Press Clips

When Donald Trump won re-election in 2024, there was one campaign pledge that voters across the political spectrum felt the most confident he’d make good on: controlling illegal immigration and making the country safer. About 55 percent of Americans approved of Mr. Trump’s approach to immigration upon his return to the White House, my polling found.

One year later, however, the public’s assessment has turned negative, having flipped to 55 percent disapproval in my own most recent polling, whose dates included last Saturday, the day Alex Pretti was killed by federal agents in Minneapolis.

Driving this is Americans’ belief that Mr. Trump’s policies are not delivering on the safety and security he promised — in fact, now quite the opposite. On one side of the ledger, there is a decreasing sense that roundups and deportations by federal agents are focused on true security threats. On the other, there is rising anxiety that the presence of an armed federal force in cities is actively making daily life less safe for people who live there.

As a result, what was once an issue that Mr. Trump could rely on as a political asset — winning over even some of his skeptics — has now curdled into a tragic debacle. Americans are seeing horrifying video clips of clashes with ICE agents that instill a sense of fear, not of immigrants, but of their own government.

Immigration is an issue on which Mr. Trump held a solid advantage throughout the 2024 election, with 53 percent of voters in the exit polls of key states saying they trusted him more, compared to only 44 percent who preferred Kamala Harris. At the heart of his campaign were calls to deport criminals living in the United States illegally.

And indeed, at the start of Mr. Trump’s second term, that goal was broadly popular: Some 63 percent of voters overall — including nearly four in 10 who had voted for Ms. Harris — said at the time that they hoped deporting undocumented immigrants who had committed other crimes or had outstanding deportation orders would be one of Mr. Trump’s highest priorities. But that consensus faded when voters were asked in the same survey about deportations that go beyond those with criminal convictions or removal orders; only 41 percent felt deporting all illegal immigrants should be a high priority.

Even within Mr. Trump’s own party, there has been considerable disagreement over how widespread to make deportation efforts. Or, as Representative Maria Salazar, Republican of Florida, put it this week, “One thing is the gardeners, another thing is the gangsters. One thing is the cooks, the other thing is the coyotes,” a reference to the smugglers paid to guide migrants across the border.

While illegal immigration is an economic concern for some — Vice President JD Vance often points to immigrant labor as depressing wages for citizens — Mr. Trump has more often focused on the issue as a matter of law, order and security. When a horrific episode like the 2024 murder of the Georgia college student Laken Riley occurs at the hands of someone who should not have legally been in the country, it galvanizes those who say the United States has a too-soft approach to immigration that puts everyday Americans at risk.

Mr. Trump is now discovering that sending masked ICE agents to apprehend immigrants in public spaces is having an equivalent effect in the opposite direction, and many Americans who were vital to his electoral coalition now feel less safe, rather than more.

In October, I asked voters about that. At the time, voters were fairly split, with 36 percent saying the agents’ actions made them feel more safe and only 34 percent saying it made them less safe. Since then, many of those in the middle have come off the sidelines. My most recent survey, which was initiated after the shooting of Renee Good and was still being conducted during the shooting of Mr. Pretti, showed a jump to 45 percent of voters saying they now feel less safe as a result of ICE’s raids.

When I look at the groups that moved away from Mr. Trump, some of the biggest changes were among Black voters, independent voters and voters in urban areas, all of which Mr. Trump prided himself on adding to his new Republican coalition. Crucially but perhaps unsurprisingly, the group with the largest increase in feeling unsafe was Hispanic voters, who skyrocketed from 32 percent feeling less safe in October to 58 percent today. Latino voters have generally been supportive of Mr. Trump’s policies on border security, but in Times/Siena College polling last week, they said that ICE has gone too far.

In part, this is related to voters’ increasing belief that ICE is aiming at people well beyond the criminals and the coyotes. It isn’t just that the tactics being used feel dangerous, it is that the targets increasingly are not. In October, by just a five-point margin, voters leaned slightly toward thinking that ICE was focused more on people who are peaceful and not a threat to public safety; by January, that had widened to a 14-point gap, with only 38 percent of voters thinking ICE is mostly going after criminals.

Mr. Trump’s decision to change course in Minnesota, both in terms of personnel and his rhetorical approach, suggests he is aware the issue has gotten away from him. Many voters counted on Mr. Trump’s immigration policy to keep them safe, and they no longer feel they are. An issue that was once something of a political safe space for the president no longer is, either.

It’s hard to believe Trump has just finished his first year of a second term as president. His impact is devastating on many fronts—global and domestic— and it feels like years have passed. Worse, more is yet to come.

Immigrants have borne the brunt of a relentless war that is a multi-headed monster attacking us all in one way or another. Because immigrants do not operate in a vacuum. They are part of families, communities, and the economy, and everything has been adversely affected.

What began as detentions and deportations of alleged “criminals” is now a network of terror. Illegitimate racial profiling targets lawful residents and U.S. citizens, who must carry passports to prove citizenship—often still facing abuse from immigration agents. Due process, the rule of law, and the Constitution are violated.

In his first year, Trump laid the groundwork for a dangerous militarization of cities and states led by Democrats by deploying National Guard troops to assist ICE and CBP agents, who are masked and drive unmarked cars, abuse their authority, and are becoming increasingly violent, to the point of shooting and killing a U.S. citizen, Renee Nicole Good, in Minneapolis. None of the besieged cities requested assistance from the federal government.

This is a strategy of provocation. The federal government fuels chaos to justify extreme measures like invoking the Insurrection Act, which lets the president deploy the Army within the country. Trump has already threatened Minneapolis with this.

With his low popularity ratings and the possibility of losing control of the House of Representatives and potentially the Senate in the midterm elections, it cannot be ruled out that Trump will even try to declare martial law, when the Armed Forces take control of a specific area or the entire country, and all laws and civil rights, including elections, are suspended.

On immigration, Trump has mostly used executive orders to support changes that seek to reduce, and even eliminate, mechanisms for immigrating to or remaining legally in the United States, including asylum and refuge, as well as programs such as TPS, humanitarian parole, and the granting of immigrant and work visas. He has de-legalized millions of immigrants to make them vulnerable to deportation.

“The Migration Policy Institute (MPI) estimates that the Trump administration in the first year of its second term took more than 500 actions on immigration, surpassing the 472 actions over all four years of Trump’s first term,” concludes an analysis by the MPI.

Millions who had protection from deportation, work permits, and paid taxes have lost their status. Millions more are blocked from adjusting their status. Naturalization ceremonies have been canceled.

Trump has deported 622,000 immigrants, some to unfamiliar countries. They have not reached their goal of one million deportations a year. Others have self-deported. Immigration detention now holds about 73,000—its highest in 25 years. Most detainees have no criminal record.

Although some measures have been blocked in lower courts, the Supreme Court has been more favorable to Trump. One of the most anticipated pending cases is that of eliminating birthright citizenship for babies of undocumented parents.

In just one year, Trump’s immigration policy has caused devastating damage not only to separated families but also to the communities that suffer the brunt of the impact and to the economy, which is affected by the reduction in workers and consumers who pay taxes and sponsor businesses. Public safety suffers from the diversion of funds and staff to immigration tasks.

“What is undeniable is that the first year of Trump 2.0 has ushered in some of the most profound immigration policy changes in modern history, and the administration has three years ahead to deepen its impact. It remains to be seen if these changes will represent a temporary detour or a foundational shift in the country’s future,” the MPI analysis stated.

The question and concern is what comes next. When you hit rock bottom, the only way is up. A change of leadership in Congress could serve as a counterpart to Trump’s assault, laying the groundwork for immigration reforms that both parties avoided for decades, something that many now regret.

The Senate will have to try again on Friday to pass a funding deal to separate the fight over ICE funding from the threat of a broader government shutdown.

Why it matters: The deal between the White House and Senate Democrats doesn’t promise Democrats the changes they want, but it would avoid disruptions to other government services while giving negotiators more time.

President Trump said in a post on Truth Social that he was “working hard with Congress to ensure that we are able to fully fund the Government, without delay.”
He added: “Hopefully, both Republicans and Democrats will give a very much needed Bipartisan “YES” Vote.”
Driving the news: The Senate had hoped to quickly advance the bill on Thursday, but senators were sent home without a vote.

“Republicans need to get their act together,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) told reporters Thursday.
Schumer said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) was holding up the deal.
Graham told reporters on Thursday that “the cops need us right now” and criticized a House-passed provision that would repeal payouts to senators targeted in Operation Arctic Frost.
Zoom in: As part of the deal, senators are trying to pass the broader, non-DHS government funding package to avoid a shutdown at the end of the day Friday.

Lawmakers will also pass a stopgap measure to continue current funding for DHS for two weeks, during which time negotiations will continue over Democrats’ demands for changes at the department.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has said he’s willing to let DHS funding lapse in two weeks if the talks don’t result in changes Democrats want.
Those demands include barring federal agents from wearing masks and requiring that they wear body cameras, along with a ban on roving patrols and tighter use of warrants.

Zoom out: Senate Democrats pledged this week to block government funding if the White House did not agree to reforms at DHS after federal agents killed 37-year-old Alex Pretti in Minneapolis on Saturday.

If negotiators fail to reach a deal over ICE and Homeland Security, funding will also cease for the Coast Guard, TSA and FEMA.
What to watch: The Senate will still need unanimous consent to be able to clear procedural hurdles and pass the package ahead of the weekend.

Several rank-and-file Republicans were still negotiating with leadership on which amendments they wanted votes on.
The House, which is not in session until Monday, would also need to pass the package before it can head to President Trump’s desk.

The Trump administration dialed down its aggressive immigration rhetoric in Minneapolis this week in the face of public outcry after a second protester was shot to death.

But for some blue city mayors, the damage is already done.

In Portland, President DONALD TRUMP only a few months ago floated invoking the Insurrection Act, amid protests at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility south of the city that caught the White House’s attention. The president’s threats still haunt Mayor KEITH WILSON, who was in Washington for the annual U.S. Conference of Mayors.

“When President Trump put his focus on Portland — and he couched it in public safety — he was using words like, ‘We’re going to use Portland as a training ground,’ or ‘bring in and allow full force,’” he said, adding that he welcomes a change in messaging from the administration. “That messaging has consequences. We’ve had people be shot in automobiles. You see Renee Good shot in an automobile. You see [Alex] Pretti killed.”

Chicago Mayor BRANDON JOHNSON told POLITICO that just a year ago border czar TOM HOMAN, sent to Minneapolis this week to deescalate tensions, kicked off the administration’s mass deportation campaign in his city. Chicago also was the subject of Trump’s threat to send in the National Guard, though ultimately that was dropped after legal setbacks. Johnson mentioned MARIMAR MARTINEZ, a U.S. citizen shot by a Customs and Border Protection agent five times. The government accused her of ramming her car into federal agents before she was shot. Martinez’s case continues to play out in the courts.

“Killing people and then deciding maybe it’s not a good idea is their rationale for reconsidering their strategy after death? And that’s not only abhorrent, it’s an offense to our shared dignity and our humanity,” he said. “This is not a ‘my bad’ or ‘I’m sorry’ moment. Believing that they can behave with impunity is an insult to our democracy.”

The enmity from many mayors POLITICO spoke with today underscores how difficult it will be for the Trump administration to reset relations in blue cities or work with local elected officials as it has said it needs to do in order to avoid clashes between federal agents and protesters.

And while Minneapolis has captured national attention, mushrooming into a political crisis for the White House, it’s hardly the only city that’s borne the brunt of Trump’s crime and immigration crackdown — or his threats to use troops.

Los Angeles was the first city where Trump deployed the National Guard in response to protests surrounding immigration raids. The troops were later pulled after the administration lost at the Supreme Court, but Mayor KAREN BASS said fears still weigh on her city “every single day.”

She noted that Homan was recently in Los Angeles.

“The racial profiling continues. The fear and terror that started and spread in our city, it continues,” she said. “The impact of people being fearful to leave their homes, to go to work, kids to go to school, continues.”

White House spokesperson ABIGAIL JACKSON said ICE officers face ongoing threats, which she blamed on rhetoric from Democrats. She pointed to the person accused of biting off the tip of a CBP agent’s finger over the weekend in Minneapolis, adding that ICE officers act “heroically to enforce the law and protect American communities.”

“Local officials should work with them, not against them,” she said. “Anyone pointing the finger at law enforcement officers instead of the criminals is simply doing the bidding of criminal illegal aliens.”

A subdued Homan today called his conversations with local officials, including Minneapolis Mayor JACOB FREY, productive. He vowed to remain in the city until the administration’s work is complete, while also saying he hopes ICE’s presence can be reduced if federal officials can gain access to the state’s jails.

“I don’t want to see anybody die. Not officers, not members of the community, not the targets of operations,” he said during a press conference in Minneapolis.

Frey said this week that he made clear to Homan that his city “does not and will not enforce federal immigration laws.” He also warned other mayors at today’s conference that if “we do not speak up, if we do not step up, it will be your city that is next.”

Kansas City Mayor QUINTON LUCAS agreed.

“I think why you see so many people standing up for Minneapolis now, it’s not just because of right or wrong, but because the fight needs to happen somewhere or it comes to you,” he said. “We have seen over a year that just being silent doesn’t mean that you don’t get targeted.”

Five years ago, local police departments faced a tidal wave of criticism over racial profiling and the unnecessary killing of unarmed people. Many citizens looked to the federal government to rein them in.

Now the tables have turned. It’s police officials who are complaining about federal agents, saying they are endangering residents and violating their civil rights.

Police chiefs who have spent half a decade trying to persuade a skeptical public that officers would curb their use of violence are contending with widespread alarm over federal officers ushering an innocent man into the snow in his shorts, arresting a 5-year-old and killing U.S. citizens. While local officials have vowed to hold officers accountable for misconduct, Trump administration officials have been quick to declare that their agents did nothing wrong.

Some chiefs have worried that the fragile trust they have worked toward is coming rapidly undone.

“It’s all just going down the toilet,” said Kelly McCarthy, the police chief in Mendota Heights, a Minneapolis suburb. “We do look good by comparison — but that won’t last because people are really frustrated.”

Trump administration officials have defended their operations and blamed state and local officials in Minnesota for the unrest, saying they have incited insurrection and failed to assist federal agents.

Some local departments have taken steps to distance and differentiate themselves from Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and Border Patrol agents. The city of St. Paul, Minn., has distributed photos showing what their police, fire and animal services uniforms look like. “St. Paul Police Department does not ask people about their immigration status” and “cannot impede or interfere with federal agents,” one advisory said.

On tJan. 20, top brass from about a dozen Minnesota police departments held a news conference to say that while they had nothing against immigration enforcement, they were receiving “endless complaints” about the behavior of federal officers and that city employees and off-duty officers had been illegally stopped on the basis of their skin color.

“It’s impacting our brand as police officers, our brand of how hard we work to build trust,” said Chief Mark Bruley of Brooklyn Park, another Minneapolis suburb.

The grievances are not limited to the Twin Cities. In Maine, a sheriff complained about “bush-league policing” after one of his correction officers, who he said was authorized to work in the United States, was detained by ICE officers. In Brookfield, Ill., outside Chicago, an ICE officer was charged with misdemeanor battery after a man reported that he had been attacked while trying to film the officer.

The criticism aimed at federal agencies is tinged with the irony that for years, the federal government was the nation’s policing watchdog. But under President Trump, the Justice Department has walked away from efforts to force deeply troubled departments to improve — efforts that some chiefs had called intrusive and heavy handed.

The Justice Department announced plans to drop federal oversight of the Minneapolis and Louisville Police Departments last year, within days of the fifth anniversary of the very episode that triggered so much soul-searching over American policing: the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, by Minneapolis officers.

State and local officials have no comparable tool with which to hold federal agencies to account, but elected prosecutors are investigating reports of abuse and conferring on how they might curb warrantless entries and unlawful detentions.

Longtime critics of American policing were quick to say that they remain frustrated with local departments and that people in some predominantly Black and Latino neighborhoods still regard the police as an occupying force. DeRay Mckesson, the executive director of Campaign Zero, which seeks to reduce police violence, said he believed the recent violence by federal officers — and the fact that the victims in the two fatal shootings, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, were white — could lead more people to demand more accountability from law enforcement.

“ICE has helped people understand that the system is broken, that it’s not just one or two bad officers,” Mr. Mckesson said.

He pointed to Trump administration accounts of the shootings that were contradicted by bystander videos. “People are for the first time are like, ‘OK, the government’s lying to me,’” Mr. McKesson said. “Before, that would have sounded like a conspiracy theory.”

For one former police chief, Brandon del Pozo, the contrast with ICE is an opportunity for local departments to show that they are committed to improving even when no one is compelling them to do so.

“Never before in our lifetime have they had a better foil than they have in ICE,” Mr. del Pozo wrote in Vital City, a Columbia Law School journal that covers urban issues. “The nation’s attention is rightly focused on flagrant abuses at the federal level that constantly dominate the news and provide a clear moral compass for how police shouldn’t behave,” he added.

ICE has not learned the central lesson that the nation’s police departments learned after Mr. Floyd’s death, said Jerry P. Dyer, the Republican mayor and former police chief of Fresno, Calif. “In order for police to be accepted in communities, they have to have permission to police those communities from the people who live there,” he said.

Instead, Mr. Dyer said, federal agents are not using policing techniques that build trust, like de-escalation and the use of body cameras. “They’re not trusted because of the manner in which they operate,” he said.

Mr. Dyer and other police officials said they had no problem with immigration enforcement, done properly. And many Americans support the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. Differing views have translated into conflicting requests for local departments, with some residents asking the police to do more to assist federal agents, while others demand that the police block or even arrest them.

When he tried to get answers, he encountered another chronic problem that some local departments have been pressured to fix — a lack of transparency. “When you call ICE leadership or you call Border Patrol leadership or you call Homeland Security leadership, they’re unable to tell you what their people were doing that day,” the chief said, adding, “They like to give you a website to go file a complaint.”

For her part, Chief McCarthy said that on a recent day when she was off duty, she had gone, out of uniform, to act as a legal observer outside an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting conducted in Spanish near her home. There, she encountered a Border Patrol agent.

“He told me to get a job, and that I was a paid agitator,” she said. “I would have been embarrassed if he had been one of my officers.”

The Trump administration sued a Virginia woman for almost $1 million as part of an escalating drive to get undocumented immigrants to leave the U.S. by levying court-imposed fines.

The lawsuit, filed last week in U.S. District Court in Richmond, seeks $941,114 plus interest from Marta Alicia Ramirez Veliz for allegedly failing to leave the U.S. for more than three years after a Justice Department appeals panel ruled against her in an immigration case in 2022.

Officials appear to have arrived at the whopping sum by imposing a $998 daily fine for each of the 943 days that passed between the Board of Immigration Appeals dismissing Ramirez Veliz’s appeal and Immigration and Customs Enforcement sending her a formal bill last April.

The Trump administration set up a new process last year to assess the fines. Lawyers challenging that system say the penalty for Ramirez Veliz appears to be the highest sought among dozens of similar lawsuits the administration has brought in recent months.

“That does sound like the largest number we have heard when we were tracking this,” said Charles Moore, a lawyer with the public interest law group Public Justice. “We know that the amounts were as low as $3,000 and as high as several hundred thousand but, no, we hadn’t heard of anything close to $1 million.”

Legal experts say they’ve strained to find any patterns in the new lawsuits or tens of thousands of bills ICE has sent out, although attorneys say the assessments often go to immigrants who have been fastidious about keeping their addresses updated in government files and checking in with immigration officials as directed.

“They are people who have been interacting with the system attempting to obtain [legal] status through the proper procedure. It seems many people in this situation are folks who are getting these fines,” Moore said.

Efforts to contact Ramirez Veliz for comment for this story were unsuccessful. The lawsuit against her describes her as “an individual and noncitizen residing in Chesterfield County, Virginia,” just south of Richmond. It does not provide her nationality or discuss any legal arguments she made against her deportation, which was ordered by an immigration court in 2019.

A Justice Department official said the lawsuit appeared to be the first of its kind filed in the Eastern District of Virginia. POLITICO located one lawsuit filed last week against a man living in Florida that demands over $717,000 for failing to depart the country. Other lawsuits, filed in California and Texas, seek amounts ranging from $3,000 to over $292,000.

A statute of limitations that applies to the fines means an immigrant who remains in the country for five years or more after being ordered to leave could face a maximum penalty of about $1.8 million, although it’s unclear if any of those fines have led to lawsuits.

A law passed by Congress and signed by President Bill Clinton in 1996 authorized civil penalties for immigrants who “willfully” fail to leave the country as directed.

The provision remained unimplemented for two decades, but during President Donald Trump’s first term, ICE began to assess fines on undocumented immigrants. However, officials never turned to lawsuits to enforce the meager fines that were assessed. Ultimately, ICE imposed 20 fines totaling almost $84,000. From those invoices, ICE collected a total of $4,215, according to data gathered by groups challenging the policy.

As part of broader efforts to reduce immigration, the U.S. Department of State (DOS) recently announced that it will pause issuance of all immigrant visas for individuals from 75 countries. This analysis shows that workers from 69 of the 75 countries affected by the pause for which data are available make up nearly one in ten (8%) of the U.S. health care workforce. The pause will likely reduce the supply of workers and particularly health care workers in the U.S., which could exacerbate existing health care worker shortages. Shortages are likely to be compounded by other policies limiting immigration into the U.S. as well as ongoing deportation efforts. Estimates suggest the Trump administration’s policies could reduce legal immigration to the U.S. by 33% to 50% over four years.

On January 14, 2026, the DOS announced that it will pause processing of immigrant visas for individuals from 75 countries who it identified as at, “high risk for use of public benefits” and becoming a public charge. (See Methods for full list of impacted countries). This policy is part of broader efforts to expand public charge policies.The DOS indicates that the pause is being implemented to ensure “immigrants must be financially self-sufficient and not be a financial burden to Americans”. However, the DOS has not provided details about the process used to identify countries subject to the pause. Moreover, few immigrants are eligible for federal benefits due to longstanding restrictions. For example, most lawfully present immigrants have to wait five years after obtaining a “qualified” immigration status to be eligible for federal programs including Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

The pause went into effect on January 21, 2026, for nationals from the 75 countries applying for immigrant visas. Immigrant visas allow an individual to live and work in the U.S. on a permanent basis and can provide a pathway to citizenship. Examples of immigrant visas include family-based visas (when a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident (LPR or “green card” holder) sponsors a family member for permanent residency), certain types of employment-based visas, as well as refugee visas (although entry of refugees to the U.S. has already largely been eliminated through executive action). Individuals applying for non-immigrant visas such as a student visa, tourist visa, or temporary work visa like H-1B are not impacted by the pause. The DOS states that, during this pause, applicants from impacted countries may submit visa applications and attend visa interviews, but that it will not issue any immigrant visas. The pause does not impact immigrants from the 75 countries who are already present in the U.S.

