Bonners Ferry, Idaho, is home to about 2,900 people in the state’s northern panhandle, where mountains and lakes stretch across a quiet rural landscape. A sign near the edge of town, Holly Pennington said, welcomes visitors to “Trump Country.”
But in early February, Pennington and about 25 friends in that small community gathered around tables with paper, markers and glue, determined to send a different message — one of solidarity.
Together, they created and mailed roughly 1,000 Valentine-themed cards to businesses across the Twin Cities metro, including several in Columbia Heights.
“And at the same time, we’re just so disheartened with what’s going on in the world,” Pennington said. “And so we just really wanted to make sure you all know how grateful we are.”
Pennington said she was emotionally shaken after hearing about Alex Pretti’s killing during ICE activity in Minnesota, along with other enforcement actions in the area.
Living in rural Idaho, she said, left her feeling helpless.
“I just thought, well, I’ll just, you know, make some cards and send cards out to the people of Minneapolis,” Pennington said. “And so I contacted my friends and they contacted their friends, and so we just got together.”
The effort expanded quickly. Pennington traveled to nearby Sandpoint, Idaho, where another 10 people joined in assembling cards. Additional cards are being sent with help from friends in Creston, British Columbia.
Among the metro recipients were Heights Coffee Bar, Valley View Elementary, Dero and Community Grounds coffee shops.
“It brought tears to their eyes,” Pennington said of the reception. “And they felt … good, you know, to connect with people out there.”
Heights Coffee Bar later posted about the unexpected delivery on Instagram.
“We have no connection to anyone in Idaho — this was 100% a random act of kindness born out of the hearts of fellow Americans witnessing the atrocities our community is experiencing at the hands of ICE,” the post read. “They are raining love down on us and want us to know they see us and they stand with us.”
Pennington described Bonners Ferry as a place where political identity is visible.
“In the beginning of our town, on someone’s private property, there’s a big sign that says Welcome To Trump Country,” Pennington said. “And God, guns and family and something else, in that order.”
She said the town is overwhelmingly white and that many residents move there seeking isolation.
“People actually do move up here to be isolated from each other,” Pennington said. “We have a lot of preppers up here, and people like that.”
She said Bonners Ferry once earned recognition as one of the friendliest towns in the country, but that the community shifted after the first Trump election and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Since the pandemic, really, since Trump was elected,” Pennington said, “people started moving up here and it’s really changed a lot.”
She said Idaho’s culture of limited government and deregulation has drawn newcomers, including, at times, organized political groups.
Even so, she said, the sense of neighborly care remains.
“When you live in a rural space, and you have harsh winters and that sort of thing, and you live out in the woods … you just care about each other. Community matters.”
That sense of community, she said, is what connected Bonners Ferry to Columbia Heights.
In Sandpoint, about 200 people rallied during a local “No Kings” event, and Pennington said residents have organized small resistance-style gatherings similar to those seen in the Twin Cities.
What they saw in Minneapolis, she said, inspired them.
“And in our little town, it has inspired us to gather more, make red hats, send notes of support, speak up, and organize in our own small way,” Pennington said. “We’ll never have the same numbers, our voices won’t reach as many people, but we’ll do our part because together we are strong.”