Star Tribune
Family, friends of St. Paul’s Tou Ger Xiong gather in remembrance
Tou Ger Xiong composed a poem amid the COVID-19 pandemic’s onslaught in 2020. In it, he mused about the prospect of dying alone in a hospital.
“Did I say all that I had to say?” wrote the longtime entertainer and esteemed Hmong-American activist from St. Paul.
Nothing, he added, could “compare to the fear of dying, alone, away from family, with unfinished business, and unspoken words.”
Xiong’s words echoed inside a Woodbury high school gymnasium Saturday as mourners gathered to remember a prolific life brutally ended by kidnappers in Colombia this month.
“I’m still in shock, mainly because he died so far away from us,” said KaYing Yang, a St. Paul entrepreneur and social justice advocate.
Saturday’s vigil, Yang said, marked the first step for a reeling community to celebrate Xiong’s positive contributions rather than reflect on his life’s violent end.
Xiong, 50, was one of 11 children in a family that fled its native Laos amid warfare in 1973. The family spent four years in a refugee camp in Thailand before settling in St. Paul. The Humboldt High School and Carleton College alum later toured the country as a motivational speaker, blending rap and comedy into his storytelling.
Xiong’s fingerprints were also on the first Hmong Minnesota Day held at the Minnesota State Fair in 2015, and he was credited with helping Mee Moua become the nation’s first Hmong American elected to a state legislature in 2002. Xiong, Sen. Amy Klobuchar said Saturday, “made the most of his tragically short time here on Earth.”
Xiong was killed this month in Medellin, Colombia, after being kidnapped following a date, according to local press reports in Colombia. Kidnappers reportedly stabbed and beat Xiong to death a day later without collecting the money.
Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, Attorney General Keith Ellison and St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter were also among those to remember Xiong on Saturday.
Eh Xiong, an older brother to Tou, closed the vigil by reciting his brother’s May 2020 poem that pondered a lonely end. That same poem included a message for Xiong’s “spiritual children,” described as all of those he taught or entertained.
“Smile when you think of me, for I’m smiling because I thought of you,” he wrote.
Two men are dead and one woman was injured in a shooting at a homeless encampment in south Minneapolis on Sunday afternoon, police said. It was the second shooting at a Minneapolis encampment this weekend.
At about 2:20 p.m. Sunday, police responded to a reported shooting in the 4400 block of Snelling Avenue near the railroad tracks at the small encampment between Snelling and Hiawatha avenues. At the scene, officers found two men with fatal gunshot wounds, said Sgt. Garrett Parten Minneapolis Police spokesman. Responders rendered aid, but both men died at the scene.
A woman was found at the scene with life-threatening injuries and was taken to a local hospital where she was being treated Sunday night, he said. Police have yet to say whether the three were living at the encampment.
Officers detained three people, who Parten said have since been released after police found they were not believed to be involved in the shooting. No suspects had been identified as of 6:30 p.m. Sunday.
The shooting is the second at a southside homeless encampment this weekend. One man died and two were critically injured early Saturday at an encampment shooting near E. 21st Street and 15th Avenue S. On Sunday, the man was identified as Deven Leonard Caston, 31, according to the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s Office.
“We don’t know if there’s a connection between this homeless encampment shooting and the one that occurred yesterday,” Parten said on Sunday. “That is a consideration of the investigation. We can’t rule it out.”
Ward 12 Council Member Aurin Chowdhury, who represents the area and lives nearby, was at the site of the shooting Sunday afternoon. She said officials need information about what happened to better understand how to address situations like this long-term.
“This is an absolute tragedy, and this type of violence should never occur within our city,” she said. “It really makes me think about how we need to look at this more systemically and not just take a whack-a-mole approach and expect the problem to go away.
During Sunday’s Twitch stream, Walz and Ocasio-Cortez played Madden while discussing making homebuying more accessible, building affordable housing, eliminating student loan debt and raising the federal minimum wage.
After the match, Walz showed off his Sega skills in a round of “Crazy Taxi,” the Y2K-era racing game where gamers play as a taxi driver picking up passengers and taking them to their destination for cash.
Walz called himself a “first-generation gamer” and recalled playing “Crazy Taxi” when he bought a Sega Dreamcast. He also mentioned the Minnesota Star Tribune’s coverage of how his old game console was sold and ended up with a Plymouth resident, who still has it.
Afterward, Walz and Ocasio-Cortez watched a short clip of Trump denying on Rogan’s podcast that he lost the 2020 presidential election. Democrat Joe Biden won that year.
Ocasio-Cortez during the livestream also showed viewers her farm on the cozy, indie game Stardew Valley. Walz said the game reminded him of Minnesota: “You’ve got mining,” he said. “You’ve got agriculture. You’ve got snow.”
Before Walz headed out to a rally in Nevada, he pleaded with viewers to vote. More than 12,000 viewers tuned into the livestream on Ocasio-Cortez’s Twitch channel. More watched from Harris’ channel.
”Hey guys, they’re now scrambling and trying to call us Nazis and fascists,” said Alina Habba, one of Trump’s attorneys, who draped a sparkly ”MAGA” jacket over the lectern as she spoke. ”And you know what they’re claiming, guys? It’s very scary. They’re claiming we’re going to go after them and try and put them in jail. Well, ain’t that rich?”
Declared Hogan in his characteristic raspy growl: ”I don’t see no stinkin’ Nazis in here.”
Trump has denounced the four criminal indictments brought against him as politically motivated. He has ramped up his denunciations in recent weeks of ”enemies from within,” naming domestic political rivals, and suggested he would use the military to go after them. Harris, in turn, has called Trump a ”fascist.”
The arena was full hours before Trump was scheduled to speak. Outside the arena, the sidewalks were overflowing with Trump supporters in red ”Make America Great Again” hats. There was a heavy security presence. Streets were blocked off and access to Penn Station was restricted.
In the crowd was Philip D’Agostino, a longtime Trump backer from Queens, the borough where Trump grew up. The 64-year-old said it was appropriate for Trump to be speaking at a place bills itself as ”the world’s most famous arena.”
”It just goes to show ya that he has a bigger following of any man that has ever lived,” D’Agostino said.
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