Foreign-born workers from 69 of the 75 countries impacted by the DOS visa pause for which data are available make up nearly one in ten (8%) of health care workers in the U.S. Based on KFF analysis of 2025 Current Population Survey data, there were 7.8 million foreign-born workers (ages 19 to 64) from 69 of the 75 countries impacted by the visa pause as of 2025, including 1.2 million health care workers. A little over half (55%) of health care workers from these countries are employed in health care support occupations such as home health aides and nursing aides, and the remaining 45% are in health care practitioner and technical occupations such as physicians, surgeons, and nurses. These workers include individuals who may have arrived on immigrant or non-immigrant visas since the data do not include information on visa type. Separate data for the remaining six countries affected by the pause (The Gambia, Kosovo, Kyrgyz Republic, Rwanda, South Sudan, and Tunisia) were not available. Among foreign-born workers from the 69 countries, those from Haiti (13%), Jamaica (10%), and Nigeria (9%) made up about one in three (32%), or the highest shares, of health care workers. Workers from 69 of the 75 countries affected by the DOS visa pause accounted for 6% of the total U.S. adult workforce and 8% of health care workers under age 65 (Figure 1). Immigrants from other countries not impacted by the pause accounted for 14% of the U.S. adult workforce and 11% of health care workers, and U.S.-born citizens accounted for the remaining eight in ten workers.

The White House and Senate leaders are moving closer to a deal to avert a government shutdown but are seeking to resolve final sticking points in eleventh-hour negotiations ahead of Friday’s deadline, according to several sources familiar with the talks.

The sources indicated that the White House was moving closer to the Democrats’ demands to split funding from the Department of Homeland Security from a larger funding package in order to give them time to negotiate new policy measures on the deployment of ICE agents across the country.

The deal in the works would provide funding for the rest of the agencies in the package through the end of September — including the departments of Defense, Labor, State, Transportation and Health and Human Services. But it would only temporarily extend funding for DHS. That would allow time for the two sides to negotiate over ICE, after Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer laid out a list of demands that he says must be included in final legislation.

The two sides are still trying to sort out the timeline for extending funding for DHS, the sources said, underscoring that a deal has not yet been reached.

But the fast-moving talks are a clear sign that President Donald Trump and GOP leaders recognize that they need to respond to the public outcry over ICE agents’ harsh tactics following the deadly shootings of two US citizens in Minneapolis this month. Plus, it’s a sign that Trump is eager to avoid the second government shutdown of his second term, after the 43-day shutdown from last fall left him upset about the fallout.

CNN has reached out to the White House for comment.

Earlier Wednesday, Schumer laid out a list of new restraints on immigration enforcement as a condition for Democratic support, including to restrict roving patrols, tighten parameters around warrants for searches and arrests, toughen use-of-force policies and require ICE agents to wear body cameras and remove their masks. Democrats, who have enough votes to sustain a filibuster in the 53-47 GOP-led Senate, say such changes must be in legislation — and that promises of executive action are not enough.

As Democrats and Republicans negotiated Wednesday on the Hill, the risk of a shutdown appeared to skyrocket earlier in the day.

Behind the scenes, several of Schumer’s Democrats rebuffed efforts by the White House to privately discuss off-ramps for a shutdown, insisting that Republicans must come to the table instead of trying to peel off centrist Democrats like the last shutdown.

Even confronted with the prospect of a shutdown of three-quarters of the government starting Saturday, many Democrats were unwavering – buoyed by a belief that the country’s patience for the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement tactics have run out.

“I am just so sick of them ignoring it all because Donald Trump might give them a spanking,” Sen. Jacky Rosen, a Democrat from Nevada, said.

There is little time to reach a deal that can pass both chambers ahead of the Friday deadline at 11:59 p.m.

President Donald Trump’s border czar said Thursday that his team is working on a plan to “draw down” the number of federal immigration enforcement agents in the Minneapolis area and admitted that “certain improvements” could be made.

But Tom Homan said any scaling back in immigration raids hinges on increased state and local cooperation on enforcement with the Department of Homeland Security, and Minnesota’s attorney general said they reached no such accord.

Attorney General Keith Ellison (D) said he had a “cordial” meeting with Homan on Wednesday to explain state law, to register the state’s outrage over the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renée Good, and to call for joint and transparent state and federal investigations into their deaths.

“I did not negotiate with Mr. Homan, come to any agreement, or offer any compromise on the goal of keeping Minnesotans safe,” Ellison said in a statement. “I raised with him directly the rage Minnesotans feel at the unconstitutional tactics federal immigration agents have been using in Minneapolis, Saint Paul, and elsewhere in our state.”

The more conciliatory tone from Homan came as the White House seeks to quiet a growing backlash against immigration crackdowns following Saturday’s fatal shooting of Pretti, an ICU nurse, by federal immigration agents. Scenes of smashed car windows and people being dragged out of their cars and tear-gassed have led to national outrage and calls from Democrats and some Republicans to rein in immigration enforcers.

Meanwhile, a stepped-up enforcement effort in Maine, dubbed Operation Catch of the Day, appears to have ended after a week of sowing fear within immigrant communities in and around the cities of Portland and Lewiston.

Homan, a former career ICE official and Fox News analyst, is an unlikely peace envoy. Last year he warned he was “bringing hell” to “sanctuary cities” such as Boston, and he serves a White House pressuring agents to make mass arrests or risk losing their jobs. He struck a far more somber tone Thursday, saying, “I don’t want to see anybody die.”

Without making specific concessions, Homan also said the federal government had not “carried this mission out perfectly.”

“President Trump and I, along with others in the administration, have recognized that certain improvements could and should be made,” Homan said. “That’s exactly what I’m doing here.”

Operation Metro Surge, the Trump administration’s biggest deployment yet, quickly increased the number of immigration officers in the Minneapolis area from 80 to 3,000. Homan said the raids also placed intense strain on immigration officers, who have been shadowed by whistle-blowing protesters, banned from restaurants, spit on and shouted at. “Having all these threats at you, day after day, having people trying to interfere with you, day after day, you know, they’re human,” he said.

Law enforcement experts say the fatal shootings of Good and Pretti raised questions about training for officers, noting that some appeared to lose their tempers or failed to follow basic safety protocols to de-escalate tensions and avoid violence.

Administration officials initially accused Pretti, who was monitoring and protesting immigration enforcement in Minneapolis, of trying to kill federal officers. But video of the shooting shows that he did not brandish a weapon and that multiple officers pinned him on the ground and took a gun from his waistband before he was shot.

Videos released Wednesday showed that officers wrestled him to the ground 11 days earlier after he kicked a taillight off their SUV. The Jan. 13 video was recorded by the News Movement, a digital news outlet. (Washington Post publisher William Lewis co-founded the News Movement and is no longer with the outlet.) A representative of the Pretti family said the family knew about the incident and said Pretti “sustained injuries” in the altercation “but did not get medical care.”

Homan said he and the officials he met with this week appeared to agree on one thing: They wanted the tensions to cool down.

Nonetheless, it was unclear how close Homan was to reaching an agreement with state leaders on immigration enforcement. He said he’d spoken with Ellison, Gov. Tim Walz (D) and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey (D) earlier in the week. He called them “good brokers” and said he had made “great progress” in particular with Ellison and local sheriffs, alluding to “agreements” in which Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers would conduct more activity in county jails.

Homan acknowledged that state prisons already work with immigration officers to turn over felons to be deported but said he hoped for greater cooperation from the state’s prisons and jails. Although anyone in the United States illegally is eligible for deportation, he said, the administration’s top priority is to deport criminals.

“More agents in the jail means less agents in the street. This is common-sense cooperation that allows us to draw down on the number of people we have here,” Homan said, later adding that he would not be “walking away” without seeing certain plans put in place.

Frey called his conversation with Homan “productive and collegial” during a CNN town hall broadcast Wednesday evening, and said there was a “general consensus that the present status needs to change.” He spoke hours after Trump posted on social media that Frey was “playing with fire” by failing to assist in federal immigration enforcement.

On Thursday, however, Frey gave a speech at a gathering of the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington urging hundreds of other mayors to stand united against the immigration crackdown because their city could be the next target. The mayors greeted him with a standing ovation.

“Our police officers will do their jobs, they will not do someone else’s job,” Frey said afterward to reporters. “I want them spending every second keeping people safe. You know what I don’t want them doing? I don’t want them spending a single minute hunting down a father who just dropped his kids off at day care and is about to go work a 12-hour shift who happens to be from Ecuador.”

Frey said that he is hopeful the Trump administration will end the operation in Minneapolis but that he would “believe it when I see it.” Frey has no plans to meet with Trump while in Washington, he said.

The Trump administration dispatched Homan to Minneapolis this week to replace Border Patrol official Gregory Bovino amid calls from Democrats, and some Republicans, for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem to be dismissed or impeached.

During a Cabinet meeting Thursday that lasted nearly an hour and a half, Trump did not bring up the tensions in Minnesota and mentioned immigration issues only in passing. Noem was in the room but not among the 10 or so administration officials called upon by Trump to speak.

The Trump administration and Minnesota are locked in dueling court battles over immigration enforcement. In September, the Justice Department sued Minnesota, Minneapolis, St. Paul, Hennepin County and the attorney general’s office over “sanctuary city” policies they alleged “interfere with the federal government’s enforcement of its immigration laws.”

State and local officials asked a judge to dismiss the suit this month just as the immigration raids began. Since then, the state has filed lawsuits seeking to curtail the massive immigration operation and to preserve body-camera footage and other evidence in Pretti’s death.

But state officials and legal experts caution that Minnesota’s overall posture on immigration enforcement is far more nuanced than that of California or Illinois, which have sweeping laws that limit state and local involvement in immigration enforcement. The Minnesota attorney general’s office has declared that it is illegal to hold someone arrested for a crime after a judge has released them just so ICE can pick them up, though that is nonbinding.

Several county jails and one police department in Minnesota have gone in a different direction and signed up for a program to assist ICE. But the sheriff’s office in Hennepin County, which includes Minneapolis, says it “does not work with any agency on civil immigration enforcement.” That includes cases where ICE specifically asks the sheriff’s office to hold someone, after a judge has ordered them released from the county jail, so that ICE can pick them up and deport them. The county jail holds people awaiting trial, according to its website.

Julia Decker, policy director at the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota, said jails in the state’s cities and counties have offered varying degrees of cooperation with immigration enforcement since long before Operation Metro Surge was justified by painting the Minneapolis-St. Paul region as broadly uncooperative with federal authorities.

“This administration has used a broad brush to paint a lot of jurisdictions as ‘sanctuaries’ for immigrants, which really misses the nuance of which jurisdictions actually have those types of ordinances in place and what they actually mean,” Decker said.

Minnesota Corrections Commissioner Paul Schnell, who is participating in the negotiations, said there are 380 non-U.S. citizens in the state’s prison system and ICE has detainers seeking custody of 270 of them. State law says felons are to be reported to immigration officials, and the department says on its website that it “honors every ICE detainer” and coordinates custody transfers with immigration officers.

In an interview, Schnell expressed optimism that the two sides were making progress but said state leaders will not acquiesce to federal requests to transfer immigrants convicted of state crimes before they finish serving their sentences.

“We acknowledge the fact that, in order to bring some resolution to this, there’s going to need to be some cooperation and we’re working on that,” Schnell said. “Right now, we want to see … what does it take in order for them to reduce the number of agents in Minnesota, first and foremost. Because that brings the temperature down.”

Minnesota officials say the existing cooperation is a sign that the Trump administration did not need to surge officers into a state that has a far lower share of immigrants than other states, just 9 percent of the population. They have accused the administration of targeting legally admitted refugees because of the color of their skin and harassing law-abiding workers who committed no crimes.

“Operation Metro Surge is clearly about political retribution against a state that has never voted for Donald Trump and that has policies in opposition to his agenda,” Ellison said in a statement. “We will not make any concessions or compromises to undermine our state sovereignty.”

The news on Maine came from Sen. Susan Collins (R), who wrote on X early Thursday that Noem had informed her that ICE had ended its “enhanced activities” there.

“There are currently no ongoing or planned large-scale ICE operations here. I have been urging Secretary Noem and others in the Administration to get ICE to reconsider its approach to immigration enforcement in the state,” Collins wrote. “I appreciate the Secretary’s willingness to listen to and consider my recommendations and her personal attention to the situation in Maine. ICE and Customs and Border [Protection] will continue their normal operations that have been ongoing here for many years.”

Spokespeople for ICE and DHS did not dispute Collins’s statement that the enhanced operation in her state was over but repeatedly declined to answer questions about whether it had ended.

ICE launched its operation last week in Maine and said it arrested 206 people between Jan. 20 and 24. While not involving the type of massive deployment witnessed in Minneapolis, the surge of personnel pushed immigrants into hiding in their homes. Many families kept children out of school.

Carl Sheline, the mayor of Lewiston, Maine’s second-largest city, welcomed the news of a reported end to the ICE surge in the state. The enforcement efforts have “failed to improve public safety and have caused lasting damage to our communities,” Sheline said in a statement early Thursday. “We will continue working to ensure that those who were wrongfully detained by ICE are returned to us.”

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The Trump administration could reduce the number of immigration enforcement officers in Minnesota, but only if state and local officials cooperate, the president’s border czar said Thursday, noting he has “zero tolerance” for protesters who assault federal officers or impede the ongoing Twin Cities operation.

Tom Homan addressed reporters for the first time since the president sent him to Minneapolis following last weekend’s fatal shooting of protester Alex Pretti, the second this month by federal officers carrying out the operation. His comments came after President Donald Trump seemed to signal a willingness to ease tensions in the Minneapolis and St. Paul area and as the administration ended its “enhanced operations” in Maine.

Homan, who said he wouldn’t address the shootings, emphasized that the administration isn’t relenting on its immigration crackdown and warned that protesters could face consequences if they interfere with federal officers.

But he seemed to acknowledge there had been missteps.

“I do not want to hear that everything that’s been done here has been perfect. Nothing’s ever perfect,” he said.

A possible downsizing
Homan hinted at the prospect of pulling out many of the roughly 3,000 federal officers taking part in the operation, but he seemed to tie that to cooperation from state and local leaders and a reduction in protester interference.

“The drawdown is going to happen based on these agreements,” he said. “But the drawdown can happen even more if the hateful rhetoric and the impediment and interference will stop.”

He also said he would oversee internal changes in federal immigration law enforcement, but he gave few specifics.

“The mission is going to improve because of the changes we’re making internally,” he said. “No agency organization is perfect. And President Trump and I, along with others in the administration, have recognized that certain improvements could and should be made.”

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey told reporters in Washington on Thursday he was “hopeful” that the number of federal officers in the city would be reduced. He said police would do their jobs but not “somebody else’s,” referring to federal law enforcement.

Despite Trump softening his rhetoric about Minnesota officials — he said this week they were on a “similar wavelength” — there has been no visible sign of any big changes to the operation. On Thursday, as the Justice Department charged a man accused of squirting vinegar on Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar, a smattering of protesters braved the frigid temperatures to demonstrate outside of the federal facility that has been serving as the operation’s main hub.

Pretti, 37, was fatally shot Saturday during a scuffle with the Border Patrol. Earlier this month, 37-year-old Renee Good was shot in her vehicle by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer.

A plea for cooperation
Homan doubled down on the need for jails to alert ICE to inmates who could be deported, saying transferring such inmates to the agency is safer because it means fewer officers have to be out looking for people in the country illegally.

The White House has long blamed problems arresting criminal immigrants on so-called sanctuary jurisdictions, a term generally applied to state and local governments that limit law enforcement cooperation with the Department of Homeland Security.

Homan reiterated that, saying, “Give us access to illegal aliens, public safety threats in the safety and security of a jail.”

But Minnesota officials say this is already happening.

“At best, DHS fundamentally misunderstands Minnesota’s correctional system,” Paul Schnell, chief of the state Department of Corrections, told reporters last week, pushing back against the federal narrative. “At worst, it is pure propaganda.”

State prisons, he noted, always honor “detainers,” or federal requests to hold an arrested immigrant until agents can take custody of them.

“This occurs every time without exception,” he said, noting that “the vast majority,” of the state’s county sheriffs also cooperate with immigration authorities about immigrants in their jails.

Some do not, including the jails in Hennepin County, which serves Minneapolis, and Ramsey County, which serves St. Paul. However, both do hand over inmates to federal authorities if an arrest warrant has been signed by a judge.

A targeted approach to arrests
Homan, whose arrival followed the departure of the Trump administration’s on-the-ground leader of the operation, Border Patrol chief Greg Bovino, also seemed to suggest a renewed focus on what ICE calls “targeted operations” focused on apprehending immigrants who have committed crimes. He said the agency would conduct “targeted strategic enforcement operations” prioritizing “public safety threats.”

It remains to be seen whether ICE’s renewed focus on “targeted operations” might reduce tensions.

ICE and Homan have long said the Trump administration’s primary focus is to arrest people in the country illegally who have a criminal history or pose a threat to public safety. But they acknowledge they’ll also arrest anyone else found to be in the U.S. illegally.

They argue that ICE operations target specific people, as opposed to carrying out indiscriminate raids where officers round up everyone and demand their papers.

Sameera Hafiz, policy director with the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, said Homan’s comments seemed to reflect a recognition that public opinion has turned against ICE, but she questioned his argument that carrying out targeted operations would make the country safer.

“His comments still seem to be based on the false premise that deporting people or deportation will make our community safer,” she said. “All the evidence and data has shown that deportations don’t make our communities safer. They destabilize families, they tear communities apart, they hurt our economy.”

Homan didn’t give a specific timeline for how long he would stay in Minnesota.

“I’m staying until the problem’s gone,” he said, adding that he has met with community, law enforcement and elected leaders in the hopes of finding common ground and suggested that he’s made some progress.

Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis on Thursday urged his counterparts from other American cities to take a firm stand against the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement campaign, warning them that “if we do not speak up, if we do not step up, it will be your city that is next.”

Mr. Frey was greeted with raucous applause before his address to the United States Conference of Mayors’ winter meeting in Washington. His comments came hours after Tom Homan, President Trump’s border czar, acknowledged that the immigration crackdown in Minnesota needed to be “fixed” and raised the possibility that federal agents could be withdrawn under certain conditions.

“President Trump wants this fixed, and I’m going to fix it,” Mr. Homan said at an early-morning news conference in Minneapolis.

The president sent Mr. Homan to the city on Monday, placing him in control of ICE operations there as the administration seeks to address public outrage over tactics that have led to street protests, violent confrontations and the killing of two citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, by federal agents.

Mr. Homan offered a rare admission of fallibility from a top administration official in his remarks on Thursday morning, conceding that not “everything that has been done here has been perfect.” But there has been little sign of major change on the ground, as federal immigration agents appeared to press on with their operations.

In Washington, Senate Democrats struck a deal with Republicans and the White House on Thursday evening to pass five spending bills to fund a large portion of the government for the remainder of the fiscal year. The deal includes a stopgap measure to fund the Department of Homeland Security for two weeks while negotiations continue on guardrails to rein in immigration agents.

Mr. Homan, meanwhile, tied a potential “redeployment” of agents in Minneapolis to increased cooperation from state officials, particularly regarding violent criminals already in Minnesota jails. State officials have said for weeks that they have been cooperating with immigration enforcement, and have pointed out that they routinely transfer custody of inmates based on Immigration and Customs Enforcement requests.

Here’s what we’re covering:

Attack on Omar: Anthony J. Kazmierczak, the man who used a syringe to spray what the F.B.I. said was a mix of apple cider vinegar and water on Representative Ilhan Omar at an event Tuesday night, appeared in federal court in Minneapolis to face assault charges. A judge ordered him to be jailed until his next court date, on Feb. 3.

ICE in Maine: Senator Susan Collins of Maine, a Republican, said that ICE had ended its “enhanced activities” in the state. “There are currently no ongoing or planned large-scale ICE operations here,” she said in a social media post. There was no immediate response from ICE, which started an operation to detain what it called 1,400 “criminal illegal aliens” in Maine last week. Read more ›

Shutdown talks: President Trump endorsed the deal between Senate Democrats and Republicans that would stave off a government shutdown and temporarily fund the Department of Homeland Security while lawmakers continue to discuss limits on immigration agents. But it is unclear how quickly the House can and will process those funding bills after the Senate passes them. The shutdown deadline is midnight on Friday. Follow live ›

Holding up candles and glow sticks in the bitter cold, a crowd of about 1,000 people gathered outside a Veterans Affairs hospital in Manhattan tonight for an hourlong rally and vigil honoring Alex Pretti, the nurse who was fatally shot on Saturday by federal agents in Minneapolis.

The crowd filled a plaza outside the Margaret Cochran Corbin VA campus, where speakers representing nurses unions and federal government workers lauded Pretti as a hero and a caregiver. They said his death had galvanized opposition to the Trump administration’s aggressive detention and deportation sweeps targeting immigrants in Minneapolis and other U.S. cities.

Senator Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, said that he would hold a forum at the Capitol next week with family members of Renee Good, the 37-year-old woman killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent earlier this month.

“They will come to the Capitol, along with other victims of shootings,” he said in an interview tonight on MS NOW.

While the Trump administration’s immigration blitz hit Midwestern cities like Chicago and Minneapolis, a quieter escalation unfolded in San Diego late last year with agents making thousands of arrests in and around the city.

Government data analyzed by CalMatters show nearly a 1500% increase in arrests for May to October compared to the same time period a year earlier. The arrests occurred in San Diego and Imperial counties, a region the federal government refers to as its San Diego area of responsibility.

By September, the number of arrests recorded in the two counties surpassed immigration arrests in the Los Angeles territory, a much larger region that the Trump administration targeted for a headline-grabbing crackdown that summer.

In September and October, federal immigration officers arrested more than twice as many people in the San Diego region than they did in all of 2024, according to government data.

“I feel the temperature rising,” said Patrick Corrigan, a volunteer who monitors U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity at the federal courthouse in San Diego.

As in other blue cities across the nation, activists are worried San Diego could be next on President Donald Trump’s list for a major military-style immigration operation. A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson would not comment about whether more high-profile operations were planned for the San Diego area. David Kim, a Border Patrol spokesman, said the agency cannot confirm future operations.

In December, White House “border czar” Tom Homan visited the San Diego border with U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott.

“As we bring 10,000 more agents on…you haven’t seen anything yet,” warned Homan. “Wait ’til next year.”

He added that so-called sanctuary cities that have official policies that limit law enforcement cooperation with federal officers, such as San Diego and Chula Vista, would see more non-criminal arrests because agents would be forced into the community. “If you wanna be a sanctuary city, you’re gonna get exactly what you don’t want. More agents in the community and more non-criminals arrested,” he said.

Advocacy groups and immigrants have noticed the skyrocketing arrests. In San Diego, federal immigration agents have clashed with protesters while arresting immigrants in the hallways of downtown courtrooms. Agents also swept Home Depot parking lots in Encinitas, National City and San Marcos in the past year and made arrests near public schools.

In May, ICE agents stormed Buona Forchetta, a small neighborhood restaurant in the upscale South Park neighborhood of San Diego.

But San Diego hasn’t felt like a city under siege — yet.

Gregory Bovino, the chief patrol agent of the El Centro Sector in California who made headlines around the nation as the Border Patrol’s commander at large, has not shown up in San Diego. Even without his presence and the attention that follows, arrests here have been surging.

Agents arrested more than 4,500 people between May and October of 2025 compared to less than 300 in the same period of the previous year, the data shows.

Immigration arrests in San Diego and Imperial counties increased drastically in 2025
Federal immigration officers arrested about 4,500 people for civil violations of immigration law between May and October of last year in the San Diego area, a 1500% increase compared to the same period in 2024 where nearly 300 such arrests occurred. By September 2025, arrests surpassed those in the Los Angeles area, where ICE activity surged this past summer.

Many arrests are occurring at immigration check-ins and courthouses. Some critics call that tactic illegal because they say it violates people’s due process rights to legalize their status. They say it serves as a deportation trap: if you don’t show up, you will probably be ordered deported; if you do, you may be arrested.

