The Minneapolis City Council refused to renew the liquor licenses for two downtown hotels, the Canopy by Hilton and the Renaissance Hotel at the Depot, after a contentious debate over reports that the hotels may be housing ICE agents.
The council voted to hold the licenses for another cycle, delaying a final decision until a future meeting after public comment. Earlier this week, city council member Aisha Chughtai argued that automatically renewing the licenses would go against public safety.
“These are two hotels that have contracts with the federal government that allows for housing of federal agents as they are coming in and while they are here during their stay,” she said.
“Now, let’s talk about why a liquor license renewal is attached to ICE agents staying at a hotel. What we’re seeing happen in real time in hotels that have these types of contracts with the federal government is at night when agents come back from their like being out and about and you know beating people up and separating families and abducting people for fun all day. They drink heavily at the bar and have weapons on them … that is a like real danger to public safety in our community, and so necessitates us having further conversations to try to figure out how we can ensure greater public safety for the residents we serve.”
During the discussion, council members asked city attorney Quinn O’Reilly to explain the council’s legal obligations regarding liquor license renewals. O’Reilly said the request for renewals was sent to the council for approval because city staff had determined both hotels were in compliance with all liquor licensing laws and regulations, making them eligible for renewal under existing rules.
Following that explanation, several council members pushed back in favor of immediately renewing the licenses.
Council member Warren said, “This just smells real discriminatory to me. I booked hotels, and they just asked me when I’m checking in, when I’m checking out, and how can I pay … our downtown business district has suffered enough disenfranchisement through all of the closing of buildings, buildings selling for pennies on the dollar. We don’t have time to be playing around in people’s faces with foolishness.”
Council member Vetaw echoed Warren’s concerns, adding she did not understand why the council would not go ahead and renew the licenses that met legal requirements.
Committee chair Aurin Chowdhury, who brought forward the motion, said extensive constituent outreach and concerns about worker and public safety drove the decision. “When there are hotels that are a part of our beloved hospitality community, putting them in danger, putting their workers in danger, I think that accountability is 100% warranted,” Chowdhury said. She added that by not immediately renewing the liquor license, the council is “nation-leading right now.”
“It’s wild to me that multi-million, billion dollar corporations in hospitality can just like sit aside and not answer for it.”
Another council member warned that it wasn’t just the hotels that would suffer from this damage, but the very constituents the council works to protect.
“Both hotels are now losing a lot of money … I just want you to remember how much they [hotels] have suffered. And really, it’s their employees because they’re laying people off. So the very people that we try to protect are getting laid off because of the damage and the problems that are befalling these hotels by the protesters.”
When Chowdhury moved the council to a vote, five council members voted to renew the license, and nine council members did not vote for renewal.
After the vote, council member Jamal Osman asked to add remarks to the record, defending the protesters. “I do want to thank the people that we’re calling agitators. They’re fighting for our people. They [are] out there in the cold, sniffing a gas, dealing with all kind of stuff. People die and lost their lives because of us. Because of us immigrants. Someone like me, someone like Chavez (another council member) … These people are our heroes.”
The council will meet again on February 17th, after a public comment period, to revisit its decision.
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