- “The lock to the museum is welded shut due to all the paint,” Pfeifer said. “We can’t even get in there today and probably will not until we can get a locksmith to come over.”
- A surveillance video from a tattoo parlor near the Hmong Cultural Center Museum showed three people vandalizing the storefront on Wednesday at around 3:45 a.m. They were all seen wearing black clothes and masks, with one of the vandals appearing to have light-colored skin.
- The message on the cultural center was , “Life, Liberty, Victory,” which is connected to a white supremacist group known as Patriot Front. The vandals reportedly painted over poetic verses on the plywoods installed during the riots in Minneapolis following the murder of George Floyd.
- Vandals also targeted May’s Market, a business beside the cultural center, KSTP reported. No arrests have been made so far.
- The total damage on the building is estimated to be around $1,000, including the new signboard they just put up, which cost $700, FOX9 reported.
- “We just had our new sign installed this weekend and we were so excited about our formal launch,” Pfeifer said. “I’m kind of depressed about the whole situation. It shows there’s those sentiments out there in the community. We’re just going to have to get those boards off of there and possibly get a new sign.”
- “We are very disappointed by this turn of events but we think it shows the strong ongoing need for the work of our center and our museum to promote goodwill and cultural understanding at least to those open to these things,” Pfeifer said. “The inside is beautiful. I don’t want that to get lost in this whole thing.”
- The Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations issued a statement calling on the local government to stand against anti-Asian hate crime and condemn the vandalism on the museum.
- “Anti-Asian hate is on the rise and this latest attack targeting the Hmong Museum should be condemned in the strongest terms,” the statement read. “We call on local, state and national law enforcement authorities to treat this incident as a hate crime and for elected officials to condemn it and work to pass hate crime legislation that has been outlined by many civil rights organizations.”
- Other organizations, such as the Minnesota House DFL, TakeAction Minnesota and the American Jewish Committee, have also issued statements online to show support.