“They’re just putting numbers on the board,” said Andrea Guerrero, the executive director of Alliance San Diego, a community human rights organization that works to hold federal law enforcement accountable, including Border Patrol.

“And they’re doing so in a way that is not just irresponsible, but is inhumane. There is no doubt that public trust is eroding in real time in the institutions of our government and that has an impact on the resiliency of our democracy,” she added.

San Diego arrest data shows immigration agents are no longer focusing on people with criminal records. Only 25% of people arrested between May and mid-October had criminal convictions, compared to over 60% in the same months of the final year of Joe Biden’s presidency.

The data was provided by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in response to a public records request by the Deportation Data Project, a group of academic researchers and attorneys, and analyzed by CalMatters.

This data set only includes administrative arrests: when ICE agents arrest an individual for a civil violation of immigration laws, such as being in the U.S. without permission from the government. ICE can also make criminal arrests, but those figures do not appear to be included in this data set, according to researchers.

Courthouse arrests
Earlier this month, a woman from Venezuela showed up at the federal immigration courthouse with her 5-year-old son and a social worker. She was nervous because agents previously arrested her husband. The family had waited in Mexico for an appointment through Biden’s CBP One application in 2024, which was the legal way to enter the country and seek asylum at that time.

“I was very afraid to go in,” said Milagros about the Edward Schwartz federal court building. She said she asked the social worker to accompany her to her immigration check-in so that her son would not also be taken into custody if she was arrested. She planned to hand the boy off to the social worker if she had to.

“When they’re constantly changing all the policies, it’s very difficult. We don’t feel like we can walk around freely,” she said. She asked CalMatters to identify her only by her first name because she feared retaliation for speaking with the media.

As she approached the court building, Milagros spotted The Rev. Brad Mills, who helped run a church shelter during a surge of Venezuelan asylum-seekers during the Biden administration.

“When I saw the father, I was able to relax a little,” she said.

Mills said he comes to the courthouse to accompany people to their hearings and check-ins because they “are trying to go through the legal pathways to seek residency or seek some legal right to stay here and work here.”

“Many come here with a lot of fear,” Mills said. “The presence of the faith volunteers, we’ve been told, has kind of a peaceful calming effect.”

Corrigan, another FAITH volunteer, accompanies people at the courthouse four days a week and five to six hours a day.

“We’ve seen increases in detention, a lot of detentions in the courthouse,” Corrigan said. “There were two weeks in October where it was 10 to 20 (people) a day, and then lately maybe one or two a day,” he said in mid-January.

The arrests include people who likely would have been allowed to remain in the country in past administrations. They include a Cuban man who had been in the U.S. for 15 years, a Turkish man married to a U.S. citizen, and a Mexican mom granted withholding from removal, court records show.

‘How much longer is this going to go on’?
On a crisp January morning before dawn, a group of volunteers gathered in a parking lot in Linda Vista, a San Diego neighborhood that’s home to the University of San Diego and Skate World, the only indoor roller rink in the county.

Armed with megaphones and walkie-talkies, they were preparing to patrol the neighborhood block-by-block, street-by-street to warn Latino, Filipino and Vietnamese community members about Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity in the area. The day before, ICE arrested a day-laborer here. A week earlier, agents took four people: three Guatemalans and one Mexican national, according to members of the group Union del Barrio.

The Union del Barrio volunteers are not nervous, even though less than a week prior to their patrol, ICE agent Jonathan Ross shot and killed Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis for doing exactly what they say they’re trying to do: protect their streets from the Trump administration’s massive deportation machine.

“We’ve been doing this for many years, so I think it is fair to say that it shakes you, as a person … the violent way agents or the agent in particular decided to act or react to the situation,” said Adriana Jasso.

But it’s not going to stop them, she adds.

They patrol six, sometimes seven days a week, and they respond to calls from neighbors afraid to go outside when they see a passing SUV. They’re looking for fancy cars; the grade of tint on their windows; the type of haircut and color of pants a 20-something is wearing — clues that agents are operating in the area. If they confirm ICE is here, messages go out to a WhatsApp group with more than 700 members for the Linda Vista neighborhood.

That day was quiet, but others have not been. In July, community members clashed with agents from Homeland Security Investigations outside the Mesa Vista Apartments in Linda Vista, according to news reports. The federal agents requested and received backup from the San Diego Police Department, fueling further community outrage. In August, ICE arrested a parent waiting nearby to pick up his child from Linda Vista Elementary School, according to Voice of San Diego.

But it hasn’t reached the fever pitch seen in cities like Los Angeles, Chicago and Minneapolis. “No, we haven’t seen that, that degree of presence or force,” says Jasso.

Later in the week, Union del Barrio volunteers were just wrapping up their shift patrolling Barrio Logan, one of the region’s oldest Mexican-American communities. It has a history of immigration, labor and grassroots activism. A wave of phone pinged and alerts rippled through the group. A neighbor has spotted a suspicious vehicle back in Linda Vista, about 10 miles to the north.

The volunteers sprang into action, getting to Linda Vista with the same determination as cops rolling to a crime scene. In an alley in the Village apartment complex, they found a dark blue minivan with no front license plate and visible collision damage on the passenger side. In the back, there was a handicap plate. A reflective sunshade propped against the windshield partly concealed the agents inside.

Jasso got out and tentatively approached the car. Once she confirmed two men wearing Department of Homeland Security uniforms were inside, she got on the bullhorn.

“La migra! La migra está aquí en Linda Vista! This is an ICE vehicle!” her voice echoed across the parking lot in English and Spanish.

“You need to move or you’re going to get arrested for impeding,” an agent told a Union del Barrio driver, who asked CalMatters not to identify him because he fears arrest because of his involvement.

The volunteer backed up slowly as Jasso kept screaming. Once the Union del Barrio car was out of their way, the agents peeled out of their spot and continued out of the parking lot.

“It’s just way too much for people,” Jasso said. “One of the constant questions we get is: ‘How long is this going to go on? ¿Cuantó tiempo más?’”

“It breaks your heart because what can we say?” she added. “Nobody knows.”

Boston — Governor Maura Healey today took action to protect the people of Massachusetts from abuses by President Donald Trump and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She filed legislation to keep ICE out of courthouses, schools, child care programs, hospitals and churches; make it unlawful for another state to deploy its National Guard in Massachusetts without the Governor’s permission; and allow parents to pre-arrange guardianship for their children in case they are detained or deported. This is the most comprehensive effort in the country to protect against ICE activity in sensitive locations.

Governor Healey also signed an Executive Order prohibiting the state from entering into any new 287(g) agreements unless there is a public safety need, prohibiting ICE from making civil arrests in non-public areas of state facilities, and prohibiting the use of state property for immigration enforcement staging.

“In Massachusetts and across the country, we continue to see unlawful and unconstitutional actions by ICE that are meant to intimidate and instill fear in our communities, including against United States citizens who are exercising their constitutional rights,” said Governor Healey. “This puts people at risk and in harm’s way, and I find it necessary in the interest of public safety to take this action today.”

For decades, the Department of Homeland Security maintained a “protected areas” policy requiring ICE to refrain from immigration enforcement actions in sensitive locations, including hospitals, houses of worship, courts, and school programs. This policy allowed all community members to access basic support and services without fear, and protected public safety by encouraging all people to seek necessary medical care and testify in court when necessary, whether as a victim, witness, or party. On January 20, 2025, the Trump Administration rescinded the protected areas policy, replacing it with a directive giving ICE agents unbridled power to take enforcement actions in medical facilities, houses of worship, courts, schools and child care programs. Governor Healey’s legislation would restore the longstanding protections against arrests by ICE agents in these essential spaces where families, children, and vulnerable people should feel safe.

Courthouses

ICE’s presence at courthouses creates confusion and chaos and is deterring witnesses, victims and litigants from coming to court. It has resulted in the dismissal of charges and release of defendants. Governor Healey’s legislation would ban warrantless civil arrests by ICE agents inside of courthouses to protect access to justice and ensure that anyone who walks through the courthouse doors to seek relief, protection, or to defend themselves should feel safe doing so.

Schools and Child Care Programs

School enrollment has declined dramatically, particularly in districts with high populations of immigrant students, across the state this school year, with record declines of over 5 percent in Chelsea and Everett. The Trump Administration’s decision to revoke the protected areas policy has allowed ICE agents to target schools and child care programs. As a result, some families have been fearful of sending their children to school or participating in sports or school events, like graduation ceremonies. In addition, with national reporting of child care workers being followed into child care programs and detained by ICE, parents are increasingly reluctant to use necessary child care services so that they can go to work and continue to provide for their families.

Governor Healey’s legislation would prohibit elementary, middle and high schools, as well as licensed child care programs and after school programs, from allowing an ICE or immigration agent to enter the premises without a judicial warrant. Schools, child care programs, and after school programs will also be required to adopt and implement their own policies on how to interact with or respond to requests from ICE agents, in line with guidance issued by the Healey-Driscoll Administration and Attorney General Andrea Campbell.

Hospitals and Medical Facilities

Health care providers have been reporting that more immigrant families are skipping medical appointments, delaying care or canceling their health insurance because they fear being detained by ICE. Hospitals also used to fall under the protected areas policy until it was revoked by President Trump. Governor Healey’s legislation would prohibit hospitals, community health centers, nursing homes, and substance use disorder programs from granting ICE access to nonpublic areas without a judicial warrant. These facilities will also be required to issue policies on how their staff and volunteers should interact with or respond to requests from ICE. In Massachusetts, no one should have to hesitate to seek essential or life-saving medical treatment because they fear detention, deportation or being separated from their families.

Churches and Houses of Worship

The Trump Administration’s cancellation of the protected areas policy has deterred many immigrants from attending religious services, as reported by religious organizations across the country. Governor Healey’s legislation would codify a statutory privilege against civil arrest for individuals within places of worship while attending services, protecting the First Amendment right of free exercise of religion.

National Guard

President Trump has been sending National Guard troops from other states into cities like Chicago and Los Angeles against the wishes of state and local officials. These deployments have drained resources, taken members of the Guard away from their day jobs, and have not made anyone safer. Governor Healey is the Commander of the Massachusetts National Guard, and her legislation would make it unlawful for a military force under the control of another state’s Governor to enter Massachusetts without her permission.

Guardianship

Governor Healey’s legislation would also allow parents to pre-arrange guardianship for their children in the event that they are detained or deported by ICE, ensuring that their child will be transitioned to a trusted caretaker. Parents will be able to designate an adult to be on standby to automatically assume temporary guardianship of their child, without losing their legal or parental rights.

Other Provisions

Governor Healey filed these provisions in “An Act Making Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2026 to Provide for Supplementing Certain Existing Appropriations and for Responding to Recent Federal Actions.” The supplemental budget proposes $411.3 million in time-sensitive appropriations for deficiencies.

In addition to the supplemental appropriations, the legislation proposes veterans benefits access reforms to ensure eligible veterans are able to obtain state benefits even if they are denied federal benefits, indemnification provisions to protect public employees acting within the scope of their duties in connection with federal investigations, and technical and privacy-related amendments affecting higher education access and student records. The legislation also includes an important time-sensitive proposal that allows for the Joint Hazard Incident Response Team to proactively work together and coordinate for large scale events, such as the World Cup or Tall Ships. Finally, the legislation includes several collective bargaining agreement ratifications.

Executive Order

Governor Healey’s Executive Order prohibits any office or agency in the Executive Department from executing any new agreement under section 287(g) of the federal Immigration and Nationality Act, or any similar agreements, unless there is a specific and certified public safety risk or need.

The Executive Order also prohibits civil arrests by federal immigration officers in nonpublic areas of state facilities, except when authorized by a judicial warrant or judicial order. Staff will be made aware of this requirement and trained on interacting with federal immigration officers.

The Executive Order also prohibits state facilities, and other property owned or controlled by the Executive Department, from being used by federal immigration officers as a staging area, processing location, or operations base for civil immigration enforcement efforts.

Additionally, the Executive Order directs the Executive Office of Education and the Executive Office of Health and Human Services to support public and private entities in developing policies and guidance on interacting with ICE.

Statements of Support

Senate President Karen Spilka (D-Ashland):

“I am grateful to Governor Healey for her leadership and partnership on the pressing issue of protecting our state and its residents during these dark and uncertain days. The Massachusetts Senate stands firmly with the Healey-Driscoll Administration in this effort, and we will do everything in our power to return these proposals—along with additional protections developed by the Senate we feel necessary to defend the safety, dignity, and rights of our residents—to the Governor for her signature soon,” stated Senate President Karen E. Spilka (D-Ashland). “Massachusetts is the birthplace of American democracy. Right now, that democracy feels fragile, but we will not let it die on our watch. Together with our partners in state government, the Senate will continue to meet this moment by protecting our residents, defending our values, and demonstrating the leadership our residents expect of us.”

Attorney General Andrea Campbell:

“ICE’s activity across the country is a reckless, dangerous and lawless abuse of power. When militarized federal agents kill people in the streets, detain innocent children, attack protesters with tear gas and pepper spray, and remove law-abiding residents from their loved ones, it does nothing to make our communities safer. Attorneys general are stepping up to hold the federal government accountable, and I am grateful to Governor Healey for today’s announcement to further protect Massachusetts residents. I look forward to working with her and others, including legislative leadership and the Black and Latino Legislative Caucus, on related efforts.”

Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan:

“It is critical that we all act to protect the rule of law. Courthouses are sacred spaces where everyone must be able to access justice and protection without fear or intimidation. Governor Healey’s actions today are a welcome and necessary step forward, using the authority of the Commonwealth to place clear limits on where civil immigration enforcement actions can occur.”

Dr. Almudena G. Abeyta, Superintendent, Chelsea Public Schools:

“Education has always been the great equalizer of our country. Our children deserve the opportunity to learn, regardless of their citizenship. But that fundamental right is under threat. In these uncertain times, we must hold tight to the core value of education. Every child has the right to attend school and must be in school to learn. Let us not forget this fundamental right and may we protect it fiercely.”

Amy O’Leary, Executive Director, Strategies for Children:

“We applaud Governor Maura Healey and her Administration for taking action today. Every child deserves safety, stability, and the opportunity to learn and grow. Schools and early learning programs must remain safe spaces where children can learn and play without fear. We know that early childhood educators are on the front lines. We continue to be inspired by this dedicated and resilient workforce and their commitment to problem solving, building partnerships and providing high-quality learning experiences under incredible continuing circumstances. We are grateful to our leaders for showing empathy, compassion, and understanding what is at stake for people across Massachusetts.”

Dr. Mary M. Bourque, Executive Director, Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents:

“Our students, families, and educators continue to live in terror and trauma because of the cruel and often unlawful acts of federal ICE agents. We are grateful to the Healey-Driscoll Administration for standing up to the Trump Administration, particularly to ensure that parents can send their children to school every day without fear.”

Brooke Thomson, President and CEO, Associated Industries of Massachusetts:

“We have seen the negative impact of escalating tensions in Minnesota and Maine brought about by recent federal immigration enforcement activity. Businesses are not immune. Our members throughout Massachusetts cannot afford the economic uncertainty brought about by this type of activity, and we have heard from members experiencing workforce challenges as a direct result of enforcement. That is why Associated Industries of Massachusetts supports Governor Maura Healey’s efforts to set clear rules for what activity can take place and where it is permitted. AIM looks forward to reviewing the Governor’s legislation and executive order and to working with elected leaders on this important issue.”

Bishop Cristiano Borro Barbosa, Archdiocese of Boston:

“As an immigrant myself and as a bishop ministering here in the Commonwealth, I can affirm that many among the good people we serve are experiencing and living in constant fear and distress. Legal protection for safe spaces in schools, hospitals and houses of worship are needed as one means of providing locations and institutions to renew the spiritual and physical lives of all of us and our neighbors. All human beings with their God given dignity deserve to feel safe and protected.”

Elizabeth Sweet, Executive Director, Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition (MIRA):

“ICE’s violent and paramilitary tactics have no place in our state and only make Massachusetts less safe. We are grateful that Governor Healey has today taken concrete steps toward ensuring the people of Massachusetts, particularly our immigrant and refugee communities, feel safe and welcome here. The federal administration should remove ICE agents from our neighborhoods before there are more avoidable acts of violence. We applaud today’s state action to help ensure local communities and law enforcement are not collaborating with ICE and look forward to working with the Governor, Legislature and our federal partners to ensure we are strengthening safeguards for our immigrant communities.”

Michael Curry, Esq., President & CEO, Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers:

“Community health centers must remain safe, trusted spaces for everyone who walks through our doors. Patients come to us for care, and that trust is foundational to public health. Especially during times of increased immigration enforcement activity, it’s critical that health centers are respected as places where care is provided regardless of ability to pay, as it has been by mission and federal mandate for 60 years. When people are afraid to seek care, they suffer, entire communities suffer, and there is tremendous unnecessary cost to the entire health care system. Protecting access, privacy, and dignity isn’t just a moral obligation—it’s essential to keeping our communities healthy and our economies strong.”

Ashley Blackburn, Interim Executive Director of Health Care For All:

“Everyone should feel safe seeking medical care in Massachusetts – period. Thriving immigrant communities are vital for a thriving Commonwealth, economically, socially and culturally. Health Care for All stands with Governor Healey and our partners throughout our Commonwealth in ensuring doctor’s offices, hospitals and community health centers remain safe places for immigrants who are patients, caregivers or part of the health care workforce. It is critical that all providers are equipped to help their patients know and understand their fundamental rights in health care settings anywhere in the Commonwealth. Fear should never be a barrier to accessing the health care you need.”

Steve Walsh, President & CEO, Massachusetts Health & Hospital Association:

“Our hospitals take pride in creating a safe and welcoming environment for every person in need. That fundamental responsibility has not and will not change, and we appreciate the Healey Driscoll Administration’s strong commitment to protecting patients seeking services. Massachusetts hospitals will continue to prioritize our core mission: delivering compassionate, high-quality care to all.”

Dr. Anne Klibanski, President and CEO, Mass General Brigham:

“Earlier today, Governor Maura Healey introduced legislation intended to limit immigration enforcement activity in hospital and care settings in Massachusetts. At Mass General Brigham, we support efforts that help ensure hospitals remain a place where patients feel safe seeking care, and preserving the integrity and trust of the care setting is essential to our ability to serve our communities.”

Dr. Olivia Liao, President, Massachusetts Medical Society:

“The physicians, residents, and medical students of the Massachusetts Medical Society firmly believe that health care is a basic human right. For that right to be fully realized, it is imperative that all health care settings remain safe, welcoming, and free from intimidation. It is unacceptable that immigrant patients in Massachusetts are avoiding care out of fear. Such barriers compromise individual and community health. We commend the Healey Administration for taking action that strengthens protections for our patients and helps ensure access to essential medical care for all.”

Gladys Vega, President & CEO, La Colaborativa and Co-Chair of the Governor’s Latino Empowerment Council:

“The protections announced today by Governor Healey mean the world to me and my community—people I see every day asking for reassurance that they can live a normal life again. Like sending their children to school, going to doctors’ appointments, going to work, and continuing to contribute to this state. These protections will help us navigate this new reality we all live in, and I know they will offer hope that, in Massachusetts, we have a leader who knows what’s right, that our people deserve dignity, and that enough is enough.”

Josiane Martinez, CEO & Founder, ASG, and Co-Chair of Governor’s Latino Empowerment Council:

“The Governor’s Latino Empowerment Council has carried the voices of immigrant and Latino families marked by hope and resilience, but also by the constant fear of federal enforcement actions that threaten to tear families apart. Today, Governor Healey answered that call with courage. By delivering protections for sensitive locations like schools, churches, and hospitals, and ensuring state resources are not used to aid federal overreach, she is standing up to federal intimidation and refusing to be complicit in the destabilization of our communities. We stand in full support of these actions to safeguard the dignity and stability of all who call Massachusetts home.”

Eneida Roman, President & CEO, We Are ALX:

“Immigrants are essential to the economic and civic fabric of Massachusetts. At We Are ALX we see every day how immigrant communities drive entrepreneurship, strengthen our workforce, and contribute to the long-term prosperity of the Commonwealth. We applaud the Healey-Driscoll Administration’s leadership in advancing policies that recognize the dignity, humanity, and economic contributions of immigrant families across the Commonwealth.”

Lenita Reason, Executive Director, Brazilian Worker Center Inc:

“As an immigrant and as the Executive Director of the Brazilian Worker Center, I see every day how gaps in our laws put families at risk. The governor actions are critical to ensuring due process, fairness, and equal protection for immigrant communities across Massachusetts. This EO reflects what immigrants have been calling for—courts and institutions that uphold dignity, protect our rights, and allow our families to live without fear. We are grateful for the Governor’s leadership and we look forward to working with the Legislature to move this bill forward.”

Suma V. Nair, President, Boston Bar Association:

“Courthouses must be safe spaces for justice. When people are afraid to show up, the system fails. The Governor’s proposed courthouse protections are more urgent now than ever in the face of federal agents’ disregard of due process, accountability, constitutional limits, and longstanding norms that kept—and should continue to keep—Massachusetts courts, schools, hospitals, and places of worship off limits to immigration enforcement.”

Nicole Obi, President and CEO, BECMA:

“Massachusetts’ economy depends on the stability, dignity, and full participation of immigrant families, including many who are business owners, workers, caregivers, and essential contributors to our local communities. Governor Healey’s actions make clear that public safety, economic vitality, and human rights are not competing priorities, but deeply connected and mutually reinforcing.”

James E. Rooney, President & CEO of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce:

“Now is the moment for deescalation and reflection concerning recent federal immigration enforcement actions across the nation. The Chamber has long advocated for sound, reasonable federal immigration reform, but absent that, the Governor’s proposal provides clear boundaries to avoid disruptions at the workplace, at school, and for the broader economy. We look forward to analyzing the details of this legislation and executive order.”

Washington — Federal immigration officials have brought an end to enhanced immigration enforcement operations in Maine, Sen. Susan Collins said Thursday.

“While the Department of Homeland Security does not confirm law enforcement operations, I can report that Secretary Noem has informed me that ICE has ended its enhanced activities in the State of Maine,” Collins, a Republican, wrote on social media. “There are currently no ongoing or planned large-scale ICE operations here.”

The senator from Maine said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection will continue normal operations, which have been ongoing in the state for years.

“I have been urging Secretary Noem and others in the Administration to get ICE to reconsider its approach to immigration enforcement in the state,” Collins said. “I appreciate the Secretary’s willingness to listen to and consider my recommendations and her personal attention to the situation in Maine.”

The Department of Homeland Security announced last week that it would be launching new immigration enforcement operation in Maine, dubbed “Operation Catch of the Day” and said it had detained people from Angola, Ethiopia, Guatemala and Sudan who had criminal histories. A Homeland Security official told CBS News that Somali immigrants were among those who ICE was targeting as part of the effort.

The department said immigration agents arrested more than 200 people who are in the U.S. illegally since the surge in enforcement operations began in Maine.

The effort, however, sparked pushback from state and local leaders, particularly after ICE came under intense scrutiny for its tactics in the Minneapolis region, where thousands of officers were deployed in recent weeks. Two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, were shot and killed by federal immigration authorities in Minneapolis.

Collins’ announcement came shortly before the Trump administration border czar, Tom Homan, announced there would be a “drawdown” of immigration agents in Minnesota, saying he had made an agreement with local officials.

