The Advocates for Human Rights accepts Zabel Human Rights Award on behalf of Courageous Minnesotans
The Advocates joined Minnesota-based COPAL earlier this month to accept Human Rights First's William D. Zabel Human Rights Award on behalf of courageous Minnesotans standing up for our neighbors and U.S. democracy. Read Executive Director Michele Garnett McKenzie's full remarks below:
Good evening.
I’m Michele Garnett McKenzie, executive director of The Advocates for Human Rights, and I am deeply honored to accept the William D. Zabel Human Rights Award on behalf of the people of Minnesota.
This award recognizes something extraordinary. Not the work of a single organization or the efforts of a handful of leaders. But the collective courage of thousands of ordinary people who chose solidarity over fear.
At The Advocates for Human Rights, we believe that everyone has a part to play in defending human rights.
Minnesota proved that.
When human rights are under attack, lawyers have a part to play. Organizers have a part to play. Faith leaders, teachers, healthcare workers, business owners, students, artists, neighbors—and most of all—those who are in the crosshairs of oppression for no reason other than what they look or sound like, what they say or believe—we all have a part to play.
Human rights are protected when ordinary people decide those rights matter.
Operation Metro Surge was billed as an immigration enforcement operation. But those of us who witnessed it understood that it was something more.
Yes, it was a direct attack on refugees and immigrants in Minnesota. But it was a shot across the bow of democracy itself.
Textbook authoritarianism. Target communities you believe are vulnerable. Test whether people will look away. Whether institutions will remain silent. Whether fear will become stronger than solidarity.
What happened in Minnesota was a test. And the people of Minnesota answered.
Across the state, people refused to stand by. Led by fearless immigrant, refugee, Indigenous, and labor leaders, Minnesotans marched on a cold day in January. Checked on neighbors. Patrolled the streets. Stood guard over mosques and schools. People who had never thought of themselves as human rights defenders discovered that they were exactly that.
Over the last six months, The Advocates for Human Rights has worked with the Minnesota Truth Council to document the impact of Operation Metro Surge and Operation PARRIS. We have documented human rights violations from enforced disappearances and arbitrary detention to the denial of the right to food, health, and education. Of infiltration and surveillance. Of direct targeting of movement leaders. But also stories of extraordinary courage, resilience, and resistance.
Because authoritarianism depends on distortion and erasure, on people forgetting what happened or doubting what we experienced, documenting truth is itself an act of resistance.
Authoritarian regimes do not rely on strength alone. They rely on exhaustion.
They throw everything they have at people. They spread lies. They manufacture confusion. They create crisis after crisis. Their goal is to wear us down, distract us, divide us, and make us too afraid to act.
Authoritarianism is not inevitable.
When people remain clear-eyed about the truth, when we are relentless in demanding accountability, and when we keep our focus on the world we are trying to build, we can prevail.
Minnesota showed that courage is contagious.
Minnesota showed that solidarity is stronger than intimidation.
Minnesota showed that when people unite around human dignity, authoritarian tactics can be defeated.
The work ahead remains difficult. The forces that seek to divide us have not disappeared. The attacks on immigrant communities are escalating. The pressure on democratic institutions is real.
But this award reminds us that we are not powerless.
Thank you to Human Rights First for your courage, your documentation, and your recognition that everyone has a part to play in defending human rights.
