People Have the Power—of Music
A Dispatch from Minnesota During the ICE Age
by Colin Scharf
On the morning of February 13, I leapt from bed in a panic. The UK music blog Dancing About Architecture had published a video premiere of my band Silver Summer’s lead single from our forthcoming album, and I’d forgotten to switch the YouTube settings from “unlisted” to “public.” I made coffee and spent the next hour sharing the premiere around our social media channels and texting with our publicist about next steps.
Then my wife Laura came into the room. “ICE is moving,” she said.
“About damn time,” I replied. Earlier that week, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz announced that ICE would be ending their occupation of our state within the coming days. I figured that’s what Laura meant.
“No,” she said. “They’re moving to a trailer park in St. Peter.” Laura’s on a private ICE Watch chat for our community. Agents were preparing for yet another raid.
And there I sat, in the safety of our home, refreshing YouTube, watching video plays tick up, replying to comments and feeling rewarded by my little artistic milestone. Meanwhile, masked men in tactical gear were preparing to steal people from their homes fifteen miles north of our house. I imagined another instance of leaping from bed in a panic. I felt like a fool. My heart sank. My joy evaporated.
Minnesota has been under siege by an occupying force for the majority of 2026. If we’re not physical targets of ICE, then we’re psychological targets. From the filmed murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti to videos of ICE brutalizing people in the streets to the reality that my non-white friends have taken to carrying their birth certificates and other official documentation as a form of flimsy armor, it’s difficult not to feel hopelessly demoralized.
Almost as if that’s the point.
At the end of January, I hosted a going-away party for two friends in the event space of my recording studio, which is the sanctuary of a 19th century church. The guest list included a variety of individuals from around the world living in Minnesota on visas. My ruminating intrusive thought involved a scenario similar to the end of Cabaret, where Nazis burst into the Kit Kat Club and wreak havoc. I wasn’t the only one whose mind generated images of paramilitary goons bursting through the stained glass, either. ICE has possessed the majority of us.
My friends and I have had plenty of uncomfortable conversations since the start of the year. “Should we buy guns? Move to Canada? Start a compound and live off the grid?” I don’t want to do any of those things (although I do like Canada). I want to believe that this descent will ultimately right itself, but it’s difficult when half the people driving past our small but defiant anti-ICE protests flip us off and crank “Ice Ice Baby.”
If only the ire of music snobs could be harnessed...
Lines feel drawn. Sides feel taken. My mind has replayed images from war movies I watched as a kid. If Minnesota suddenly exploded as the powder keg of the second American civil war, what would I do? How would I protect Laura? What about our cats?
It isn’t natural to feel so uncomfortable, nor is it healthy. It’s as if an infection is spreading, and the primary symptoms are fear and paranoia.
But then another film scene came to my mind one morning. Rather than drag me deeper into distress, like the end of Cabaret, I found myself reinvigorated. The film? The Exorcist. Unlikely, I know. But during a brief exchange near the end, while the two priests rest between bouts with the demon, Father Karras asks the older Father Merrin why the demon has chosen to torment an innocent girl.
“The point,” Merrin says, “is to make us despair.”
The film’s director, William Friedkin, cut the clip from the original release. To Friedkin, the priest’s statement was inherent in the film. But something important happens when we name overwhelming feelings of discomfort—whether it’s a mental health diagnosis, chronic illness diagnosis, or a fascist assault. Names stabilize, categorize, shape, and unmask chaos.
In my own experience, receiving an ADHD diagnosis refocused the majority my life. My procrastination, chronic lateness, struggle to complete tasks, my impulsivity, and my ability to hyperfixate on artistic pursuits (among other things) were no longer random personality quirks. They’d emerged as stars in a constellation.
Now The Exorcist is admittedly an odd place to find strength at a time like this, but Merrin’s statement works to corral the pervading dread, fear, helplessness, and hopelessness afflicting the film’s characters—and inadvertently gives it a name.
That name is Evil.
The raids, patrols, violence, abductions, and murders in Minnesota at the hands of ICE agents are acts of evil being committed to sow fear, terror, and further destabilize the already tenuous threads of our society. Like most Minnesotans, I spent the first few weeks of 2026 adrift in malaise, bewildered by every black vehicle with tinted windows, scared for my immigrant and non-white friends, scared for my friends attending protests, and disappointed with myself for not doing more. I’m a punk rocker, after all. My favorite band is The Clash. I should be out there on the front lines with a camera and a whistle and my fists. Isn’t that where Joe Strummer would be?
Maybe.
But Joe Strummer would also be fighting back with music, just like Bruce Springsteen and his new song “Streets of Minneapolis,” just like the dozens of drummers pounding away along Minneapolis’ Stone Arch Bridge, and the pickup bands playing all-night gigs outside hotels housing ICE, and the Minnesota musicians who’ve raised at least $100k in the past month from benefit albums and shows. For the past few weeks, I’ve been helping produce a benefit album featuring musicians in my community. When the songs are compiled, it’ll be my job to master them and duplicate the CDs. When the album is ready, my studio will host the release party.
It doesn’t seem like much when another message from Laura’s ICE Watch chat came through as I’ve been writing today, saying that ICE smashed into someone’s car and threatened to mace the driver. But others filmed the incident. A local reporter interviewed the driver. I’m sharing their story here, and later today I’ll head to my studio to finish mixing songs for our benefit album. We’re not letting those bastards grind us down.
I think about Woody Guthrie’s guitar scrawled with “This Machine Kills Fascists.” I think about Tom Morello and Springsteen and others on stage at the sold-out First Ave popup benefit concert. I think about Raffi—yes, that Raffi!—and his pro-Minnesota, anti-ICE posts on Threads. I think about recording Laura singing Patti Smith’s “People Have the Power” for our compilation, and all the other groups adding music to our album, and my heart leaps from the abyss straight into my throat, and I feel alive again. I feel powerful again.
We have music. We have art. We have community, compassion, and empathy for our neighbors. We have the world on our side. And what constellation do those stars compose?
Hope.
COLIN SCHARF is a musician, writer, filmmaker, audio engineer, and event programmer living in South Central Minnesota. He is the creative director of Vision Studios, a multimedia creators’ space and events center housed in a 19th century church. His band Silver Summer’s debut full-length Die of Love is set for a June 2026 release.