The killing in Minneapolis of a mother of three, Renée Good, by an ICE agent who invited the deadly confrontation while breaking every standard police protocol by standing in front of her car while filming and then firing into her vehicle as it moved away from him was chilling.

The execution of Alex Pretti, a VA nurse, in Minneapolis by immigration agents who shot him after he went to the aid of a woman shoved to the ground by a federal agent was horrifying.

But, more chilling, more horrifying, more consequential to the lives and fortunes and futures of tens of millions of Americans is the practice of masked ICE agents taking photographs of those who object to their violent tactics and swarming entire communities in their farcical quest to make some arbitrary quota of harassing and locking up people. This is happening whether those people are criminals, and most are not, or following the rules to have their residency legalized, or happen to be US citizens, which many are.

An ICE agent in Portland, Maine, revealed what’s really going on with the phony baloney Trump crackdown on illegal immigration in liberal cities like Portland when he tried to intimidate a legal observer of ICE’s roundup in that city.

As my colleague Sabrina Shankman reported, a video widely circulated on social media shows a Maine woman who was filming ICE activities in Portland last week and noticed one agent took a picture of the license plate on her car.

“Why are you taking my information down?” she asked.

“Because we have a nice little database, and now you’re considered a domestic terrorist,” the agent responded.

Funny, domestic terrorist is how the president, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, and Stephen Miller, the architect of Trump’s immigration policy, described Good and Pretti after they were gunned down by federal agents.

If you ain’t with ’em, you’re a domestic terrorist.

In politics, a gaffe is when someone unwittingly tells the truth.

And in telling the truth, that ICE agent gave away the whole plot, the whole shebang. What the Trump administration is up to has little to do with making communities safer and everything to do with settling scores with people who didn’t vote for Trump and oppose the most fascist government in the nation’s history.

That’s what this is all about. And no rambling speeches by Tom Homan — who, without irony, was dispatched to Minneapolis because he’s considered the rational face of an irrational administration — changes the fact that Trump’s immigration policy is part of what he has openly admitted is retribution against his enemies.

We are living in a country run by fascists, who have dispatched several thousands of ICE agents, untrained and unaccountable, to cause maximum damage to communities that rejected Trump by wide margins at the ballot box.

All this baloney about making Minneapolis and Portland safer when ICE’s heavy-handedness has demonstrably made those cities less safe and left two American citizens dead and countless others traumatized is just that, total BS.

It’s merely a manifestation of everything the toddler-in-chief does, which is lash out at anyone who doesn’t bow and kiss his ring.

Tricia McLaughlin, an assistant secretary for Homeland Security, told CNN in a statement, “There is NO database of ‘domestic terrorists’ run by DHS.”

Of course, McLaughlin is the same Trump toady who kept insisting ICE wasn’t separating families when there is ample evidence and plenty of reports that ICE has been doing exactly that.

This administration has zero credibility, on anything, but especially when it comes to immigration policy.

But just in case you’re not keeping score at home: Two weeks ago, Homan, the so-called border czar, told Fox News that “we’re going to create a database where those people that are arrested for interference, impeding, and assault, we’re going to make them famous.”

This is a White House that believes people exercising their First Amendment rights are interfering and impeding ICE, which is, like everything this administration does, not legally grounded. The administration believes it’s acceptable for federal agents to assault and knock cellphones out of the hands of people legally filming them. Classic fascist tactics.

Nicole Cleland, a Minnesota woman who had followed ICE agents as an observer, sued Homeland Security. She alleged an agent approached her vehicle and confronted her by name, saying they were using “facial recognition” technology and recording her with a body camera. Just days later, Cleland said, the government revoked her Global Entry status at US Customs and Border Protection.

“I am not particularly concerned with the revocation of my privileges in isolation,” Cleland, an executive at the ironically named retail chain Target, wrote in the suit. “However, given that only three days had passed from the time that I was stopped, I am concerned that the revocation was the result of me following and observing the agents. This is intimidation and retaliation.”

You bet it is. That’s what the whole immigration policy is. It’s about intimidating and physically attacking people who didn’t vote for Trump and oppose all his policies, not just immigration. It’s about retaliation against people who had the good sense not to put a bad person in the White House.

Shankman, my colleague, reported that legal observers who have confronted ICE agents say they have been threatened with retaliation and believe the Trump administration is trying to blacklist them.

Other people in Maine who have observed ICE arrests have reported getting phone calls or knocks on the door from someone claiming to be an agent. They’ve been warned they could end up on a domestic terrorist list, Zach Heiden, chief counsel of the ACLU of Maine, told Shankman.

“People are being told that their names are going on a list, that their personal information is going into a domestic terrorism database, or they’re creating a file on them, all sorts of things that smack of authoritarian regimes that we don’t typically try to emulate,” Heiden added.

It all sounds familiar.

“You’re a domestic terrorist.”

“You’re on a list.”

“Show us your papers.”

“Ve vill ask ze questions!”

If it walks like a fascist duck, and quacks like a fascist duck, it’s fascism.

Voting wasn’t top of mind for Minnesotans on the bitter cold January morning when Border Patrol agents shot and killed Alex Pretti. But Attorney General Pam Bondi had the state’s elections on her agenda. Her January 24 letter landed in St. Paul on the same day. In it, the attorney general suggested that all Gov. Tim Walz had to do to expedite the departure of ICE and immigration agents from Minneapolis after the shootings of Pretti and Renee Good, though she offered no assurances, was to follow her “common sense solutions”: Reverse sanctuary policies, allow immigration agents to track down undocumented people in the prisons and jails, and turn over the state’s Medicaid, food, and nutrition program records.

She also wanted Minnesota’s voter rolls. “Fulfilling this common sense request will better guarantee free and fair elections and boost confidence in the rule of law,” Bondi wrote.

More from Gabrielle Gurley

It was a baffling request to bring up in the middle of the most intense period of civil unrest since the death of Minnesota resident George Floyd almost six years ago. Immigration agents have killed at least eight people and wounded nine more during their nationwide terror campaign, while causing at least 32 others to die in detention camps. Baffling, that is, until one plowed through that mental minefield and remembered the midterm elections and pending court cases that have the administration very nervous. The start of mail-in and in-person voting for the state’s August 11 primary is set for the end of July, and the state is already in litigation over the Justice Department’s earlier demands.

“The answer to Attorney General Bondi’s request is no,” said Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon in a bristling statement. He underscored that the state had already responded to the Justice Department and reminded Bondi about the pending litigation.

“It is deeply disturbing that the U.S. Attorney General would make this unlawful request a part of an apparent ransom to pay for our state’s peace and security,” he wrote. “More broadly, the federal government must end the unprecedented and deadly occupation of our state immediately. The tactics used by too many ICE agents have been dangerous, destabilizing, unnecessarily cruel, and counterproductive. They are tactics that often seem aimed at instilling fear more than protecting the public.”

Bondi’s request added to the nationwide outrage over the Trump’s administration attempts to federalize a state’s election administration processes, this time with a quid pro quo. The basis for states’ opposition to Bondi’s demand is easy to explain. Election administration is laid out in Article I, Section 4, Clause 1, of the Constitution, which reads, “The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof …”

“The federal government does not run our elections and the executive branch in particular has no role in running our elections,” says Sean Morales-Doyle, director of the Brennan Center’s voting rights and elections program. “It’s telling and it’s chilling that this administration through this letter from Attorney General Bondi has made explicit a connection between the kind of law enforcement abuses, immigration enforcement activities, and the things that are happening in places like Minnesota and the administration’s campaign to undermine elections.”

Last year, President Trump issued an executive order that illustrated his interest in federalizing elections through a variety of mechanisms: requiring voters to show proof of citizenship, adding additional paperwork requirements for military and overseas voters, mandating receipt of mail-in ballots by Election Day, and other elements—all tied to a possible loss of federal funding for noncompliant states. Federal courts have blocked several of the executive order’s provisions, including the proof of citizenship and mail-in ballot orders.

Minnesota is just one of many states, along with the District of Columbia, that have received Justice Department requests for their voter data. The department has filed lawsuits against 24 states and the District for noncompliance; 11 others plan to provide the data; and ten states have requested more information. Combating voter fraud has been one of the primary reasons for the request, but numerous researchers have found that voter fraud, and especially noncitizen voting, is practically nonexistent.

The states that agree to cooperate would be subject to a Justice Department memorandum of understanding. State officials would have to remove voters who fail to meet the federal department’s criteria for voting eligibility within 45 days of being notified. The Democratic National Committee has warned both Democratic and Republican states that agreeing to provide the voter information may violate the federal National Voter Registration Act.

Last October, Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson announced that the Justice Department wanted state registration data and that federal officials refused to explain why. “Other secretaries of state—both Democrats and Republicans—have asked them that. They won’t tell us,” she said.

Federal courts have dismissed the Justice Department’s lawsuits against California and Oregon. In the California case, U.S. District Judge David O. Carter ruled that the department’s request was “unprecedented and illegal.” (A federal judge in Georgia dismissed a department lawsuit that had been filed in the wrong court; the suit has been refiled.)

Although it’s a federal crime for members of the military or armed federal forces to deploy or be present at polling places or other election sites or to interfere with the conduct of elections or with election officials, the federal government’s overreach has immigrants as well as citizens particularly worried about ICE agents at polling places.

Last year, California Gov. Gavin Newsom warned that immigration agents and members of the military might patrol around voting places “all around the country.” (KQED, the San Francisco–area PBS station, reported that an ICE statement indicated that the agency had no plans to monitor voting locations unless they were tracking a “dangerous criminal alien” near such a site.)

In the 2020s, states have had to confront a pandemic, natural disasters, cybersecurity threats from malicious actors foreign and domestic, and voter and election official intimidation. In response, election officials have implemented a variety of procedures to protect voters, election workers, and property. However, the Minnesota crisis and new ICE activity in Boston and Portland, Maine, introduces a new dynamic that amplifies the debate over ICE excesses.

State and local election officials are not only gearing up for lawsuits, but for other disruptions. President Trump has encouraged an unprecedented midterm redistricting push designed to give Republicans electoral advantages in the House of Representatives. He’s also recently said that he regrets not seizing voting equipment in 2020 and would like to do away with the machines altogether. He now supports a ban on mail-in voting after encouraging the use of it in 2024.

Throughout this hyperpolarized era, most election officials across the country regardless of party affiliation have expressed strong interest in preserving the integrity of American elections. But in 2026, the most serious threat to free and fair elections originates in Washington. “What’s different about this election,” says the Brennan Center’s Morales-Doyle, “is that we actually have the president explicitly declaring that he has power over elections that he does not have and attempting to exercise that nonexistent power in all kinds of ways: through that executive order that he issued, these voter roll requests and lawsuits, and through the ransom note that AG Bondi wrote—and we will continue to see more of that heading into the election.”

California Democratic senators advanced a measure Tuesday that would make it easier for people to sue federal agents over civil rights violations, a bill shaped by fears of the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement practices.

The bill from Sens. Scott Wiener and Aisha Wahab, both Bay Area Democrats, took on additional significance after federal agents gunned down Alex Pretti, a U.S. citizen and ICU nurse, in Minnesota last weekend. Senators discussed the measure on the floor for more than 90 minutes before voting along party lines, 30 to 10, to send it to the Assembly.

“It’s a sad statement on where we are in this country that this has to be a partisan issue,” Wiener said just before the vote on his bill, which is also known as the “No Kings Act”. “Red, blue, everyone has constitutional rights. And everyone should have the ability to hold people accountable when they violate those rights.”

It’s among several bills lawmakers are moving forward in the new year to confront an escalation of aggressive immigration enforcement tactics and to protect immigrant communities. They include bills that would tax for-profit detention companies, prohibit law enforcement officers from moonlighting as federal agents and attempt to curb courthouse arrests.

Those efforts follow a slate of legislation signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom last year to resist the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign in California, including a first-in-the nation measure to prohibit officers from wearing masks and others that limit their access to schools and hospitals.

While some of those laws are facing legal challenges, the new batch of proposals offer “practical solutions that are squarely within the state’s control,” said Shiu-Ming Cheer, deputy director at California Immigrant Policy Center.

Here’s a look at some of the key bills lawmakers are considering:

No moonlighting as a federal agent
Assemblymember Isaac Bryan, a Democrat from Culver City, authored a bill that would prohibit law enforcement from taking a side job as a federal immigration agent.

At a press conference in San Francisco earlier this month, Bryan said the measure is especially timely as the federal administration ramps up its recruitment of California’s local law enforcement.

“We don’t collaborate in the kidnapping of our own community members, but there is a loophole in state law,” he said. “While you can’t collaborate with ICE while you are working in your police shift, you can take a second job with the Department of Homeland Security. And I don’t think that that is right.”

In an interview with CalMatters, he said the legislation is intended to bring transparency and accountability, and to close that loophole.

“The federal administration has created not just a secret police but a secret military at the expense of health care, social safety nets, and key benefits that the American people need and rely on to make it through the day,” said Bryan. “All of those resources have been rerouted to the unaccounted militarized force patrolling our streets and literally killing American citizens.”

Keep ICE away from courthouses
Sen. Eloise Gómez Reyes, a Democrat from San Bernardino, introduced legislation to prevent federal immigration agents from making “unannounced and indiscriminate” arrests in courthouses.

“The issue is clear cut,” said Gómez Reyes in a statement. “One of the core responsibilities of government is to protect people — not to inflict terror on them. California is not going to let the federal government make political targets out of people trying to be good stewards of the law. Discouraging people from coming to court makes our community less safe.”

The legislation was introduced nearly two weeks after a federal judge ordered that the U.S. Justice Department halt civil arrests in immigration courts across Northern California, ruling that its deportation policies hadn’t addressed the “chilling effects, safety risks, and impacts on hearing attendance.”

Efforts to bolster protections in California courthouses have also been championed by Sen. Susan Rubio, a Democrat from West Covina, who introduced a bill that would allow remote courthouse appearances for the majority of civil or criminal state court hearings, trials or conferences until January 2029.

Taxing detention centers
Assemblymember Matt Haney, a Democrat from San Francisco, introduced a bill that would place a 50% tax on profits from immigration detention centers. Over 5,700 people are being held in seven immigration detention centers across California, three of which are located in Kern County.

Escalating ‘resistance’
Cheer, of California Immigrant Policy Center, said the early introduction of the bills demonstrates more urgency from the state Legislature to tackle issues around immigration enforcement.

“My hope for this year is that the state can be as bold and innovative as possible seeing the crisis communities are facing from immigration enforcement,” she said.

That means ensuring funding for attorneys to represent people facing deportation, addressing existing gaps in state laws around information sharing with the federal government, and looking into companies that are directly profiting from the business of arresting and deporting people, Cheer said.

It was clear after the killing of Renee Good on Jan. 7 that “Operation Metro Surge” — the Trump administration’s pretextual immigration crackdown in Minnesota — was a failure. Far from cowing the people of Minneapolis, Good’s death at the hand of an ICE officer stiffened their resolve and led even more Minnesotans to join the fight against the president’s masked paramilitaries.

A less fanatical White House might have used that moment to stage a tactical withdrawal, to pull back on the assault and recalibrate in the face of stiff resistance. But in the actually existing Trump administration, immigration policy is dictated by rigid ideologues. They met Good’s death with insults, slander and the promise of further repression.

Kristi Noem, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said that Good was engaged in “domestic terrorism.” The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, called Good a “deranged lunatic.” Vice President JD Vance said that her actions were “an attack on law and order” and “an attack on the American people.” He also said that the officer who shot Good was protected by “absolute immunity.” (He later backtracked from this claim, insisting instead that he said the opposite, video evidence notwithstanding.)

We know what happened next. On Saturday, officers with Customs and Border Protection detained, beat, shot and killed Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old I.C.U. nurse who had been observing and filming ICE and C.B.P. operations. Like Good’s death, Pretti’s was caught on camera, and like Good’s death, it was egregious. Images and video of Pretti’s killing exploded on social media. Before the White House could even respond there were protests on the ground, demands for accountability, calls to abolish ICE and palpable discontent from across the political spectrum. And when the administration did address the killing, it returned to the same lies and distortions it used to try to discredit Good.

“This individual went and impeded their law enforcement operations, attacked those officers, had a weapon on him and multiple dozens of rounds of ammunition, wishing to inflict harm on these officers, coming, brandishing like that,” Noem said, as if video of the confrontation did not exist. Similarly, Stephen Miller, the president’s homeland security adviser, called Pretti a “domestic terrorist” and accused Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota of “flaming the flames of insurrection for the singular purpose of stopping the deportation of illegals who invaded the country.”

By Sunday, officials in the Trump administration had begun to backpedal. By Monday, they were doing everything they could to appease the public’s anger. First, administration officials announced that they would remove Gregory Bovino, the highly visible field commander for Customs and Border Protection, from the area. Homeland Security said it would remove some C.B.P. agents from Minnesota, and President Trump said that he would withdraw ICE officers as well. “At some point, we will leave,” he said. “We’ve done, they’ve done, a phenomenal job.”

This was no longer a defeat; it was a rout. Not only had the White House failed to achieve its strategic objective — both the mass removal of immigrants from the Minneapolis area and the suppression of the administration’s political opponents through force and the fear of force — it had also lost significant ground with the public on its most favorable issue.

When Trump took office last January, he had a net eight-point advantage on immigration according to an average computed by the pollster G. Elliott Morris. Now he has a net 10-point disadvantage. Individual polls show an even starker decline: Trump is 18 points underwater on immigration, according to the latest poll from The New York Times and Siena University. Sixty-one percent of respondents also said the tactics used by ICE have gone too far. And Trump’s overall approval has dropped below 40 percent in recent polls from YouGov, Reuters and The Economist.

The president is so clearly in retreat in the wake of Pretti’s death — especially coming as it did on the heels of Good’s — that even congressional Democrats have abandoned their usual defensive posture for something more aggressive. Senate Democrats have promised to filibuster an upcoming funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security if it doesn’t include a serious effort to rein in ICE and C.B.P. Representative Hakeem Jeffries, who leads Democrats in the House, has pledged to impeach Noem if she doesn’t resign. There are signs, too, of infighting within the administration. “Everything I’ve done, I’ve done at the direction of the president and Stephen,” Noem said in remarks reported by Axios, referring to Miller.

Gettysburg was supposed to be the blow that forced the United States to negotiate an end to the Civil War. Gen. Robert E. Lee would demonstrate the superiority of his Army of Northern Virginia — on Union soil, no less — and prove to key European powers that the Confederacy was here to stay so as to push them off the sidelines. The Gettysburg campaign was, in other words, a strategic offensive meant to advance the overall goals of the rebellion if not win the conflict altogether.

What Lee did not anticipate was the iron resolve, the ferocious tenacity, of the Union defenders. There was Brig. Gen. Gouverneur K. Warren, whose quick thinking brought reinforcements to a small, rocky hill at the left flank of the Union line — Little Round Top — where Col. Joshua Chamberlain and the 385 men of the 20th Maine held their position against a fierce Confederate offensive. There was the lone brigade of New Yorkers, led by George S. Greene, who fended off attacks on the right flank, suffering significant losses but successfully holding Culp’s Hill. And there were the soldiers of the Army of the Potomac’s II Corps, who successfully repelled Lee’s frontal assault on the Union center.

The result was a catastrophic defeat for the Confederacy. Lee lost the initiative and would spend the rest of the war fighting on the defensive, unable to wage another strategic campaign. The Confederacy would not win foreign recognition, leaving it helpless against a Union blockade. And even with the tremendous loss of life — the Union Army suffered more than 23,000 casualties over three days of battle — the Northern public would be reinvigorated by victory, ready to continue the fight.

ICE and C.B.P. still roam the streets, and Trump’s authoritarian aspirations have not dimmed. But surveying the wreckage of Operation Metro Surge — of this reactionary administration’s crushing defeat at the hands of another band of tenacious Northerners — it does look to me like MAGA’s Gettysburg.

A number of Republican mayors are condemning the Trump administration’s hardline immigration enforcement tactics in Minnesota, as they call on the president to pull back from Minneapolis and worry their cities might be next.

“It’s roiling the country,” Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt told POLITICO. “We’re all sort of feeling the angst of our residents and the fear that our city will be next and that chaos is going to inevitably creep across the entire country.”

Fresno, California, Mayor Jerry Dyer said in an interview that “too much damage has been done” with the crackdown and “the trust in communities has been lost.”

And Burnsville, Minnesota, Mayor Elizabeth Kautz, warned that the agency’s current tactics meant “our cities are no longer safe.”

The remarks from the trio of moderate-leaning GOP mayors who have broken with Trump in the past came at the annual gathering of the nonpartisan U.S. Conference of Mayors, held blocks from the White House. Holt chairs the conference.

The Republican leaders’ calls for Trump to deescalate after the fatal shootings of two Minnesotans by federal agents show the GOP’s deepening fissures over the administration’s aggressive immigration agenda, even as the mayors and Republicans broadly offered support for the president’s overall goal. And their alarm comes as ICE ramps up operations in other states, including Arizona and Maine.

The escalating immigration enforcement crackdown hung over the annual gathering, dominating conversations among leaders who are scrambling to prepare their cities for ICE sweeps and allay anxious and outraged residents.

Dyer on Wednesday said federal agents need to receive more training in deescalation tactics — a practice that the Fresno mayor, who served in law enforcement for 40 years, including 18 as the city’s police chief, said is integral for local police departments. He also said federal agencies should only work in communities where they have the cooperation of local leaders.

“I don’t believe that agencies should be deployed into cities against the will of local government and without the cooperation of local law enforcement,” Dyer said. “That’s a recipe for disaster, and I believe that’s somewhat of what we’re seeing today.”

And he urged other Republicans to speak out against federal immigration agents’ recent tactics.

“The Republican Party in general cannot rubber-stamp everything a party does or this administration does,” Dyer said. “Too many people today are turning a blind eye when they should be speaking out in opposition.”

It wasn’t just big-city GOP mayors who were concerned with the administration’s response: Kautz’s town of 64,000 people is in Minneapolis’ south suburbs.

Kautz, who said she now carries her passport in public, called for ICE to use judicial warrants, arguing that while violent criminals need to be off the street, it needs to be done “through proper channels, the rule of law, due process [and rooted] in the Constitution.” In Minnesota, “that is not our experience.”

A new POLITICO poll found that more than 1 in 3 Trump voters said that while they support the goals of his immigration agenda, they disapprove of the way he is implementing it.

Holt, who runs one of the most conservative large cities in the U.S. but backed Kamala Harris over Trump in 2024, warned that Trump’s interior enforcement was a failure.

“The president can feel, generally, that his policies at the border have been largely supported by a majority of Americans,” Holt said. “But what he’s doing inside the border seems to be not working.”

WASHINGTON – Liam Conejo Ramos, the pre-school student who ICE agents in Minneapolis nabbed last week and shipped off to a Texas detention facility with his dad, is in poor health now, according to his school’s superintendent.

Zena Stenvik, the superintendent for Ramos’ Columbia Heights public school district, told HuffPost that she spoke to the 5-year-old’s mother on Tuesday.

“Unfortunately, Liam’s health is not doing great right now,” said Stenvik. “He’s been ill. I’ve been told he has a fever. So I’m very, very concerned about his well-being in that facility.”

His mother is also “incredibly distraught,” she said.

Ramos’ mother addressed his deteriorating health earlier this week: “Liam is getting sick because the food they receive is not of good quality,” she told MPR News on Monday. “He has stomach pain, he’s vomiting, he has a fever and he no longer wants to eat.”

