Greg initiated and led the fight to try to get Affirmative Action enforced during the construction of the Enbridge Pipeline and the Bemidji Regional Event Center (now completed and called the Sanford Center) in Bemidji, Minnesota.
I first met Greg after he first called me to ask if I would join with him in trying to build a movement to get Affirmative Action enforced in Minnesota. Greg had researched the issue very thoroughly.
He asked me if there was a good book to read about organizing. I gave him a copy of "Always Bring A Crowd" about steelworker Frank Lumpkins. What stood out in Greg's mind about this book is that Lumpkins had looked for someone to lead the struggle to save the jobs and pensions of his fellow workers and found no one so he decided he would have to become that leader. Greg told me he would have to do the same thing because all the people who should be helping lead the struggle to get Affirmative Action enforced were doing nothing as unemployment on the local Indian Reservations was not just hovering at between 65% and 85% but climbing.
Greg as the Business Manager of the Native American indian Labor Union #12, working pro se, he filed a lawsuit against the State of Minnesota, the racist general contractor Kraus-Anderson, the City of Bemidji and Beltrami County which infuriated these racist public officials and the racist business community.
As a result of Greg's efforts the entire power structure including the FBI along with the Beltrami County Sheriff, Phil Hodap, and Beltrami County Prosecutor, Tim Faver, went on a vicious revenge campaign targeting Greg for the most personal and unrelenting campaign of harassment. Organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union watched as Greg was targeted and didn't lift a finger to help even though they could see that Greg's rights were under attack.
The FBI carried out a similar long-term, unrelenting vendetta against Native American Indian activist and long-time Red Lake Nation Chair Roger Jourdain.
Greg was a member of the Plumbers' and Pipefitters' Union-AFL-CIO. Because of the racist leadership of this Union in Minnesota which tried to block entry of people of color and women, Greg founded the Native American Indian Labor Union #12.
This was Greg's blog. A racist Beltrami County Judge ordered Greg not to blog or use the Internet for organizing OR ANYTHING ELSE.
Greg refused to take his blog down. Here is his blog:
http://nativeamericanindianlaborunion12.blogspot.com/
Greg wrote letter to the editors of local newspapers explaining how working people without jobs would remain poor.
Greg challenged the racism in the Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party as well as in the Building and Construction Trades unions.
Greg read Stewart Acuff's book, "Getting America Back To Work" and he was so intrigued with Acuff's call for working people to become "warriors for justice" he helped to try to start a new party in Minnesota, "Warriors for Justice."
Greg was recently married and he and his wife Kathy were building a new home doing all the work on their own. When I saw Greg last week he was excited about learning how to make cupboards for their new home which he had been working on since last summer and throughout the winter.
I was with Greg when we met with Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton in his office on the day of his Inauguration; Greg took off the necklace he had been wearing and gave it to the Governor. Governor Dayton said he was honored to be given the necklace and counted Greg among his good friends.
Greg Paquin will be missed by his family and friends and all of us struggling for social and economic justice.
