Inside Minnesotans’ moonshot to cover rent for their immigrant neighbors

As immigration operations continue in Minnesota, communities rally to pay rent for vulnerable families

In a striking display of community action, Ashley Fairbanks turned to social media with an urgent plea: twelve immigrant families needed immediate help paying rent. Within hours, all twelve families had received assistance. By the end of the day, 43 families had been helped through direct cash transfers.

This grassroots campaign emerged in response to ongoing federal immigration enforcement operations in Minnesota, where thousands of immigrants remain confined to their homes, afraid that venturing out might lead to detention or deportation. Though Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has discussed reducing their presence, many immigrants continue to avoid work, creating a crisis for families with rent payments due.

“Despite not being able to work, rent is still due,” explained Jessica Mathias, executive director of Open Your Heart To The Hungry And Homeless. Her organization has quickly mobilized to distribute rental assistance, prioritizing households with children and those facing imminent eviction.

Mathias’s organization is one of many addressing the urgent need. “Minnesota is a very generous state,” she noted, adding that they were able to help a dozen households within a week of opening applications for assistance.

Fairbanks, who now lives in Texas but maintains strong Minnesota connections, created the Stand With Minnesota website, which has received over 2 million visits in just two weeks. The site aggregates fundraisers and mutual aid networks focusing on rental assistance.

Her “adopt-a-rent” campaign has inspired numerous individuals to contribute directly to families in need. However, Fairbanks acknowledges the limitations of this approach. “It’s not sustainable,” she said. “People are maxing out their credit cards and emptying their savings accounts to pay other people’s rent.”

The scale of the problem far exceeds what individual donors can address. Nearly half of Minnesota’s renters were already housing cost-burdened before the immigration operation began, meaning they spent over 30% of their income on housing. These statistics are even more pronounced among immigrants and people of color.

“I still know that it’s not enough,” said Yusra Murad, an organizer with United Renters for Justice, referring to the fundraising efforts. She cited one example where $200,000 raised for a single school community was depleted within two days of February.

Local governments have begun responding, albeit modestly. The Minneapolis City Council recently approved $1 million for rental assistance after a contentious two-hour debate. Council member Aisha Chughtai characterized this amount as “a drop in the bucket,” noting it would only help about 250 families.

This city funding will supplement Hennepin County’s $9.6 million emergency rental assistance program, which county official Will Lehman estimates can help approximately 2,500 families avoid eviction.

For context, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Minnesota received $673 million in federal emergency rental assistance plus $100 million in state funds. No such large-scale assistance has materialized for the current crisis, though many have called on Governor Tim Walz to implement an eviction moratorium similar to pandemic-era protections.

“This is not something that we will GoFundMe our way out of,” said Minneapolis Council member Robin Wonsley.

University of Minnesota sociology professor Nick Graetz emphasized the need to “be serious about the scale of need.” A report from Minnesota Housing estimated that meeting emergency assistance needs just for the state’s low-income households requires $350 million annually, far exceeding the $28 million typically available through existing programs.

Despite these sobering figures, community members continue their efforts to help neighbors in crisis. As Murad put it, “Every single avenue that could possibly keep a family housed is worth pursuing.”

The situation highlights the limitations of volunteer-driven responses to systemic issues, while also showcasing remarkable community solidarity. As pressure builds for government intervention, ordinary citizens continue stepping up to prevent evictions one household at a time, recognizing that while their efforts cannot solve the entire problem, they make a critical difference for families facing housing insecurity in an already challenging moment.