Marc Prokosch, the family’s attorney, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Ramos and his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, are being held at the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas. This is despite Arias entering the country legally and having no criminal record, according to Prokosch. Late Tuesday, a federal judge temporarily blocked federal immigration officials from deporting Ramos and Arias, for now.

The conditions at the Texas facility where Ramos is being held are “absolutely abysmal,” according to attorney Eric Lee, who represents other families being held there.

“They mix baby formula with water that is putrid. The food has bugs in it. The guards are often verbally abusive,” Lee told Minnesota Public Radio on Monday. “One of my clients had appendicitis, collapsed in the hallway, was vomiting from pain, and the officials told him, ‘Take a Tylenol and come back in three days.’”

Reps. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) visited the Texas ICE facility on Wednesday to meet with children and families being held there, including Ramos and his dad.

He posted a photo on social media after meeting with them. It shows Ramos either sleeping or lying weakly in his father’s arms, as Castro stands with them:

“Just visited with Liam and his father at Dilley detention center,” Castro wrote. “I demanded his release and told him how much his family, his school, and our country loves him and is praying for him.”

In a separate video, the Texas Democrat said he spent 30 minutes with Ramos and his dad. He said the 5-year-old “wasn’t in any kind of emergency or anything, physically,” but that he shared the photo of them together so people could see the state he’s in.

“His dad said he hasn’t been himself and he’s been sleeping a lot, because he’s been depressed and sad,” said Castro. “Liam actually was not awake during our visit.”

WASHINGTON – Liam Conejo Ramos, the pre-school student who ICE agents in Minneapolis nabbed last week and shipped off to a Texas detention facility with his dad, is in poor health now, according to his school’s superintendent.

Zena Stenvik, the superintendent for Ramos’ Columbia Heights public school district, told HuffPost that she spoke to the 5-year-old’s mother on Tuesday.

“Unfortunately, Liam’s health is not doing great right now,” said Stenvik. “He’s been ill. I’ve been told he has a fever. So I’m very, very concerned about his well-being in that facility.”

His mother is also “incredibly distraught,” she said.

Ramos’ mother addressed his deteriorating health earlier this week: “Liam is getting sick because the food they receive is not of good quality,” she told MPR News on Monday. “He has stomach pain, he’s vomiting, he has a fever and he no longer wants to eat.”

Marc Prokosch, the family’s attorney, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Ramos and his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, are being held at the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas. This is despite Arias entering the country legally and having no criminal record, according to Prokosch. Late Tuesday, a federal judge temporarily blocked federal immigration officials from deporting Ramos and Arias, for now.

The conditions at the Texas facility where Ramos is being held are “absolutely abysmal,” according to attorney Eric Lee, who represents other families being held there.

“They mix baby formula with water that is putrid. The food has bugs in it. The guards are often verbally abusive,” Lee told Minnesota Public Radio on Monday. “One of my clients had appendicitis, collapsed in the hallway, was vomiting from pain, and the officials told him, ‘Take a Tylenol and come back in three days.’”

Reps. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) visited the Texas ICE facility on Wednesday to meet with children and families being held there, including Ramos and his dad.

He posted a photo on social media after meeting with them. It shows Ramos either sleeping or lying weakly in his father’s arms, as Castro stands with them:

“Just visited with Liam and his father at Dilley detention center,” Castro wrote. “I demanded his release and told him how much his family, his school, and our country loves him and is praying for him.”

In a separate video, the Texas Democrat said he spent 30 minutes with Ramos and his dad. He said the 5-year-old “wasn’t in any kind of emergency or anything, physically,” but that he shared the photo of them together so people could see the state he’s in.

“His dad said he hasn’t been himself and he’s been sleeping a lot, because he’s been depressed and sad,” said Castro. “Liam actually was not awake during our visit.”

U.S. Rep. Dan Newhouse said Wednesday that “a lot of questions need to be answered” in the wake of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minnesota, but stopped short of calling for new leadership at the Department of Homeland Security.

Newhouse, a Republican from Sunnyside, was in Olympia speaking to the state House and Senate Republican caucuses.

The congressman, who isn’t running for reelection this year, told the Standard he sees signs the administration is “turning the corner a little bit” and figuring out a new strategy with a “different tone.” He said he agreed with President Donald Trump’s initial push to deport the so-called “worst of the worst” who have committed violent crimes.

But it’s clear that federal immigration authorities have gone beyond that, Newhouse said, arguing “things have gotten out of hand.”

“I’m all for border security and getting rid of the bad people,” Newhouse said. “But we have to show some humanity.”

Newhouse didn’t say that embattled Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem needs to be replaced. Her agency oversees Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection. He said that, following Pretti’s killing by federal agents Saturday, he’d “like to hear what she has to say” in congressional hearings.

A growing number of House Democrats, including several from Washington’s congressional delegation, are pushing to impeach Noem after the shooting of Pretti.

Rep. Suzan DelBene, D-Medina, is among them.

“The American people are demanding accountability for these horrific acts,” she said in a statement Monday. “Accountability needs to start with Secretary Noem. It’s clear that the administration and Republicans in Congress are unwilling to hold ICE and its leadership accountable.”

U.S. House Democratic leadership said Tuesday that Noem should be fired or impeached. Two Republican senators, Thom Tillis, of North Carolina, and Lisa Murkowski, of Alaska, recently called for Noem’s ouster.

Newhouse drew blowback from other Republicans because he supported Trump’s impeachment after the president’s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. But in Trump’s second term, Newhouse, like most Republicans in Congress, has avoided criticizing the president.

Several GOP candidates are seeking to replace Newhouse in his safely red central Washington congressional district. They include state Sen. Matt Boehnke, past candidate Jerrod Sessler and Yakima County Commissioner Amanda McKinney, who are all Republicans. Trump has endorsed McKinney in this race, and Sessler in his 2024 challenge of Newhouse.

Newhouse declined to pick a favored successor Wednesday, noting that there are “good people that are running.”

As for issues he’s watching in Olympia this legislative session, Newhouse, a farmer, said last year’s Democratic-backed tax increases are worsening affordability for state residents. He’s generally focused on trying to improve the economic climate for businesses.

He previously served four terms in the state House in the 2000s before then-Gov. Christine Gregoire appointed him to lead the state Department of Agriculture. He’s been in Congress since 2015.

As an American who deeply believes in our nation’s fundamental ethos and aspirations, it is hard to process the realization that the country we love is turning into a dystopian nightmare where paramilitary troops swarm our neighborhoods hunting for people who look like me and killing our fellow citizens. The abject cruelty and disregard for our collective humanity, the rule of law, and our rights, as demonstrated by the murders of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, is atrocious and morally jarring.

Last year, in an opinion piece for COURIER, I took stock of the first months of the Trump administration’s anti-immigration cruelty and chaos and asked a simple question: “Isn’t there a better way?”

Now, after a nightmare year for immigrants in America – and for the very notion of America as a nation of immigrants – my earlier impressions have become even sharper. Think of the sheer un-American sight of troops and masked ICE and CBP agents deployed in our communities as if they were an invading military force. Beyond the recent killings, consider the trauma on children, and the way kids and schools are being forced to bear the heavy burden of mass deportation. The hundreds of U.S. citizens swept up in deportation dragnets, citizens’ spouses detained at green card interviews, and canceled naturalization and citizenship ceremonies for those ready and willing to swear an oath to this country. Add to that mounting evidence that mass deportation is spiking inflation and inflicting economic damage on industries like construction, agriculture, and leisure and hospitality. Or the harm to public safety caused by this administration diverting money and manpower away from child exploitation and gun trafficking investigations and toward mass deportation efforts.

The mass deportation agenda makes all of America poorer, weaker, and less safe. Immigration has become the tip of the spear for this administration’s broader assault on core constitutional pillars. And it’s essential that all of us who have been horrified by this past year work to define – and fight for – an alternative vision in 2026.

Though it’s of course being directed by President Trump and Stephen Miller in Washington, DC, the true costs and harms of mass deportation and the anti-immigrant agenda are felt most acutely in states and communities across America – in Minnesota and elsewhere.

It is little wonder that the American public is recoiling. Poll after poll shows that this administration’s immigration agenda is unpopular and “has gone too far,” a verdict overwhelmingly echoed in media exit polls from the 2025 elections. In the aftermath of Ms. Good’s killing, multiple polls showed that Americans have moved sharply against ICE and recognize that the agency is making us “less safe” rather than “more safe.” And that was before this weekend’s killing of Mr. Pretti.

So what can we expect for the rest of 2026? For one, we can be confident that Trump and Stephen Miller aren’t going to suddenly listen to the American people and rein in their anti-immigration tirades. In fact, they will do the opposite – as their Orwellian response to Ms. Good and Mr. Pretti’s murders reminds us – and lash out with even more demonization against immigrants, as they always do when they feel besieged. Unfortunately, in light of the unprecedented funding for immigration enforcement that Republicans in Congress appropriated for mass deportation, we can expect the immigration harms and ugliness to escalate.

This makes our collective response all the more essential. A strong majority of Americans are rightly shocked by Trump’s abuses of power and want real solutions to fix our broken immigration system. Yet a majority remains skeptical about Democrats on the issue of immigration. This means those opposed to the Trump mass deportation crusade still have work to do to define an alternative vision and a better way forward than what Trump and the GOP are implementing.

On the heels of Mr. Pretti’s murder, there is a growing clamor for policy reforms to rein in the unchecked abuse and impunity we are witnessing in Minneapolis and beyond by adding essential accountability measures for ICE and CBP operations and ensuring we don’t give them even one penny more. But we cannot stop at enforcement alone; we must also pursue a broader, humane vision for our immigration system. That means charting a course aligned with the views of a strong majority of Americans: a balanced, common-sense approach that provides legal status for long-residing undocumented immigrants, such as Dreamers, addresses concerns about border security, creates an orderly and accessible legal immigration process, and focuses enforcement resources on genuine public safety threats.

But the policy blueprint is only part of it. The public also is hungry for real leadership and a well-communicated alternative vision to Trump’s chaos and cruelty – one that calls out the administration’s cruelty and lies, fights for a vision of America strengthened by immigrants, and doesn’t cede the debate to violent and xenophobic loudmouths by staying silent.

Amidst all the cruelty we are witnessing, what gives me hope is the tremendous solidarity and organizing to counter the militarization of our communities. 2026 can be a turning point in our immigration crisis and the way it’s weaponized to tear our communities apart. We must stand up to Trump, Miller, and this administration who allows these horrors to continue unchecked. We must then change course by defining and fighting for a new direction that is consistent with our values and commits to advancing common-sense solutions.

While immigration enforcement campaigns intensify nationwide, resistance is growing on both legal and grassroots levels.

This escalation reached flashpoints with the fatal shooting of American citizens Renée Good on January 7, and of Alex Pretti on January 24. Both were shot by federal immigration agents during protests in Minneapolis.

In both cases, the Trump administration defended the killing as self-defense by the agent. Officials also denied state investigators access to the shooting scene.

“The killing of Renée Nicole Good illustrated what we have been saying all along: The attacks on immigrants are the tip of the spear on attacks on all Americans. This mass deportation agenda, as much as this administration had said it will only target ‘criminals’ — we are now seeing in real time that they are affecting everyone, noncitizen and citizen alike,” said Vanessa Cárdenas, executive director of America´s Voice, at an American Community Media briefing held one day before Pretti’s shooting amid widespread protests.

Metro Surge
The ongoing protests are in response to Operation Metro Surge. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has called it “the largest immigration enforcement operation ever carried out,” involving the arrest of over 3,000 people.

The operation also involved the largest deployment of federal immigration agents in history. Some 3,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents are now operating in Minneapolis. That number is five times the size of the Minneapolis Police Department, which has about 600 officers.

Vanessa Cárdenas, executive director of America’s Voice, discusses public reaction to ICE deployment in Minnesota, the fatalities that have ensued, and how these impact political opinions.

“Americans are seeing in real time what an [immigration] enforcement-only agenda looks like, and they’re recoiling from it,” said Cárdenas. “But even though most Americans reject what ICE is doing, that does not mean they support Democrat solutions for reforms … That’s why we have to navigate this moment carefully in terms of bringing people into our coalition.”

Public outcry
Immigration enforcement, and subsequent clashes between protesters and federal agents, is fracturing even Republican support for the administration’s actions.

A YouGov poll conducted a day after Pretti’s shooting found that “More Americans support than oppose abolishing ICE (46% vs. 41%).” A majority (57%) also “somewhat or strongly disapprove of the way ICE is handling its job. Only 37% approve.”

Meanwhile, a new POLITICO poll shows that one in five voters who backed Trump in 2024 say the mass deportation campaign is too aggressive. Moreover, 41% of Trump voters say that while they support the administration’s immigration enforcement goals, they disapprove of how the president is implementing it.

Legal tussles
The class-action and state lawsuits that have emerged to stop the immigration enforcement surge “show a dynamic where district courts are ruling in favor of plaintiffs on injunctions, which are just pauses, only to have circuit courts roll back those pauses,” said Ann Garcia, staff attorney for the National Immigration Project.

On January 26, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals refused to reinstate a district judge’s injunction barring federal immigration agents from retaliating against protesters during Operation Metro Surge. The case involved Tincher v. Noem, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Minnesota on December 17, 2025 on behalf of six Minnesota residents.

Five days prior, an internal ICE memo was leaked authorizing agents to forcibly enter homes without a judge’s warrant, but only with an administrative warrant to arrest someone with a final order of removal.

“I imagine that will be challenged. There’s nothing legal about this,” said Garcia. “For many decades, courts have been abundantly clear on this point. Administrative warrants do not permit the government to enter a home or other private spaces. Only a judicially authorized warrant is valid to enter, search, arrest a person.”

Wider threats
“It’s a matter of the politicization of our judiciary,” she added. “Part of the reason that people are galvanized and going into the streets is because they realize that … at this point, it’s not just the freedoms of immigrant neighbors. It’s your freedom.”

Amanda Otero, parent of kids in Minnesota public schools and co-executive director of Take Action Minnesota, explains the steps Minnesotans are taking to form sanctuary school teams.

On the ground, “I’m seeing tens of thousands of my neighbors organized in local teams, providing rides and food support and rental assistance to families who are afraid to leave their homes and staying home, doing ICE watch and patrolling schools to make sure that our kids can come and go from school safely, and these kinds of initiatives are happening all across the state,” said Amanda Otero, co-executive director of Take Action Minnesota and a parent of two kids in Minnesota public schools.

“We are seeing catalyzing events every single day,” she explained. “The day before Renee was killed, at my child’s preschool, as parents were arriving, getting their little kids in their little snow suits up to the door and handing them over to the staff, teachers and parents looked up and, not a block away, watched federal agents tear gassing folks and arresting legal observers. Parents and teachers made eye contact and said, ‘Okay, kids, let’s go,’ and shoveled those kids in a little more quickly.”

Otero is part of a growing network of over 1,000 parents that have built sanctuary school teams in 40 public schools across Minneapolis. The teams are now training parents in other school districts statewide to peacefully ensure kids can safely enter and leave school. They are also offering food, rent aid and transportation to critical appointments for affected families.

“In Minneapolis and in Minnesota, I have never seen this many people get off the sidelines and take action, doing organizing to keep us safe,” she said. “The scale of what I’m seeing makes it very clear that whether you were supportive of ICE before or not, this moment is pushing so many more people to take a new step.”

Moral evaluation
“As lawyers, we would use the language of unconstitutionality. But really that’s just a substitute for the moral evaluation of what’s happening,” said Mark Tushnet, professor emeritus at Harvard Law School.

“One of the most encouraging things about the current situation is precisely the degree of popular opposition,” he continued. “Elected politicians say, ‘We ran on these programs,’ that ‘People are behind us’ … One way of showing it’s wrong is through popular demonstrations and resistance in the street.”

“It’s not the law in the abstract that solves these problems. It’s people standing behind their particular vision of what the law should be,” Tushnet added. “From the point of view of a constitutional lawyer: Don’t count on the courts, but go to the streets and the courts will follow.”

The morning after federal agents fired tear gas near a Minneapolis preschool, Amanda Otero watched the usual drop-off ritual morph into something surreal. Parents quickened their pace. Teachers looked on, tense. Hours later, Rene Nicole Goode—a U.S. citizen, mother, and protester—was dead.

“We are seeing catalyzing events every single day,” said Otero, a mother of two and co-director of TakeAction Minnesota. She spoke during an emergency ethnic media briefing hosted by American Community Media (ACOM), moderated by journalist Pilar Marrero. The moment was urgent, the tone unapologetically defiant.

Otero wasn’t alone. The panel included grassroots organizers Sari Lee of ONE Northside (Chicago) and Amanda Otero herself; legal expert Ann Garcia of the National Immigration Project; policy leader Vanessa Cárdenas of America’s Voice; and constitutional law scholar Professor Mark Tushnet of Harvard Law School. Journalists and media professionals across the country also joined the conversation—not just to report, but to listen, question, and document in real time what this movement means. The message: resistance is not isolated. It is coordinated. It is immigrant-led, unapologetic, and unstoppable.

As the panel unfolded, journalists raised questions rooted in real community concern: How widespread is the fear beyond undocumented residents? Are lawful immigrants equally afraid to leave their homes? What are the risks for neighbors who step in to help? What protections remain when ICE shows up at a school, a daycare, or a driveway? They wanted to understand not only the scope of ICE operations but also the human cost—and how local governments, courts, and communities are responding.

A Rising Movement Born of Crisis

Minneapolis, still marked by the wounds of past state violence, is now a flashpoint once again. ICE raids, once a background threat, have become highly visible, militarized, and traumatic. With thousands of federal agents on the ground, the city is under siege. But this time, immigrant communities are not facing it alone.

Across Minnesota, over a thousand parents have formed sanctuary school teams. These aren’t symbolic gestures. They patrol drop-offs, organize ride shares, deliver groceries, and raise emergency funds for families too scared to leave their homes. Otero called it “neighborhood care and safety.” It’s survival work. It’s resistance.

Inspired by models from Chicago, these teams follow three pillars: protect schools, provide mutual aid, and organize against ICE’s presence. Their demand is clear: get ICE out of our schools and out of Minnesota.

In Chicago, that blueprint was written under pressure. Sari Lee, Deputy Organizing Director at ONE Northside, recounted Operation Midway Blitz—a months-long ICE offensive with nearly 200 agents deployed.

“We educated, we defended, we showed up,” Lee said. From rapid response networks to public town halls, their efforts trained thousands. They knew their rights. They resisted detentions. When a daycare worker was arrested, 500 people showed up that night. She was released.

But defense was only the start. The movement escalated. Community members organized mass actions against corporations with ICE contracts. At 22 AT&T stores across Illinois, protesters demanded divestment.

“Don’t renew your contract with complicity,” Lee said.

A Broader Reckoning

Vanessa Cárdenas, Executive Director of America’s Voice, pulled the lens back. “This is no longer about targeting undocumented immigrants. This is about terrorizing communities,” she said.

Goode’s death underscored the point. It shattered the illusion that U.S. citizens were immune from immigration violence. The administration may claim to target “criminals,” but the reality, Cárdenas warned, is indiscriminate harm.

Polling now shows a majority of Americans, including independents, believe ICE has gone too far. But trust in Republican-led “border security” remains high. The movement must hold that contradiction with clarity: call out the abuse, build broader alliances, and push for real reform.

“This is the largest ICE deployment in U.S. history,” Cárdenas noted. Nearly 3,000 federal agents are now stationed in Minneapolis alone. DHS, bolstered by unchecked funding, is not retreating.

The Legal Front Is Fractured

Ann Garcia, senior staff attorney at the National Immigration Project, called the federal tactics “authoritarian.” Her team is leading a class-action suit on behalf of Minnesotans arrested, assaulted, and surveilled for exercising their First Amendment rights.

Plaintiffs include legal observers, citizens, and peaceful protesters. One woman was tackled for asking if agents were with ICE. They cut off her wedding ring. They cut off her bra. The court granted an injunction. It was overturned in a one-line order days later.

“This is how repression operates,” Garcia said. “It tests the law, stretches the narrative, and counts on silence. We are not silent.”

A leaked ICE memo authorizing warrantless home entries has only escalated concern. Garcia was unequivocal: it is illegal. It defies decades of constitutional precedent. But ICE is pushing boundaries, betting on impunity.

History Is Speaking

Harvard Law Professor Mark Tushnet situated today’s resistance in deep American history. He drew a direct line from the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 to present-day ICE tactics. Then, communities resisted federal enforcement with their bodies. Now, the same is happening.

“We went to bed indifferent and woke up abolitionists,” he quoted. “That’s what these moments do. They awaken.”

But he cautioned: courts alone won’t save us. They didn’t then. They won’t now. “Real change,” he said, “comes when people make the law mean something through collective action.”

Holding the Line, Expanding the Circle

Otero and Lee emphasized that this is not a moment of despair. It’s a moment of decision. They urged peaceful, organized resistance. They urged training. They urged care.

Neighbors supporting neighbors isn’t charity. It’s protection. It’s solidarity.

And even those hiding in fear, Otero said, find hope in seeing others step forward. “It’s what keeps them strong, even while they stay home.”

So the resistance continues. School by school. Block by block. In courtrooms. In the streets. In memory of Rene Nicole Goode. In defense of every child, every worker, every neighbor who calls this country home. Stay rooted, stay bold, stay visible.

For years, Republicans have had some reliable terra firma: If they were talking about immigration and border security, they were winning.

Even amid the backlash from Donald Trump’s 2016 pledge to ban all Muslim immigrants to his 2024 amplification of baseless claims that migrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating pets—immigration remained a durable, winning issue for the GOP.

Now the ground is shifting under them.

A torrent of viral images from Minnesota and beyond as Trump’s immigration agents stepped up their shambolic interior campaign of enforcement in recent months — and the killing of two people in Minneapolis in two separate incidents this past month — have led to a loud public backlash, soured voters on the GOP’s approach and eroded President Donald Trump’s standing on the issue ahead of the looming midterms.

The broad sweep of public polling shows Trump fumbling what has historically been his party’s strongest issue, which even Democrats concede paved his path back to the White House. A Reuters/Ipsos poll found this week Trump hit a second-term trough on the issue, with a majority of Americans — 58 percent — saying his crackdown has gone too far. Only 39 percent approve of his handling of immigration, down two points from earlier this month, and an 11-point erosion from last February. What’s more, a poll from the Democratic-aligned Searchlight Institute this week found that 58 percent of likely midterm voters want ICE to be reined in.

“The image that has been created is not a good thing,” said Jose Arango, the Republican chair of Hudson County, New Jersey, a heavily Democratic area with a large Hispanic population that shifted rightward in 2024. “We’re losing in the public relations campaign.”

Even before Alex Pretti’s killing in Minneapolis, Trump’s own voters were fretting over his agenda. A plurality of Americans said the president’s mass deportation campaign is too aggressive — including 1 in 5 voters who backed Trump in 2024, according to the latest POLITICO Poll. More than 1 in 3 Trump voters said that while they support his immigration agenda, they disapprove of the way he is implementing it.

And another new round of polling on Thursday could give Democrats more ammo as voters move away from Trump’s immigration agenda. The Democratic-aligned Senate Majority PAC’s latest polling, shared exclusively with POLITICO and being sent to lawmakers, donors and campaigns Thursday, shows not only a growing number of likely voters who disapprove of ICE, but also a majority in favor of Democrats’ strategy of demands for reform even if it means a partial government shutdown, with 54 percent also saying they would blame the GOP and Trump for the shutdown and not accepting ICE reforms. These numbers are especially telling as the biggest shifts occur “among moderates, non-MAGA Republicans, and key swing voters,” the polling memo said.

