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Yesterday my wife and I were doing a morning walk along the lake when a young man with his car window rolled down yelled out at us 75-year-old seniors: “Line up!” So is it a firing squad for us now?

What is this young man’s history? What has he done so far with his life? Why did he rush away in his car like a coward? A heart full of violence cannot be very healthy.

Mary as a candidate and I knocked on 17,000 doors in Minnesota House District 23A a couple of years ago, where we heard too much of this type of threatening behavior off and on, including an actual physical violence attack against Mary, which I had to physically intervene. It got pretty hairy sometimes on the campaign trail.

Our local law enforcement got involved after the physical attack, doing an excellent job of protecting and serving us two door-to-door campaigners. Today we decided to take along our phone camera to record any license plate number needing to be reported to law enforcement.

I would like to set out a short resume for whom these attacks are targeting. We moved to town with our 1-year-old twin boys in the summer of 1979 when I began my 42 years of legal advocacy for Southern MN Legal Services. We proudly adopted our Kentucky Black daughter 10 years later. Mary had several jobs in town, including a long history as the director of the Area Learning Center. Prior to this we were community organizers in the 1970s south for 2 1/2 years, two years as group home houseparents in the south Bronx for the Sisters of the Good Shepherd, one year as houseparents in a crisis intervention center in Chicago plus one year as group home houseparents for Catholic Charities in Washington, D.C.

Here is a message for the young man who yelled out his window that we should expect to be executed by a firing squad coming soon.

We earned our right to advocate for the values we learned in our lifetime. We earned our right to be protected and served by law enforcement. We will take advantage of this law enforcement protection should we ever be attacked by someone who wants to line us up in front of a firing squad.

Ted Hinnenkamp
Albert Lea