Final Thought on Why Minneapolis Was Chosen

I need to say something clearly:

Minneapolis was not chosen at random.

This city was the epicenter of the George Floyd uprising — the largest civil rights movement in modern American history. It forced accountability. It forced police reform. It forced the nation to confront its own brutality.

And there are people in power who have never forgiven Minnesota for that.

Now, six years later, the same city is being flooded with nearly 3,000 federal agents, denied investigative authority, threatened with the Insurrection Act, and provoked at every turn.

It looks like retribution.
It looks like provocation.
It looks like they want Minneapolis to explode again —
but this time on their terms.

And I don’t have the luxury of pretending not to see that.
Neither do you.

We outnumber them.
We always have.

And “we the people” have rights worth defending if this government continues acting like the Constitution no longer applies to them.

I’m not saying this lightly.
I’m saying it because choosing not to see the danger won’t protect us.

Staying awake just might.