As former President Joe Biden and his administration officials left themselves electorally exposed on the issue, then-candidate Donald Trump exploited those vulnerabilities with vows to seal the southern border and enact the largest deportation campaign in American history. But his enforcement actions have focused less on the border, which polls show most voters approve of, and more on the nation’s interior, drawing the ire of Trump-curious commentators like the comedian and podcaster Joe Rogan and raising alarm among Republicans.

“The president can feel, generally, that his policies at the border have been largely supported by a majority of Americans. But what he’s doing inside the border seems to be not working,” said Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt, a Republican who runs one of the most conservative large cities in the nation but backed Kamala Harris in 2024.

One longtime Republican strategist who worked on presidential campaigns in 2020 and 2024, granted anonymity to candidly assess Republicans’ standing, expressed consternation over ICE’s deployment to a place like Minnesota, far from the southern border.

“When I think of immigrants broadly, I don’t think of Minnesota,” the strategist said. “People want to see, like, okay, ‘I voted for taking criminal illegal immigrants and getting them out of the country. I want to see criminal illegal immigrants taken out of the country. I want to see more miles of wall being built.’ I feel like we talked about the wall weekly in Trump 1. I don’t remember the last time we talked about the wall in Trump 2.”

All of which raises an uncomfortable question for Republicans: Is the party in danger of ceding one of its best issues back to Democrats?

“Immigration used to be a winning issue for Democrats back when we made clear we took enforcement seriously,” said Adam Jentleson, the former chief of staff to Sen. John Fetterman (D-Penn.) and top aide to former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), who commissioned the Searchlight polling shared with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer as he shuttled toward another potential shutdown over the issue. “It can be a winning issue for us again if we are smart about how we handle this.

Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), a rising Democratic star who won his seat in 2024 at the same time Trump carried his state, campaigned in key Latino areas for his party in New Jersey, Virginia and Miami’s mayoral elections last year, and who has launched his own border security and immigration platform, told POLITICO his party has to build trust with swing voters.

“We have to be the party that talks about professional, legal enforcement of our immigration laws with an understanding that criminals need to be deported and the border needs to be secure, and that we have to move to a sane compromise when it comes to immigration reform,” Gallego said.

It wasn’t so long ago that was the reality: As recently as 2013, under then-President Barack Obama, the majority of Americans said the Democratic Party better represents their feelings on immigration than Republicans did.

What does the GOP risk ahead of the midterms if it doesn’t find a better message?

“I think you’ll see the numbers continue to suffer,” the longtime GOP strategist said.

Gallego, who has called for White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller to be fired, said that gives Democrats an opportunity.

“If I was the Republicans right now, I would be very worried about what the future looks like in terms of elections, and Stephen Miller may have basically created a political tsunami among voters, both Latino voters as well as just kind of moderate voters,” Gallego said. “That’s going to come back and haunt them, going into the 2026 election.”

Alec Hernández, Lisa Kashinsky and Ali Bianco contributed to this report.

When Republicans muscled President Trump’s signature domestic policy bill through Congress last year, they gave a windfall to the Department of Homeland Security — including for Immigration and Customs Enforcement — with effectively no strings attached.

Republicans allocated a total of $190 billion over four years, including $75 billion for ICE alone, making it the highest-funded federal law enforcement agency. At the time, Democrats warned that the money would supercharge the department without any checks on its operations. But Republicans used a special maneuver to shield the measure from a filibuster and get it to Mr. Trump’s desk on a simple majority vote, leaving Democrats powerless to block it.

Now, in the middle of an aggressive immigration crackdown that has resulted in the deaths of two American citizens, Democrats are trying to exert their limited leverage. Facing a government funding deadline on Friday, they are seeking to use annual spending bills, which require congressional approval, to add at least some restrictions to the blank check the Republican Congress delivered to ICE last year.

Senate Democrats are threatening not to vote for a spending package needed to fund the government past Friday, which would result in a partial shutdown starting on Saturday, unless Republicans agree to add limitations on funding for the Department of Homeland Security to constrain its immigration enforcement operations.

“I will vote no on any legislation that funds ICE until it is reined in and overhauled,” said Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader. “Senate Democrats are overwhelmingly united on this issue.”

They cannot act alone. Making any changes to the spending measure would require buy-in from Republicans, whose votes would be needed to scale procedural hurdles in the Senate and push a revised bill back through the House.

After the two shootings this month in Minneapolis, there are signs that at least some Republicans have grown uncomfortable with the slush fund that a majority of them approved and are open to discussing new guardrails.

“I don’t want to defund ICE,” said Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, one of a few Republicans in his chamber to vote against the domestic policy measure last year. “But I’m not sure I want to give them billions and billions more without any kind of signs of, there are going to be some rules of the game.”

Because Democratic votes are needed to avert a partial government shutdown, many see the current spending package as their strongest point of leverage for any restrictions on that money. The domestic policy law already made the homeland security funds available. But Congress, through the annual spending bill needed to keep the department operating, dictates how, where and under what circumstances it can spend money.

Senator Christopher S. Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut, said the funding bills offered Democrats their best chance to address the “absurd levels” of money that Republicans allocated to immigration enforcement last summer.

“They rammed through a bill that loads ICE up with money with absolutely no restrictions on how they use it,” Mr. Murphy said. “And they have to know that comes with consequences. That has ended up helping to feed the crisis that the country is in right now.”

Most of the scrutiny of Mr. Trump’s signature domestic policy legislation last year focused on the large tax cuts it provided, the bulk of which went to high earners, and the substantial cuts to Medicaid and other social safety net programs that paid for them. But the law also gave federal immigration officials a huge injection of money to carry out the expensive mass deportation effort Mr. Trump had promised.

That combination is what gave rise to Mr. Trump’s nickname for the measure. Rather than split the two priorities into separate bills, the president insisted on pushing through “one big, beautiful bill” carrying both, pairing broadly popular tax cuts with a deportation slush fund that might have been less palatable on its own.

Just months into Mr. Trump’s second term, the immigration crackdown appeared to be straining its annual budget. Democrats and Republicans alike expressed concern that the agency was spending so heavily that officials would need to claw back money they had assigned for other purposes in order to fund widespread raids and detentions.

So Republicans turned to their megabill, using it to allocate more than $170 billion over four years for immigration enforcement at the Department of Homeland Security, with another roughly $20 billion for other operations.

Within that pool of money, G.O.P. lawmakers allocated $75 billion to ICE, an injection of cash that supplemented the roughly $8 billion that Congress had provided for the agency in its annual budget. In effect, they handed the agency an additional $20 billion a year.

The money came with no practical limitations. Though in their bill Republicans designated $45 billion to be used for detentions and $30 billion for ICE’s operations, they did not require that the agency report how it was spending the money or keep it from shifting funds around, as would typically have been done in an annual spending bill.

Another $10 billion was given to the homeland security secretary to broadly cover activities meant for “border support.” Roughly $65 billion was allocated to Customs and Border Protection, $47 billion of it for a border wall. Those funds were also free of reporting requirements, an issue raised by lawmakers from across the political spectrum.

“It is Congress’s job to ensure that the historic funding provided to DHS in reconciliation is being properly used and that procedures and protocols are being followed,” Representative David Joyce, a moderate Republican from northeast Ohio, said in a social media post.

The homeland security spending bill that the House passed last week, and that Senate Democrats are trying to change, currently includes $10 billion for ICE, rejecting Mr. Trump’s request for a large increase and keeping its budget roughly flat. It would include $20 million for body cameras for ICE and C.B.P. agents, and it would require the Homeland Security Department to give Congress monthly updates on how it is spending the money that Republicans gave it last year. Democrats tried during negotiations with Republicans to add stronger restrictions, but were rebuffed.

After the shootings in Minnesota, Democrats are demanding that the bill be reopened to add stricter limits, such as requiring judicial warrants for ICE to make arrests and requiring that federal agents wear visible identification.

At the same time, some lawmakers have warned that a government shutdown would not necessarily curb ICE’s operations, precisely because of the infusion of money that the agency has already received.

“Not passing the homeland bill will not stop ICE right now,” Senator Patty Murray of Washington, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, said on Wednesday. “Why? Because Republicans already gave ICE tens of billions of dollars without a single Democratic vote.”

The finger-pointing within the president’s inner circle over the administration’s response to the killing of a second person in Minneapolis is in full force.

The Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday said the two agents who fatally shot Alex Pretti have been on leave since Saturday — contradicting insistence by now-sidelined Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino that the agents were working in other cities.

Tellingly, key administration officials are also distancing themselves from the narrative they used in the immediate aftermath of Pretti’s killing when they accused the 37-year-old ICU nurse of being a “domestic terrorist” who wanted to “massacre” federal agents.

DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, who said Pretti was there to “perpetuate violence,” was following deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller’s lead, according to a report in Axios. Miller in turn, blamed Customs and Border Protection for faulty information and potentially not following White House instructions.

The growing list of attempts to shift liability show that people close to President Donald Trump recognize the latest shooting as a major political vulnerability for the White House.

“Mistakes probably were made, political ones and some tactical ones,” said a DHS official, granted anonymity to speak about internal dynamics. The official pointed to the mounting pressure on the immigration agencies, and the intense situation on the ground as protesters and agents clash.

“Eventually under the stress, things are going to break, and people are going to make mistakes, and then that gets used in the media coverage on both sides — and everybody gets to fighting,” the person added.

A senior White House official, granted anonymity to discuss the internal dynamics, brushed aside the ongoing criticism facing the administration’s initial response to the shooting.

“There’s no concern,” the official said. “What Stephen put out was based off of a preliminary report, and that’s what a lot of agencies were doing as well, basing their statements off of that preliminary report.

The White House also pointed to the president’s latest defense of Noem, including that she’s “doing a very good job” and won’t be resigning. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement that Miller is “one of President Trump’s most trusted and longest serving aides. The president loves Stephen.”

In the four days since the shooting, the White House has tried to contain the growing political crisis in Minneapolis, changing course by shifting its message and deploying border czar Tom Homan to Minneapolis to work with Democrats. Bovino, who the president called a “pretty out there kind of guy,” was also moved out of the state.

But the personnel shake-up has done little to abate the political pressure encircling the administration, as a number of GOP lawmakers publicly criticize the response, including some who have pressed for Noem’s firing. And now a partial government shutdown is looming over Immigration and Customs Enforcement funding, as Democrats demand new restrictions on the agency.

“There has to be accountability,” Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.) said. “This is not like some wish list. This is like really practical, common sense stuff that would actually go a long way towards minimizing the harm that we’re seeing in Minnesota right now.”

The president, for the most part, has stuck to a tight script, telling reporters that he wants to see a “very honorable and honest investigation” into Pretti’s death. Trump has distanced himself from the “terrorist” label, which both Noem and Miller used in the hours after the shooting.

Miller said the White House told DHS to use extra CBP personnel to keep protesters away from fugitive apprehension operations, saying the president’s team is “evaluating why the CBP team may not have been following thatprotocol.” He also said the initial assessment that Pretti was brandishing a weapon and engaging in “domestic terrorism,” just before he was shot was “based on reports from CBP on the ground.”

The senior White House official said Miller’s statement wasn’t in response to frustrations about his initial comment, but was designed to “set the record straight.”

“There was an initial assessment provided by CBP, and in the end, it turned out that, you know, it was an incomplete assessment,” the official said. “So I think Stephen was just trying to clear up some of the confusion.”

The tensions among the president’s top immigration officials have simmered for months. Noem and Homan have regularly disagreed over the best way to implement the president’s mass deportations agenda, and both want to be perceived as the one in charge. And Miller, viewed as the architect of the president’s immigration agenda, has pressured DHS to deliver on daily arrest and deportation targets, which some DHS officials argue has resulted in an aggressive and haphazard approach.

Miller, one of the president’s longest-serving and influential advisers, has often been seen as untouchable by aides and allies. His influence now extends well beyond immigration to a host of hardline, America First policies. His decision to walk-back and explain his rush to describe Pretti as a “domestic terrorist” was viewed internally by some as a rare example of vulnerability for the president’s domestic policy chief. These feelings were amplified by Republicans on social media jumping to his defense.

An administration official, granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive situation, said it appeared that Miller was “wounded,” but said it would be a “huge mistake to count him out.”

The senior White House official defended both Miller and Noem, saying they are here to stay and calling the secretary’s ouster in particular “wish casting.”

WASHINGTON — Elizabeth Kautz says she now carries her passport around the Minneapolis suburb where she’s been the mayor since 1995.

“Those ICE agents don’t know that I’m the mayor of the city of Burnsville,” Kautz, a Republican who has occasionally diverted from the Trump administration’s views, said Wednesday as the United States Conference of Mayors opened its meeting in Washington. “I could be coming out of a store and be harassed so I need to make sure that I have credentials on me.”

Her comments reflected a sense of frustration and exasperation hanging over the gathering of mayors, which would typically be a venue for leaders to strategize over issues ranging from affordable housing and transit to climate change and addressing urban violence.

But much of that was overshadowed by the fallout from the killing of Alex Jeffrey Pretti by two federal agents in Minneapolis on Saturday, reigniting a national debate over the Trump administration’s aggressive law enforcement tactics, which have often focused on cities.

“There has been no more urgent challenge facing all Americans these past few weeks than the chaos in Minnesota stemming from an unprecedented surge in immigration enforcement,” said Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt, a Republican who is the conference’s president this year.

Multiple mayors said they appreciated President Donald Trump’s nod this week toward deescalating the federal government’s operation in Minnesota, adding that they agreed with the administration’s goal of deporting undocumented immigrants who have committed crimes.

But they also described a dynamic in which they’re facing pressure from constituents to evict federal agents from their cities — something they can’t do — while struggling to align with federal counterparts.

The surge has had a notable impact even in cities that haven’t faced the brunt of the federal government’s pressure like Minneapolis.

“When trust is lost in how laws are being enforced in one city, we feel the risks to our police officers and to our residents in all cities,” said Leirion Gaylor Baird, the Democratic mayor of Lincoln, Nebraska.

Representatives from the Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a request for comment on the mayors’ remarks. Holt said the White House hasn’t invited the mayors for a meeting while they’re in town this week. Trump has repeatedly put the onus on local officials to cooperate with federal law enforcement, saying Wednesday on social media that Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey was “PLAYING WITH FIRE” for saying his city won’t enforce federal immigration laws.

Jerry Dryer was the police chief in Fresno, California, for 18 years before he was elected mayor in 2020 as a Republican. He said he wasn’t in Washington to “bash” ICE or the administration and expressed appreciation for Trump’s work to secure the U.S.-Mexico border.

But he criticized the way federal immigration enforcement has been implemented and said ICE was “being rejected” by communities across the U.S. In the process, he warned, trust in law enforcement is in peril.

“In order to gain that trust, we have to police neighborhoods with their permission,” he said. “We cannot be seen as an occupying force when we go into these neighborhoods.”

Jim Hovland, the nonpartisan mayor of Edina, Minnesota, a suburb just south of Minneapolis, described “external forces” that are tearing “at the very fabric of our communities that we’re responsible for shepherding.”

“It’s really hard to figure out how to deal with it,” he said.

For U.S. senators, today was the first full day back in Washington after the killing of Alex Pretti and ahead of their Friday deadline to fund the Department of Homeland Security and some of the government’s other large agencies.

They arrived as news is still unfolding on the Pretti shooting and as another lawmaker faced a new threat.

Our congressional correspondent, Lisa Desjardins, joins me now for more on all of this.

So, Lisa, we have been covering the outrage after the Pretti shooting, the sense that something shifted. As you talk to senators, are you sensing a shift in how they’re viewing the immigration crackdown?

Lisa Desjardins:

We did. We have been watching that carefully.

And, today, I have to tell you we heard from Republicans a new kind of very open sense that federal enforcement officers went too far in a dangerous way. Now, some of them word this carefully, but, more, we are seeing Republicans say this sharply.

That includes Homeland Security Chairman Rand Paul.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY):

We can’t just say, oh, nothing to see here, and he was obviously an assassin and a domestic terrorist. When we say things like that, it leads to no confidence in — so I think there really has to be an independent investigation.

And this is going to be an investigation outside of DHS. They should themselves immediately appoint a commission. If they don’t, I think Congress may do it.

Lisa Desjardins:

So there we go, a commission potentially.

Now, Rand Paul is known to break with President Trump, but I heard this kind of idea, concern from more Republicans who don’t usually do that. Of course, for Democrats, it’s more than just concern.

An example is this from Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey:

Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ):

This agency is out of control. Its leadership is out of control. Its leadership should step down, if not be impeached. So we are in a serious, serious crisis right now.

Lisa Desjardins:

And there are calls to impeach Kristi Noem. We’re going to be talking more about that in coming days.

But I want to also point out one other group of Republicans. These are Republicans who say, even as they express some concern about ICE, that they think protesters are being too aggressive. One example of that is Florida’s Rick Scott.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL):

You have a right to protest in this country, but you don’t have a right to interfere with law enforcement. So don’t be stupid. Don’t interfere with law enforcement. We all are going to have to work together to get the criminals out of our country. Local law enforcement should be working to work hand in glove with ICE right now.

Lisa Desjardins:

One other standout note, Republican Leader John Thune told reporters he thinks this is in fact potentially an inflection moment.

Amna Nawaz:

So, when it comes to leaders who have concerns about the tactics of federal agents, especially Democrats, what are they going to do about ICE and what does this mean for the chance of a potential shutdown?

Lisa Desjardins:

Those are intertwined questions.

And let’s start with Democrats. Many people have been wondering. Senator Schumer today told reporters what Democrats want to fund DHS. There are three things that he listed today, first, that they would end roving raids, enforce code of conduct, and hold agents accountable for harming people, and also that there would be no more masking, that they would require bodycams and I.D.s on all officers.

But the problem is, the DHS funding bill, of course, already passed the House, along with all these other funding bills. So to change it now would cause that partial shutdown.

The White House says, if Democrats demand a legislative fix, there will be a shutdown. And that’s the point we’re at right now. One difference, though, is, people seem to want a solution, but, honestly, they’re just far apart on how to get there.

Amna Nawaz:

So let’s leave Washington for just a moment and talk about this climate of political violence I know you spend a lot of time covering.

Another attack on a member of Congress. This time, it was Democrat Ilhan Omar last night. Bring us up to speed.

Lisa Desjardins:

Viewers may know Omar represents Minneapolis. She herself is a Somali immigrant. She also is someone who has really received the most vitriolic rhetoric from President Trump while he’s been in office.

She was speaking at a town hall in Minneapolis last night when a man ran toward her. He squirted a syringe with an unidentified liquid. And a reporter said there was a vinegar smell afterward. Police have arrested a man who the Associated Press said supported Trump online and also called Democrats liars.

As for Omar, she kept going at that town hall. And she posted some defiance on social media, writing that: “This small agitator isn’t going to intimidate me from doing my work. I don’t let bullies win.”

But President Trump was asked about this. He told ABC that he didn’t watch the video, but he called Omar a fraud. He gaslit her, saying she probably had herself sprayed.

Now, we raise that because that’s a message, even if it is a joke, that is part of this climate of intimidation.

Amna Nawaz:

Meanwhile, we know there’s some new information about the level of threats against lawmakers. What should we understand about that?

Lisa Desjardins:

Capitol Police came out with some eye-popping statistics over the number of threats they have been tracking.

Let’s take a look at this. It came out just yesterday, last night. Look at this. These are the number of threats that Capitol Police have investigated in the last few years.

And you see that spike? That is last year, 14,000-plus threats against members of Congress investigated. Amna, that’s more than a 50 percent increase from the year before. So they do have more funding for security.

But I can tell you personally lawmakers are feeling this, some of them having to move their residence, taking careful plans with family vacations. This is a real climate of political violence and threat.

While more than half of voters approve of the job President Donald Trump is doing on border security, a new Fox News survey finds a majority disapproves of how he is handling immigration and a growing number view the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency’s tactics as “too aggressive” — including significant portions of the president’s coalition.

In addition, there is disagreement about how well ICE is carrying out its core mission. Twenty-nine percent of voters say ICE’s enforcement practices “almost always” reflect Trump’s pledge to focus on illegal immigrants with criminal records, 25% think that happens “most of the time,” 19% say “sometimes,” and 27% “not very often.” More Republicans (45%) than Democrats (17%) and independents (15%) think ICE is “almost always” keeping the pledge.

At the same time, there is a backlash against the agency’s methods. Fifty-nine percent of voters characterize ICE as “too aggressive,” a 10-point increase since July 2025. This sentiment is increasingly defined by a shift in the center: the perception of ICE as too aggressive is up 14 points among Whites without a college degree, 19 points among moderates, and 22 points among independents. A similar shift is seen among right-leaning groups, including Trump voters (+9 more aggressive), Republican women (+14), and non-MAGA Republicans (+23).

When those saying ICE is too aggressive are asked to specify their concerns, they are more likely to point to tactics rather than targets: 44% say “using too much force,” while 23% say the agency is “targeting the wrong people.” Another 29% volunteer it’s both.

The survey was conducted from Friday through Monday (January 23-26); on Saturday, during a Minneapolis protest, federal agents fired shots that killed Alex Pretti.

Border security remains Trump’s best issue, and currently the only one where he receives a net positive job rating: 52% of voters approve. That’s up 1 point from 51% in December, but down from a record high of 57% approval in September. Some 17% of Democrats approve of Trump on border security compared to 9% on immigration. Among Republicans, it’s 89% and 85% approval respectively.

Forty-five percent of voters approve of the president’s job performance on immigration, while 55% disapprove. That’s unchanged since last month. His highest immigration approval was 48% in July 2025. In trends going back to early in Trump’s first term, only once has his disapproval rating on immigration been below 50% and that was 48% in April 2025.

“This poll demonstrates something we’ve noted for a long time — border security and immigration are often distinct issues,” says Republican pollster Daron Shaw, who conducts the Fox News Poll with Democratic counterpart Chris Anderson. “Republicans in general, and the president in particular, are seen as effective when it comes to border security. But public sentiment is more complicated when it comes to handling immigrants in the U.S. illegally.

Currently, 44% approve of Trump’s overall job performance, while 56% disapprove — the same marks he received in December.

Support for abolishing ICE has doubled since 2018, rising from 18% to 36%. Much of the increase comes from White voters (+20 points), women (+21), independents (+22), and Democrats (+34). Opposition to abolishing the agency held steady at 42%, while the share saying they are unsure dropped from 39% to 22%.

Views are split on whether local governments should be required to collaborate with ICE: 49% favor requiring cooperation, 50% oppose it. The level of support for cooperation among Republicans (85%) is matched by opposition among Democrats (83%). Independents are against cooperation by a 30-point margin (34% favor, 64% oppose).

Virginia Democrats on Wednesday rolled out a package of bills designed to curb federal immigration enforcement activities in the commonwealth. The lawmakers framed their effort as a public safety measure to protect the state’s immigrant communities and other residents, following deadly clashes between ICE agents and protesters in Minnesota and as media polls show Americans’ growing discontent with the federal government’s aggressive campaign to rout out undocumented immigrants.

The proposals, which have been filed but not yet advanced through committee, would restrict where and how federal immigration and border patrol agents can operate and limit cooperation from state and local authorities.

At a morning news conference at the state Capitol in Richmond, Democratic lawmakers said the legislation aims to prevent what they described as aggressive, unaccountable federal enforcement actions from taking place in Virginia communities and to ensure immigrants and other residents can access schools, hospitals, courthouses and polling places without fear.

