What was billed as a “grassroots” uprising against immigration enforcement in Minnesota is now facing serious scrutiny after new research suggested the movement was anything but organic.
Roughly 15,000 demonstrators flooded the streets of Minneapolis last week, demanding that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) be barred from operating in the state.
Protesters chanted “ICE out now” and framed the rally as a spontaneous show of public outrage.
But behind the scenes, investigators say the operation bears all the hallmarks of a professionally coordinated, donor-funded activist campaign.
Notably, the campaign is strikingly similar to protest movements repeatedly deployed during President Donald Trump’s first and second terms.
According to reporting by the New York Post, influence researchers believe the Minneapolis demonstration followed a familiar pattern as protests marketed as grassroots but quietly fueled by wealthy megadonors and ideological networks operating out of public view.
Scott Walter, president of Capital Research, told the outlet that his team believes Neville Singham, a China-based financier long linked to far-left causes, plays a central role in backing groups connected to the Minnesota protests.
“My team’s best judgment is that it’s the Neville Singham network that is most active [in Minnesota], partly because that’s the most crazy network,” Walter said.
“But they aren’t alone,” he added.
Singham has previously been tied to funding radical activist organizations such as the People’s Forum and the Party for Socialism and Liberation.
Both groups have reportedly promoted the Minneapolis protest online.
Analysts say members of these groups increasingly blend into crowds organized under other banners to avoid public scrutiny.
The rally itself was promoted under the name 50501, shorthand for “Fifty states, fifty protests, one day.”
The group appeared almost immediately after President Trump’s second inauguration in January 2025.
It claims to be a decentralized resistance movement opposing what it calls the Trump administration’s “anti-democratic” actions.
But critics say the branding masks a deeper coordination effort.
“What’s new is we’re seeing truly extreme Communist splinter groups showing up alongside major institutional players,” Walter said.
“That’s a disturbing trend.
“Normally, they wouldn’t have been standing shoulder to shoulder in public.”
Little is known about 50501’s leadership.
Reports indicate the network is allegedly run by an anonymous Reddit user operating under the handle u/Evolved_Fungi.
He previously told Newsweek that he simply provided a time and place and watched the movement take off.
Foreign-policy experts aren’t buying the spontaneity claim.
Ian Oxnevad, a senior foreign affairs fellow at the National Association of Scholars, questioned why these protests consistently target specific federal agencies while ignoring other left-wing causes.
“If this were organic, you’d see multiple protest movements happening at once,” Oxnevad said.
“Instead, it’s always the same narrow political targets, at the same time, in the same cities.”
The Minneapolis rally comes amid a nationwide surge in anti-ICE activism as the Trump administration expands deportations and interior enforcement.
Similar protests have erupted in California and other major cities, with some escalating into disruptions of public meetings and confrontations with law enforcement.
As federal investigators and lawmakers begin examining the financial networks behind these demonstrations, the Minnesota protests are increasingly being viewed not as a spontaneous uprising but as another example of manufactured outrage, carefully funded and coordinated.
They have been deployed to obstruct immigration enforcement, sabotage the rule of law, and undermine President Trump’s leadership.
It is now becoming clear that this “uprising” is the voice of Democrat donors, not the people on the streets.
READ MORE – Soros Pumps $3.3 Million into Minnesota Anti-ICE Activist Groups
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