Indivisible Twin Cities Statement on the Great Minnesota Flag Rebellion of 2026
Fly whichever flag you want. Just stop pretending it is the work.
While federal agents disappear our neighbors off the streets, while grocery prices climb, while families wonder whether they can afford insulin or rent or both, the brave city councils of Elk River, Champlin, Ham Lake, Inver Grove Heights, and a growing roster of suburban outposts have identified the true crisis facing Minnesota: a flag.
Not the cost of housing. Not the federal assault on due process. Not the schools, not the hospitals, not the farms going under. A flag.
We want to congratulate these local Republican officials on their courageous stand against a piece of cloth. It takes real conviction to look at everything happening in this country right now and conclude that the most urgent use of your council’s time is rerunning a 2023 legislative debate you lost. We understand the impulse. Governing is hard. Pretending to govern is easier, and the costumes are better.
Let us be direct about what this is. This is not a principled stand. This is theater for an audience of one congressman and a handful of talk radio hosts. These council members are not solving problems for their residents. They are auditioning for the GOP primary electorate, and they are using city staff time, public meetings, and a few thousand dollars in flag procurement to do it. Elk River will spend weeks on flag logistics. Inver Grove Heights budgeted three thousand dollars and a month of staff coordination to take down a flag and put up a different one. That is money and time their constituents will never get back, spent on a grievance their constituents did not ask them to litigate.
And let us name the deeper dishonesty. The old flag depicted a Native man riding away from a white settler with a rifle. Reasonable people understood why that imagery did not belong on a state symbol in 2024. The men and women now voting to bring it back understand it too. They simply do not care, because the point is not the flag. The point is the performance of refusal. The point is to signal, to a particular slice of the electorate, that they will not accept any change, any update, any acknowledgment that Minnesota in 2026 is not Minnesota in 1957. The flag is a vehicle. The denialism is the cargo.
We would take these officials more seriously if they brought the same energy to the actual emergencies in their communities. We have not seen Elk River’s city council pass a resolution on ICE raids. We have not seen Champlin demand answers on federal funding cuts to their schools. We have not seen Inver Grove Heights take a stand on anything that would require courage rather than cosplay.
To the Republican legislators cheering each of these votes from the sidelines: we see you. You are not leading. You are not governing. You are running a permanent campaign against a state that has already moved on, and you are recruiting local officials to stage the same show in town after town because you have nothing else to offer.
Minnesotans deserve serious leaders working on serious problems. What they are getting from these communities is a costume drama about a flag.
Fly whichever one you want. Just stop pretending it is the work.
Powerfully stated. Thank you.
I like the comment….just fly whatever flag you want and get to work for the people instead of grandstanding!