“House Democrats are here for one reason. We’re charged with protecting all Virginians,” Del. Marcus Simon, D-Fairfax, told reporters. “It’s Virginia citizens, all Virginia residents, our neighbors, and keeping our communities safe.”

Simon tied the legislative push to the deaths of Alex Pretti, a hospital ICU nurse who cared for veterans, and Renee Nicole Good, a Minnesota mother of three, during recent federal enforcement actions.

“Alex Pretti, a VA hospital ICU nurse, was just trying to help a woman who’d been knocked to the ground, he was shot in the back 10 times by federal agents. He was shot like a dog in the street. Renee Good, a mother of three, shot in the head,” Simon said.

Democrats did not provide a response Wednesday on a reported federal plan to establish an ICE detention facility in Hanover County, nor did they elaborate in detail on the bills they expect to advance this session.

The legislative push comes as immigration enforcement has become one of the earliest tests of Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s administration, following Democrats’ takeover of statewide offices and both chambers of the General Assembly.

Shortly after her Jan. 17 inauguration as Virginia’s 75th governor, Spanberger moved quickly to reverse a signature Republican immigration policy by rescinding former Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s executive order that had urged state police and corrections officers to help carry out federal immigration enforcement, a step that advocates said fueled fear in immigrant communities.

But Spanberger’s move did not end existing agreements between state or local agencies with the federal government.

Democratic lawmakers said their own proposals are designed to draw clearer boundaries between federal immigration enforcement and state and local institutions, particularly schools, hospitals, courthouses and polling places.

“We can enforce the law and respect the Constitution,” Simon said. “We hold criminals accountable without terrorizing communities. That’s what real public safety looks like.”

Bills restricting enforcement locations and cooperation
Several of the new proposals were introduced by Del. Alfonso Lopez, D-Arlington, who said they are intended to prevent immigration enforcement from interfering with access to essential services and democratic participation.

Lopez’s House Bill 1440 would prohibit federal immigration enforcement in certain “protected areas” owned or operated by the state or local governments, including hospitals and health care facilities, schools at all levels, offices of commonwealth’s attorneys and other locations designated by the attorney general.

Under the proposal, employees of those facilities could not knowingly allow federal immigration enforcement into nonpublic areas for enforcement purposes. Violations would be punishable as a Class 1 misdemeanor, with limited exceptions.

HB 1441 would restrict state and local law-enforcement officers from assisting or cooperating with federal immigration enforcement operations, unless they are acting under a valid judicial warrant, subpoena or detainer, or are otherwise required by law.

And HB 1442 would prohibit immigration enforcement activity within 40 feet of polling places, locations where election results are being certified, or recount sites. Lopez said the legislation is meant to ensure that voters are not deterred from participating in elections.

“Public safety includes protecting the most fundamental right in a democracy, the right to vote without fear,” Lopez said. “What we have seen from ICE agents is intimidation.”

Courthouse protections
Another proposal, HB 650 by Del. Katrina Callsen, D-Albemarle, would restrict civil arrests inside courthouses. At the Chesterfield County Courthouse alone, at least 14 undocumented individuals were arrested last summer, drawing sharp rebukes from public officials, civil rights groups and lawmakers but praise from former Gov. Glenn Youngkin.

The measure would prohibit such arrests of people who are attending court proceedings, traveling to court or leaving court, including witnesses and family members, unless the arresting authority presents a judicial warrant or order that has been reviewed by a designated official.

Violations would be punishable as contempt of court.

“Courthouses should be places of justice, not fear,” Callsen said at the news conference. “People have to be able to enter a courthouse to testify, attend hearings and comply with the law without worrying that they’ll be snatched, detained or disappear on their way in the door.”

Callsen said the bill is aimed at preventing a breakdown in the justice system when people are afraid to participate.

“When people are afraid to show up, crimes go unreported,” she said. “That is not what public safety is about.”

Data, masking and cooperation limits
Other bills filed this session address transparency and cooperation with federal authorities.

HB 7, introduced in December by former Del. Mike Jones, D-Richmond, now a state senator, would prohibit most state and federal law-enforcement officers from wearing facial coverings while performing official duties, with exceptions for health protection and tactical operations.

The bill would create criminal penalties, allow civil lawsuits against officers who violate the rule and eliminate sovereign immunity as a defense.

And HB 1438 by Del. Elizabeth Guzman, D-Prince William, would prohibit state and local agencies from entering into agreements that authorize officers to perform federal immigration enforcement functions. Existing agreements would have to be terminated by Sept. 1, 2026.

The bill would also limit inquiries into a person’s immigration status and create a cause of action for violations.

And Del. Kathy Tran, D-Fairfax, said data privacy and constitutional protections are also central to the legislative effort.

“No one should have their personal information swept up, shared or misused without due process or without their consent,” Tran said. “Our legislation is proactive. It’s responsible, and quite frankly, it’s our duty.”

Senate counterparts
Across the hall, Sen. Saddam Azlan Salim, D-Fairfax, announced earlier this week that he introduced companion legislation, including bills mirroring the courthouse arrest restrictions and facial covering bans.

A third bill, SB 783, would limit agreements between state or local agencies and federal immigration authorities and expand data-collection requirements under the Virginia Community Policing Act to track the presence and actions of federal immigration officers during stops.

In a statement, Salim sharply criticized recent federal enforcement actions.

“ICE has murdered another Minnesotan, and we need to call it what it is: state violence, plain and simple,” Salim said, adding that his bills are intended to ensure that “no agency, no badge, and no president is above the law or the value of a human life.”

All three of Salim’s proposals advanced in a Senate Committee Wednesday afternoon.

Republican leaders pushed back on the Democratic proposals Wednesday, arguing the focus should remain on economic issues rather than challenging immigration enforcement.

House Minority Leader Terry Kilgore, R-Scott, and Senate Minority Leader Ryan McDougle, R-Hanover, said Democrats are straying from an affordability agenda that leaders in both parties have identified as a top priority this session.

“That should be the focus,” McDougle said. “Not political games like gerrymandering, not political games like fighting with D.C.”

Asked about the Democratic measures, Kilgore said, “Virginia has absolutely no say in what the federal government is doing.”

OAKLAND — California Attorney General Rob Bonta today, co-leading a multistate coalition along with New York Attorney General Letitia James, filed an amicus brief opposing a federal policy that mandates the indefinite detention of many undocumented immigrants without the opportunity for a bond hearing. In a brief filed in Rodriguez Vazquez v. Bostock, the coalition challenges the unprecedented reinterpretation of immigration law by immigration authorities, arguing that the new policy contravenes Congress’s intent and the right to due process and federal statutes, and inflicts widespread harm on families, communities, and states.

“The Trump Administration has carried out its inhumane immigration agenda by abducting, incarcerating, and deporting members of our communities without regard for the rule of law,” said Attorney General Bonta. “Its latest policy seeks to indefinitely detain immigrants in violation of their Constitutional right to due process. It’s inhumane and illegal, and I will continue to fight it in every way I can.”

For decades, immigrants living in the U.S. who were placed in removal proceedings had the right to request a bond hearing — a chance to argue for, and be afforded an individualized determination of the propriety of, their release while their immigration case was pending. The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) nationwide adoption of this policy eliminates that right for those who are alleged to have entered the country without inspection, mandating their indefinite detention, even where they may have strong claims for relief. Many of these people have lived in the United States for years and now face confinement in overcrowded, unsafe, and unsanitary facilities with no clear end in sight. As DHS expands its enforcement efforts, millions of additional immigrants could be subjected to mandatory detention under this policy.

This policy also hurts U.S. citizens, over 9 million of whom, including 4 million children, live with an undocumented family member. The detention of these family members can increase the risk of depression, anxiety, and economic instability. Fear of detention already deters immigrant families from seeking healthcare, food assistance, and even reporting crimes. The attorneys general argue that the excessive and unlawful mandatory detention policy only worsens this effect.

This policy doesn’t just harm families, it also costs taxpayers. Attorney General Bonta and the coalition argue that unnecessarily detaining undocumented workers disrupts the labor force and undermines local and state economies. Undocumented immigrants constitute nearly 5% of the U.S. workforce. In 2023, undocumented-led households paid nearly $90 billion in taxes and contributed almost $300 billion in consumer spending. The attorneys general also argue this policy will come at a substantial cost to taxpayers. In 2024, immigration detention cost U.S. taxpayers $3.4 billion – roughly $152 per detainee per day. By contrast, DHS’s own Alternatives to Detention program costs less than $4.20 per day and is equally effective in ensuring court appearances.

The attorneys general urge the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to grant partial summary judgment for the plaintiffs and strike down DHS’s unlawful policy.

Rodriguez Vazquez v. Bostock challenges the same “no bond” policy at issue in Bautista v. Noem. Attorneys General Bonta and James led a multistate coalition in filing a similar amicus brief in support of the plaintiffs in that case last year.

Attorneys General Bonta and James lead the attorneys general of Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawai`i, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington in filing the brief.

Republican Sen. Susan Collins said she’s asked Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to pause the immigration enforcement surge in both Maine and Minnesota, calling both operations too sweeping and indiscriminate.

Collins’ request comes amid public backlash over how Immigration and Custom Enforcement agents are sweeping up people who are legally present in the U.S., causing fear and anxiety in both states.

Collins has previously questioned the rationale behind the surge of ICE agents in Maine. Now that it’s underway, she says her misgivings have only grown.

She told Maine Public that she spoke to Noem on Monday.

“I asked her to pause the operations in both Maine and Minnesota so that they could be reviewed and far more targeted in their scope,” she said.

Collins says she has received multiple calls from constituents expressing fear and anger about the ICE operation because it was sweeping up people who are here legally. She said Noem asked for examples and that she’s compiling a list.

She described the events in Minnesota as appalling and was hopeful about recent staffing changes at the direction of the White House, including the recent deployment of White House border czar Tom Homan to Minnesota.

Homan, an immigration hardliner who served during the Obama and first Trump administration, had been sidelined during the surge. Collins said she wasn’t sure why.

Collins also rejected Noem’s characterization of Alex Pretti as a “domestic terrorist” after he was shot and killed by ICE agents in Minneapolis last weekend. She reiterated her call for an independent investigation, not one overseen by DHS.

The Republican also questioned the training of new ICE recruits, saying they were deployed too quickly.

“I believe in a rush to get them out to the field that their training has not been as thorough and extensive as it should be,” she said.

Collins stood by her calls to continue funding DHS, the umbrella agency for ICE, in an upcoming funding bill. That position has drawn criticism from Democrats, including two of the leading contenders vying to unseat her in the upcoming midterm election, Gov. Janet Mills and Graham Platner.

Collins said 80% of the DHS funding as nothing to do with ICE and that the bill includes accountability measures like requiring body cameras and crowd de-escalation training for agents.

Democrats in the Senate have vowed to block funding for DHS in upcoming vote because of ICE’s conduct.

When Kristi Noem was — what? informed? reminded? — that her meeting with North Korea’s dictator Kim Jong Un, which she reported in a prepublication manuscript of her memoir, never happened, this did not ruffle her sang-froid. She placidly said that the “anecdote” about the meeting would be “adjusted” before the book was published.

Today, Noem, a former member of Congress and former governor of South Dakota, is secretary of homeland security, under whose supervision Immigration and Customs Enforcement operates. There are, however, many reasons, beyond Noem’s nature, that multiplying millions of Americans do not and should not trust ICE.

Much has been said about the social ripples from what began with the introduction of the smartphone. Some consequences, such as instant access to torrents of information, are excellent. Others, such as addictive access to oceans of rubbish, are awful. But an insufficiently appreciated benefit of this device is that most Americans most of the time are carrying video cameras.

Governments around the world are using myriad technologies, some of them sinister, to surveil their populations. U.S. governments — national, state local — are not impervious to the temptation to overdo this. But today, a salutary effect of the ubiquity of smartphones is the surveillance of the government by citizens. Including those exercising their constitutional right to petition government for redress of grievances, and people watching other people do this.

Graphic journalism can change the world. It did so in May 1963, when Theophilus Eugene “Bull” Connor, commissioner of public safety in Birmingham, Alabama, used body-slamming fire hoses and snarling dogs against young Black civil rights demonstrators. The nation was appalled and, as important, embarrassed by photos and videos of what was being done in its streets by government.

Minneapolis is today’s Birmingham. Citizens with smartphones are supplementing journalists in gathering facts. It is infuriating, yet grimly sublime, that the current national administration, which will not stop banging on about how it is restoring America’s greatness, is incessantly embarrassing (about Greenland, vaccines and much else). The administration requires an addition to the typologies of government: loutocracy.

For a glimpse of what government of, by and for louts looks like, find on the internet the video, taken by a citizen in Minneapolis, in which a participant in the excitement of a melee — tear gas and other instruments for combating citizens — exclaims: “It’s like ‘Call of Duty’! So cool huh?” “Call of Duty” is a video game, away from which some new agents were perhaps lured by the signing bonuses, some up to $50,000, that have fueled the agency’s breakneck expansion.

Policing is a hard, dangerous profession. Done well, it demands of its practitioners discipline and judgment, and deserves from society a respect approaching reverence. The current administration, by erasing the distinction between police work and military operations — by allowing marauding ICEmen to pose as police — has grievously wounded the dignity of policing.

This is unsurprising. In a July 2017 speech to a law enforcement audience, President Donald Trump urged police, “don’t be too nice” to suspects taken into custody. The International Association of Chiefs of Police responded tartly:

“Managing use of force is one of the most difficult challenges faced by law enforcement agencies.” They “develop policies and procedures, as well as conduct extensive training, to ensure that any use of force is carefully applied and objectively reasonable.”

Trust, including trust in government, is the glue that gives successful societies the cohesion requisite for collaborative dynamism. It is calamitous when government forfeits the public’s trust. But when, as today, such forfeiture occurs, assume the worst.

Today, it is more than prudent, it is good citizenship to assume that everything ICE says, and everything the administration says in support of its deportation mania, is untrue until proved to be otherwise. Or, as Noem might say, until it has been “adjusted.”

Some administration louts have said that the most recent (as of this writing) person killed in Minneapolis by a federal officer was a “would-be assassin” and, of course, a “domestic terrorist.” Because Republicans control congressional committee gavels, and because today’s president controls congressional Republicans, there will be no oversight of ICE’s rampages. The Senate, which disgraced itself by confirming Noem and others unqualified for Cabinet positions, is especially unlikely to suddenly acquire the inconvenience of a conscience.

So, expect more killings, and more political smearing of the victims. That ICE’s disgraces will continue is, in its revolting way, a promise kept: loutocracy.

The moral horror wrought by President Trump’s second administration is incontrovertible. The killing of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care unit nurse and US citizen, by Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis was recorded from all angles by brave observers and seen by people around the world.

It follows the public killing earlier this month of Renée Nicole Good, a 37-year-old Minneapolis mother and fellow US citizen, and an untold number of unseen deaths and disappearances in American detention centers like “Alligator Alcatraz.”

Given this, the radical has become the pragmatic. Trump, and everyone else responsible for these outrages, should be impeached and convicted. Immigration and Customs Enforcement should be disbanded, as should its parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security. And the people who have killed — both publicly and privately — should be investigated and hauled before judges and juries.

But the logic of the killings is as important as the killings themselves. While a truth in itself, the moral horror is also a sign of the administration’s lies and lawlessness, a political logic known from 20th-century Soviet and Nazi totalitarian regimes and from attempts to replace the rule of law with personal tyranny.

In a constitutional republic like the United States, the law applies everywhere, at all times, to everyone. For that logic of law to be undone, the aspiring tyrant looks for cracks in the system that can be pried open.

One of these cracks is the border, where the country ends. Because the law ends there, too, an obvious move for the tyrant is to turn the whole country into a border, where no rules apply. Soviet leader Joseph Stalin did this in the 1930s, with border zones and deportations preceding the Great Terror. Adolf Hitler did it, too, in 1938 Germany, with immigration raids that targeted undocumented Jews and forced them to flee the country.

Trump, by his own admission and that of his Cabinet members, is following the same playbook. He is using ICE, nominally a border authority, to enforce his own whims on a US state of his choosing — a Democratic Party stronghold with deep-rooted civic idealism. It is not legal to attack a city over its politics, or to flood its streets with federal agents to gain information about a state’s voters in exchange for withdrawing ICE agents.

The border becomes the pretext to undo the law everywhere, at all times, and against anyone. It is the crack that can be opened. The wedge is constructed with lies, which begin as cliches and memes that the government pounds into our heads, and which the media repeat, mindlessly or with malice.

One of these cliches is “law enforcement,” which is uttered over and over like an incantation. “Law enforcement” is not a noun like “table” or “house”; it is not a fixed thing. It is an action, a process that Americans have a right to see and judge for themselves. People enforcing the law do not wear masks, nor do they trespass, assault, batter, and kill at will. Public killings carried out by Trump’s goons do a great disservice to the local, state, and federal authorities whose job is to police effectively, particularly when such state terror is defined as “law enforcement.”

The lies continue as provocative inversions, or what I called “dangerous words” in my book “On Tyranny.” In this case, the Trump administration is using “terrorist” and “extremist” — terms long favored by tyrants — to defame those killed by their policies. Their “messaging” reflects what Hannah Arendt called “the banality of evil” — or, as Václav Havel put it, the evil of banality. Words turn into reality with the collaboration of those who hear them.

In this sense, those who actively lie are complicit in the killings in Minnesota and any more to come. But those in the media who choose to treat propaganda as the story, who begin from lies rather than from events, are also complicit. The border is the crack, the lies are the wedge, and the people who accept those lies are opening it wider.

Words matter, whether uttered first or repeated. They create an atmosphere, they normalize — or they do not. We must choose to see, to call things by their proper names, to condemn people who lie.

Behind the moral horror of these public killings is a political logic. Those who resist the Trump administration’s lawlessness and the lies understand this. In Minneapolis and many other places, they are doing right — and giving the endangered American republic its best chance of survival.

As people sit outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Field Office in Dallas, waiting to be called in for their appointments, not many words are exchanged.

One of the people in line on a recent morning is Dennis, who only wanted to be identified by his first name. He drove his friend, a Cuban national, here for a routine check-in, his third since he moved to the U.S. two and a half years ago — but this time, he was detained.

“He’s a hard worker, honest, humble,” Dennis told KERA in Spanish.

His friend worked at the airport and passed through TSA every day without issue, Dennis said.

“He had all his processes turned in,” he said, “asylum, residency, everything in order, his taxes done.” But when his friend showed up at the check-in with his paperwork in order, it didn’t matter, Dennis said.

Dennis’s friend is one of countless migrants detained at their check-ins in recent months — something attorneys and advocates say hadn’t happened in the past.

“A routine check-in is no longer that,” said Dallas immigration attorney Oscar Escoto. “You really have to prepare for a more enhanced question and possible detention.”

The change has caught migrants off-guard – and forced advocates and attorneys to adjust. Escoto, who used to work for the Executive Office for Immigration Review, which conducts federal immigration hearings and removals, said he and others have seen an increase in detainments at the Dallas ICE Field Office in recent months and weeks.

Under the Trump administration, ICE reportedly has a minimum number of arrests they must make every day. An ICE spokesperson denied any quotas, but Homeland Security advisor Stephen Miller told Fox News last spring the administration had a goal of “a minimum of 3,000 arrests for ICE every day, and President Trump is going to keep pushing to get that number up higher each and every single day.”

According to data compiled by the University of California, Berkeley’s Deportation Data Project, from the time Trump took office last January, to July 29, ICE made approximately 138,000 arrests nationwide — almost a quarter of them in Texas.

Daily arrests jumped about 30% in the ICE regions that include Houston and Dallas, according to a Texas Tribune analysis of the data.

Ariel Ruiz Soto is a senior policy analyst for the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute who has studied the data of ICE arrests under the second Trump administration. Border Patrol has also been heavily involved, he said.

“The idea here is that … they’re looking to create more assistance from Border Patrol to implement, expand, and amplify the reach of enforcement in the interior,” Ruiz Soto said. “Because ICE by themselves, the agency alone cannot reach the scale of arrest and removals that are needed for what the administration is hoping to achieve.”

To reach daily quotas, advocates and attorneys say they have also seen new tactics emerge.

Kate Lincoln- Goldfinch is a legal advisor for the League of United Latin American Citizens. She said some of her clients have begun to receiving messages late at night from ICE notifying them of last-minute check-ins.

“The turnaround time is so short that they don’t have time to talk to a lawyer and explore what their options are,” she said.

She said many people — especially if they aren’t paying attention to the news or social media — don’t know when they walk into their appointments that “this is essentially a detention sentence.

“Most of these people walk into that building not knowing that they’re not going to come out,” she said.

Despite the tougher policies, attorney Oscar Escoto said it’s still possible to be successful before an immigration judge.

“What we have to brace for is ongoing changes that are adversely affecting the immigrant community,” he said. “So we have to fight harder than before.”

The state’s population kept growing last year, albeit just barely, as it felt the impact of a massive decline in international immigration that led the U.S. to its slowest growth since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Illinois added 16,108 residents between July 2024 and 2025, pushing its population to 12.7 million and ranking as the sixth-largest state, according to Census Bureau estimates.

However, the increase was 77% lower than the number of people Illinois added in 2024, when it grew by nearly 70,000 residents. It lagged Midwest peers, such as Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio, where the decline in growth ranged from 24% to 46%.
New York’s growth decelerated even more sharply than Illinois, slipping from an increase of 214,876 residents in 2024 to just 1,008 last year.
Nationally the rate of population growth last year rate fell by half to 0.5%.
“The slowdown in U.S. population growth is largely due to a historic decline in net international migration, which dropped from 2.7 million to 1.3 million in the period from July 2024 through June 2025,” said Christine Hartley, assistant division chief for Estimates and Projections at the Census Bureau.

Population growth is a barometer of economic health, fueling increased consumption of goods and services, as well as tax revenue. Illinois has had sluggish growth in the past three years and saw declines in the two years before then.
Gov. JB Pritzker, who is seeking election to a third term this year, touted the growth. “Illinois recorded its third consecutive year of population growth, as the state remains focused on strengthening the factors that help people choose to stay and build their lives here,” he said in a statement.
International immigration is a key factor. Chicago has long been one of the nation’s leading destinations for international immigration, and Illinois felt the sting of last year’s broad decline. The number of new international immigrants to Illinois last year was 44,752, down 60% to from a year earlier. It marked a retreat to 2023 levels after a sharp increase in 2024.
Extended raids in the Chicago area by Immigration and Customs Enforcement took place after the Census Bureau made its estimates.
The decline in immigration is reducing one competitive advantage the state has enjoyed over its neighbors. Illinois had nearly twice the number of international immigrants in 2024 as Ohio and Michigan, despite having similar overall population numbers. In 2025, the gap narrowed to 1.5 times.
Meanwhile, Illinois continues to be plagued by the outflow of residents to other states, or what the Census Bureau calls domestic outmigration. The exodus slowed by half in the past two years, but Illinois still lost 40,000 residents to other states in 2025. Pritzker noted it’s the lowest level in 15 years. Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio each recorded more arrivals from other states than departures last year.

