Minneapolis: Native People at Fort Snelling, 'Return Dakota Oyate Land'
NEW: Indigenous Activists Occupy Land Near Fort Snelling, Plan To Stay Until 'Land Back'
By Unicorn Riot Media, Feb. 12, 2026
On February 9, 2026, Indigenous activists erected multiple tipis at Coldwater Spring outside Fort Snelling, establishing an occupation. Organizers demand land back in the form of “returning Fort Snelling” to the Dakota people, and invite state officials like Governor Tim Walz, and Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan to have a conversation, said Gary Spears, organizer with First Nations United.
Within a wooded area, the occupation sits on the other side of the Whipple Federal Building, which is the headquarters of the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Operation Metro Surge, as well as a detention center for immigrant detainees and a flashpoint of recent protests.
Full story: unicornriot.ninja/2026/indigenou At the occupation, the chairman of the American Indian Movement Twin Cities, Mike Forcia, said, “We need land back like Powderhorn Park, if the Dakota people got Powderhorn Park, we can have green jobs, a cinema, a theatre. Land Back.” Forcia also spoke about the importance of Fort Snelling, the site of a mass hanging of Dakota people by President Abraham Lincoln. “The significance of Fort Snelling is that it was a concentration camp, no one should be held at Whipple at all. They’re Americans, they should never be in there, never again. That’s why the sight needs to be turned over to the Dakota people. All the stuff going on with ICE right now has to do with the land and resources. They decide who comes. They decide who leaves.” As part of the colonization of the Minnesota Territory, the United States government built a military fort on one of the most spiritually and culturally important sites in the area, at the confluence of the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers. The fort was used as part of the genocide and attempted extermination of the native population.
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