SANFORD, Maine — The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is saying its “Catch of the Day” program in Maine is targeting the “worst of the worst” among the immigrants who are in the state illegally, but two high-profile county officials are saying the reality of the situation doesn’t support that claim.
In a joint statement on Jan. 23, York County Sheriff William King and York County Manager Greg Zinser confirmed a corrections officer at the jail in Alfred had been detained by ICE and was in custody at a facility in Plymouth, Massachusetts.
King and Zinser did not name the employee, but they praised his job performance at the jail and said the process for hiring him was thorough.
“This individual was a contributing and valued member of the staff,” King and Zinser said.

ICE detained the individual when he showed up for an appointment with immigration officials in Scarborough, according to King and Zinser. The individual had been invited to the appointment, they added.
King and Zinser described the county’s hiring process as “rigorous,” involving an application submission, references, criminal background checks, employment verification, confirmation that someone can lawfully work in the United States, and other measures.
“We hire only those who meet or exceed those requirements,” Zinser and King said. “To the best of our knowledge, this individual has never committed any type of crime that would result in the revocation of his legal status.”
Zinser and King said it remains unknown whether the individual’s legal status has changed.
“From York County’s perspective, it never received any notification on whether there had been a change in his status,” they said.
Zinser and King stated their support for local and federal law enforcement but questioned assertions that immigration agents were only targeting the “worst of the worst,” as promoted by ICE’s “Catch of the Day” program in Maine.

“The reality appears far more complicated,” King and Zinser said.
The two county officials said that, in their view, individuals who previously were in compliance with immigration law are “now being reclassified – not necessarily because of criminal behavior, but because the rules, or the interpretation thereof, changed.”
York County is not alone. In Cumberland County, Sheriff Kevin Joyce held a press conference on Jan. 23 after ICE agents detained one of his department’s recruits for a corrections officer the night before, according to The Maine Monitor.
In that instance, as well, Joyce described a disconnect between what he and his department were told about the apprehension and what they experienced first-hand, the Monitor said.
“We’re being told one story, which is totally different than what’s occurring, or what occurred last night,” Joyce said.
And, as King and Zinser maintained for their corrections officer in York County, Joyce asserted that the recruit for his department had been through a “rigorous” vetting process.
“In this particular case, this is an individual that had permission to be working in the state of Maine. We vetted him,” the Monitor reported Joyce as saying. “Every indication we found is that this was a squeaky-clean individual that really hadn’t done anything at all.”
ICE moves the goalposts on who gets targeted
On its website, ICE maintains that the federal Department of Homeland Security is searching for and apprehending “child abusers, hostage takers, and violent assailants,” under the direction of President Donald Trump and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.
According to news reports, however, ICE is casting a wider net and is capturing and detaining immigrants who are not criminals and are believed to be in good legal standing as they pursue either asylum status or U.S. citizenship.
While the statuses of detained individuals are unclear, Trump did announce sweeping limitations and restrictions on the entries of foreign nationals in a proclamation on the White House’s official website in December.
Under an executive order by Trump, the United States is now limiting and restricting the entry of foreign nationals from several countries, most of which are in Africa. Also under this order, the United States is authorized to look into immigrants who arrived in the country after late January 2021.
The proclamation, in part, did address measures pertaining to Angola, the country many of Sanford’s new arrivals are from.
ICE operations have been the subject of heated debate throughout the country during the first year of Trump’s second term as president. Locally, in Sanford and elsewhere, people have stated a variety of positions, with some opposing ICE, with others supporting the agency, and with some who also support it but are concerned about its tactics.
Controversies over the operations spiked significantly this month, with the shooting deaths of two protesters, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, by ICE agents on the streets of Minneapolis, Minnesota on Jan. 7 and Jan. 24, respectively. In both cases, federal and state administrators have clashed in their characterizations of what happened.
Sanford deputy mayor calls detainment ‘heartbreaking’
In Sanford, some members of the community have spoken out about recent ICE activities, with protestors demonstrating in downtown Sanford on Jan. 24.
The York County corrections officer, who is now detained in a facility in Plymouth, Massachusetts, lives in an apartment complex in downtown Sanford.
Maura Herlihy, who owns and operates the complex, spoke highly of him, describing him as “extremely thoughtful, polite, and trusting,” the kind of tenant who always pays his rent on time, is known for checking in on neighbors for their well-being, and even grabs a shovel after a snowstorm to help clear the property before heading out to work.
Herlihy, who is also the city’s deputy mayor, called her tenant’s detainment “heartbreaking.”
“He’s just the sort of citizen we want in this country,” she said.
In a post on Facebook on Jan. 24, Sanford City Councilor Ayn Hanselmann, speaking as a citizen, said she could not “remain silent” about the presence of ICE agents in the community. She said she was “devastated” by recent developments.
“I know families – people with valid asylum status, work permits, driver’s licenses, jobs, children in our schools, and no criminal records – who have been detained,” Hanselmann said. “What we are seeing is fear, intimidation, and the stripping away of due process and basic rights. This cannot be normalized.”
Hanselmann urged residents not to “stay quiet.”
“We must speak up,” she said. “We must protect our Constitution and the rights it promises to all of us.”
Sanford has seen scores of asylum seekers from Angola in recent years, many who arrived in the spring of 2023. Their arrival caught city officials by surprise, as the asylum seekers had been recruited by local individuals to come to Sanford, with the promise that they would be helped.
Regardless of their unexpected arrival, and despite Sanford’s housing stock already having been at maximum capacity, city officials and local agencies, churches, service organizations, and others partnered together to help asylum seekers who were eligible for assistance.
The overall effort proved enough of a success that other Maine municipalities have taken Sanford’s lead in addressing the influx of immigrants in their own communities. This chapter in Sanford’s history even served as the subject of a documentary, “I Come From Away,” which had a special showing at the Little Theatre in Springvale and a broadcast premiere on the Maine Public Film Series.

A federal agent fired paintball-like projectiles at the cars of at least two people observing them in a Home Depot parking lot on Friday, marking one of the most dramatic confrontations between officers and the public since Maine’s immigration surge began last week.

It happened when the onlookers did not immediately leave an area of a South Portland parking lot where about six agents had gathered, according to two witnesses who recounted the episode in interviews. The projectiles left sticky, orange marks on their windshields, bumpers and car doors, they said, providing photos and videos to corroborate their accounts.

One video shows a group of about six officers approaching several vehicles in the lot. Two of them held rifles and one of them held a device that resembled a paintball gun. It is not clear what kind of threat the onlookers presented that would have justified the agent’s use of force.

The confrontation at the South Portland Home Depot last Friday afternoon is the first documented time during the Maine operation that agents have used crowd control weapons to deter public surveillance, underscoring the tension between those who say they are exercising their free-speech rights and agents who have warned them not to impede their work.

“I was not threatening them. I was yelling obscenities, but I was 50 feet away in my car with the window open and they came after me with guns and threatened to arrest me,” said Sabine Peirce of Portland, who said an agent fired at her sedan while they said she needed to leave because she was impeding federal law enforcement and could be arrested.

A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security did not respond to inquiries about the encounter. The incident was reported later that evening to a tip line operated by the Maine Immigrant Rights Coalition. Video taken by another driver was posted to a website that tracks sightings of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement across the country.

Peirce had driven to the Home Depot around 4 p.m. on Friday after witnessing an agent arrest a man about a half-mile away, near the Maine Mall. She was driving one of about four cars that approached a group of agents near the back of the lot by the service entrance.

One of the other drivers, Joshua Reynolds of New Hampshire, said that agents first approached an older woman driving a white Volkswagen who had gotten closest to the officers. They appeared to say something to her, then an agent shot projectiles at her car. Reynolds assumed they might be pepper balls, which are deployed from devices that resemble paintball guns and release a powdery irritant. But these projectiles left a liquid mark, similar to drying glue, he said.

Travis Norton, a former police lieutenant in California and use-of-force expert, said he had never encountered paintballs used by law enforcement. Federal agents have used pepper ball guns among other “less lethal weapons” during intensifying enforcement actions across the country during President Donald Trump’s second term, according to Bellingcat.

When agents shot at the windshield and bumper of Reynolds’ car, he crept further toward them, he said. At that point, two officers approached with handguns drawn at their sides, he said.

Reynolds said he backed off quickly, pulling over a curb, when an agent approached his window and issued him a warning that spooked him, making him think of the case of an ICE officer who fatally shot a woman in her car earlier this month in Minneapolis. (A border patrol agent fatally shot a man trying to film officers there on Saturday.)

Reynolds did not immediately leave. He took another picture of the agents walking toward the cars, including two agents holding long guns against their chests. Both he and Peirce said they left soon after, after the agents had coaxed them back into the front of the Home Depot parking lot. Reynolds said that onlookers, presumably Home Depot customers, had stopped to watch and some appeared to be recording with their phones.

After leaving Home Depot, Peirce drove back to the Maine Mall area and called the event into a local hotline that is tracking ICE around Maine. A hotline representative confirmed her report.

“The goal has been to be peaceful and to document and show them … that the world is watching,” Peirce said. “There are eyes on them.”

The chief federal judge in Minnesota is fed up with the Trump administration’s persistent violation of court orders and the rights of detainees amid increasingly aggressive immigration enforcement actions.

As a result, Judge Patrick J. Schiltz has ordered the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Todd Lyons, to appear in court Jan. 30 for a contempt-of-court hearing.

“This court has been extremely patient with respondents, even though respondents decided to send thousands of agents to Minnesota to detain aliens without making any provision for dealing with the hundreds of habeas petitions and other lawsuits that were sure to result,” Schiltz said in his Jan. 26 order.

“Respondents have continually assured the court that they recognize their obligation to comply with court orders, and that they have taken steps to ensure that those orders will be honored going forward. Unfortunately, though, the violations continue.”

“The court’s patience is at an end.”

Immigrants, including many in the country legally, have suffered significant hardships, such as being detained without hearings and often being released in other states “and told to figure out a way to get home,” Schiltz said. “The court’s patience is at an end.”

What the judge termed an “extraordinary step” to deal with a “likewise extraordinary” violation of court orders adds to the rapidly mounting pressures facing the Trump administration over its immigration crackdown in Minnesota.

While violence against clergy and other demonstrators has been on display for weeks, the stakes skyrocketed after what some called the “execution-style” shooting of Alex Jeffrey Pretti on Jan. 24 by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis.

It was the second fatal shooting of a U.S. citizen by immigration agents in the city since the Jan. 7 killing of Renee Good. She was shot multiple times as she observed an anti-ICE protest.

But Pretti’s shooting at point-blank range has intensified opposition to the Department of Homeland Security’s detention and deportation tactics, and to the level force it has authorized against immigrants and Americans alike.

A growing number of Republicans in Congress have joined Democrats in calling for an investigation into the killing. In addition, CBP Commander Greg Bovino has been demoted and removed from the state, and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem is reportedly facing heavy scrutiny from the Trump administration, CBS News reported.

Civil rights and humanitarian organizations reacted vehemently to the shooting, and more than 1,000 faith-based, immigrant and labor rights groups sent a letter to Congress Jan. 27 demanding termination of ICE funding.

The groups expressed “horror, outrage and deep grief about the news that federal agents have executed a human being in broad daylight.”

The developments come as the Senate prepares to debate spending measures for numerous government departments, including DHS.

“As long as ICE and CBP continue to inflict unchecked violence and evade responsibility for the harm they cause, immigrant survivors — and our communities as a whole — cannot truly be safe,” said Casey Carter Swegman, director of public policy at Tahirih Justice Center.

“Without accountability and justice for the victims and an end to the state-sanctioned violence we are seeing ICE and CBP perpetuate in our communities, no lawmaker can in good conscience give DHS one more cent of taxpayer money.”

“No lawmaker can in good conscience give DHS one more cent of taxpayer money.”

Reining in immigrant enforcement also is a way to protect children, especially after reports of students being tackled and taken away from Minnesota public schools by federal agents, according to Kids in Need of Defense.

“Over the past year, KIND has witnessed firsthand the severe harms suffered by children due to misguided DHS immigration enforcement actions that disregard children’s vulnerability and basic safety,” KIND President Wendy Young said.

Another twist came when U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi sent a letter to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz blaming him and other state politicians for stoking violence by opposing immigration actions.

Minnesota could improve its situation by sharing Medicaid, food assistance and voter registration data with the federal government, and by rescinding sanctuary policies that protect immigrants, Bondi said. “I am confident that these simple steps will help bring back law and order to Minnesota and improve the lives of Americans.”

Democracy Forward President Skye Perryman called Bondi’s letter an attempt “to extort the state with an offer to pull federal agents out in exchange for access to state voter rolls, among other things.”

The information could in turn be used to aid the administration’s ongoing efforts to undermine upcoming elections, she said. “New filings from the government revealed that DOGE accessed and may have shared Americans’ personal Social Security information with an external election-denial group as part of its efforts to undermine election integrity.”

Vanessa Cárdenas, executive director of America’s Voice, urged Americans not to celebrate the apparent setbacks the administration is experiencing in Minnesota.

“Let’s not be fooled: The news and rumors about Greg Bovino and Kristi Noem sound encouraging, but nothing will change until DHS is held accountable for the deadly and out-of-control ICE and Border Patrol and until we recognize and hold accountable those who are ultimately responsible for what is playing out before our eyes.”

And that means holding President Trump accountable, she added. “Moving around some chess pieces among his flunkeys is like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.”

The growing number of Republicans challenging the Trump administration’s handling of the Alex Pretti killing reflects a potentially significant shift in the dynamics of the Trump presidency, as GOP officials who have almost uniformly supported the president are sparking an unusual backlash over his signature issue of immigration.

Congressional Republicans voiced little dissent during the first year of President Donald Trump’s second term, rallying behind even positions that were long anathema to the party. But mounting GOP calls for an independent investigation of the killing — which was captured in a number of startling videos — have pushed the administration to abruptly soften its tone on the protester’s death and could have longer-term political consequences.

The unusual pushback also reflects Republicans’ increased concern that without a significant course correction, they are likely to lose control of Congress in November’s midterm elections. Trump’s approval ratings have fallen sharply, and polls increasingly show that Democrats are favored to retake the House and potentially the Senate.

“The circumstances are so blatant, and the situation is so stunning, that of course Republican officials are not going to buy the explanation put out before anybody actually looked at the evidence,” said Republican pollster Whit Ayres. “Any responsible public official would do what these Republicans are saying you should do, which is have a free and full and transparent investigation and follow the facts before you start making judgments and coming out with stories that are obviously lies.”

He added, “The guy is on the ground, he has been disarmed and you pump 10 bullets into his body. The circumstances are so amazing that it really presents an image of a bunch of trigger-happy masked commandos in an American city.”

The criticism and calls for investigation have come not only from the few Republicans who have previously been willing to criticize Trump, but also from partisan Republicans and some of the president’s steadfast allies.

“I’ll tell you this, there needs to be a pivot in the whole operation,” Rep. Mark Amodei (R-Nevada), who oversees homeland security spending, told the Nevada Independent. “Because regardless of what side of immigration enforcement you’re on, we are not in a good place right now.”

Sen. John Curtis (R-Utah) took particular issue with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem. “I disagree with Secretary Noem’s premature DHS response, which came before all the facts were known and weakened confidence,” Curtis said. “I will be working with a bipartisan group of senators to demand real oversight and transparency.”

Shortly after Pretti was killed, Noem suggested the protester had attacked federal agents, saying, “This is a violent riot when you have someone showing up with weapons and are using them to assault law enforcement officers.” Senior Border Patrol Commander Greg Bovino added that Pretti planned to “massacre” federal agents, and White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller called Pretti “an assassin.”

Videos from the scene, however, showed Pretti had been trying to help another protester, had not pulled out or brandished his gun and was shot multiple times after he had been disarmed.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina) on Tuesday described Noem as incompetent and called on her to resign. If she does not step down, Trump should fire her, he said.

“I feel like she is discrediting the law enforcement officers of Homeland Security, whether it’s Border Patrol, ICE, customs,” Tillis told reporters Tuesday evening. “She is way out of her depth. She needs to get out of the DHS.”

Tillis also criticized Miller. “If I were president, neither one of them would be in Washington right now,” he added.

Curtis, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) and other Republicans have called for Trump’s immigration officials to testify before Congress, paving the way for potentially contentious events that could be an unwelcome distraction from the administration’s message. The White House has been seeking to show that the president shares Americans’ concern about high prices and is working to deport undocumented immigrants who drive up those costs.

The growing Republican dissent comes as the president’s poll numbers continue to sag. Democrats are expected by strategists on both sides to recapture the House — and to even have a long-shot chance at the Senate — in November’s midterms. A shift in power would mean hearings and subpoenas by Democratic lawmakers, essentially creating an alternative power center in Washington that Trump has so far avoided in his second term.

A recent Reuters/Ipsos poll found that 39 percent of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing on immigration, while 53 percent disapprove, a steep fall on the president’s landmark issue. And 58 percent of respondents said ICE agents have gone “too far” in their crackdown.

A YouGov poll on Saturday found that more than twice as many people considered the Pretti shooting unjustified as who found it justified. That was before a wave of stories analyzing video from the scene that further undermined the administration’s version of events.

As for Trump’s overall political strength, The Washington Post’s average of polls for January shows that 40 percent of Americans approve of his job performance while 58 percent disapprove.

“Two things have dawned on Republicans. One is that Democrats could retake the House at least and maybe the Senate. The second is that Donald Trump is going to be a lame duck,” said Rep. Ro Khanna (D-California). “So I do believe you will see more and more Republicans speaking out. Trump can defy some of the laws of politics, but not all of them.”

The Pretti killing marks the third episode in which Republicans have pushed back against Trump positions in recent weeks — on matters of personal conduct, foreign policy and now domestic policy.

In November, Congress voted overwhelmingly to force the release of files related to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, a measure sponsored by Khanna and Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky). Trump had initially opposed the move, but when it became clear that a significant number of Republicans would defect, he changed his position and supported the action.

More recently, Trump declared his intention to seize control of Greenland, which is currently a Danish territory, over the objection of its residents, infuriating and exasperating European leaders. He has relented, for now at least, in the face of strong international and bipartisan opposition.

On Minneapolis, much of the critique has focused on the administration’s rapid move to vilify Pretti as a radical leftist. “What I think the administration could do better is the tone with which they’re describing this — that immediately when an incident like this happens, they come out guns blazing that ‘we took out a violent terrorist, hooray,’” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said on his podcast.

Perhaps the sharpest comment has come from Rep. Glenn Grothman (R-Wisconsin), who like other Republicans stressed that illegal immigration is a serious problem that must be addressed. He also called Pretti’s death a “murder.”

“The video looks pretty damning. Obviously we have to wait to get all the videos in before we make a final conclusion,” Grothman told Spectrum News. He added, “In the future, the Department of Homeland Security is going to have to do a better job of educating their people to make sure this sort of murder doesn’t result.”

Trump told reporters Tuesday he wants to see “a very honorable and honest investigation” into Pretti’s killing.

The White House also dispatched border czar Tom Homan to replace Bovino in Minnesota, a tacit recognition of the need for changes in the federal operation there.

Marc Short, a former top aide to vice president Mike Pence, said Trump himself appears taken aback by the events in Minnesota. “People can see the videos themselves and are becoming uncomfortable,” Short said. “Obviously the president is as well, which is why he is making changes.”

Amid the pushback, however, some Republicans continue to blame Democrats for the killings and urge the administration to stay the course.

“The coordinated effort to stop law enforcement by politicians in Minnesota and around the country has caused chaos, and led to the tragic deaths of two Americans in Minnesota,” the conservative House Freedom Caucus wrote in a letter to Trump on Tuesday. “It must end.”

Brent Buchanan, CEO of the Republican polling firm Cygnal, said polls show that the public strongly supports the goal of deporting illegal immigrants.

“Republicans need to have thick skin on this issue,” Buchanan said. “Republicans out there washing their hands need to look at this as how can the issue be framed as, ‘This is the goal.’ Maybe there are other ways to achieve the goal, but keep the goal front and center — don’t get bogged down in micro events.”
Pretti’s death has particular resonance for conservatives who have long been sensitive to federal encroachment on free speech and other individual rights. Former Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, a right-leaning firebrand who has recently broken with Trump, asked MAGA supporters to imagine an alternate scenario — that Pretti had been a MAGA enthusiast who was killed by federal agents under President Joe Biden.

“Both sides need to take off their political blinders,” Greene said. “You are all being incited into civil war, yet none of it solves any of the real problems that we all face, and tragically people are dying.”

The administration appeared to weaken its own position with some of its supporters by citing Pretti’s gun possession as a justification for killing him.

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana), calling the events in Minneapolis “incredibly disturbing,” was among those zeroing in on the gun issue. “Your Second Amendment rights don’t disappear when you exercise your other rights,” he posted. “The Constitution is crystal clear: ‘the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.’”

In another twist — Chris Madel, a Republican attorney in Minneapolis who had been running for governor — said Monday that he was ending his campaign because of the national GOP’s “retribution” against his state, calling the ICE operation an “unmitigated disaster.”

After the killing of Renée Good earlier this month by an ICE officer in Minneapolis, the Trump administration sought to shut out Minnesota state officials from the investigation, which Democrats said reflected an attempt to whitewash the matter. In the aftermath of Pretti’s death, many Republicans are urging a “full” investigation, suggesting it should not be left solely up to the administration.

Paul noted that local police routinely place officers involved in deadly shootings on administrative leave until an independent investigation is completed and that agency heads normally refrain from prejudicial comments.

“That should happen immediately,” Paul said. “I can’t recall ever hearing a police chief immediately describing the victim as a ‘domestic terrorist’ or a ‘would-be assassin.’ For calm to be restored, an independent investigation is the least that should be done.”

Sen. Dave McCormick (R-Pennsylvania), like some other Republicans, blamed Minnesota’s Democratic officials for purportedly inflaming the situation by vilifying ICE and Border Patrol agents.

Still, he added, “I also agree with the NRA and others — we need a full investigation into the tragedy in Minneapolis. We need all the facts.”

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is under fire for issuing misleading and incendiary information that claimed immigration agents killed an armed Minnesota protestor Saturday because he wanted to “massacre” them.

That language has now become a source of controversy in the Trump administration.
White House officials are blaming Customs and Border Patrol for furnishing inaccurate information, while others are targeting Stephen Miller, White House deputy chief of staff and top Trump adviser, six sources with knowledge of the situation told Axios.
Why it matters: The episode illustrates the confusion that gripped the administration after the Saturday shooting death of Minnesota protester Alex Pretti. And it shows the influence of Miller, Trump’s close and longest-serving political adviser whose dominion in the White House far exceeds his title.

Miller’s power extends to de facto oversight of Noem, though she’s a Cabinet secretary who technically outranks him.
“Everything I’ve done, I’ve done at the direction of the president and Stephen,” Noem told a person who relayed her remarks to Axios.
Zoom in: Immediately after Pretti was fatally shot in Minneapolis about 10:05am ET on Saturday, administration officials in Washington knew they had a potential disaster on their hands but had little information.

The officers directly involved in the shooting “all shut up and got lawyers real quick so there wasn’t a lot of information,” one source briefed on the statement said.
The CBP officers on the ground furnished a report that, White House officials told Axios, left officials with the belief that Pretti had brandished a gun.
Miller “heard ‘gun’ and knew what the narrative would be: Pretti came to ‘massacre’ cops,” a source briefed on the process of assembling the press statement said.
“Any early comments made were based on information sent to the White House through CBP,” Miller told Axios in response to an earlier version of this story in which others blamed him for the “massacre” statement.
Friction point: DHS posted the statement at 12:31pm on X. Some White House officials had signed off on the statement. But others had not, leaving them frustrated.

“Others within the White House attempted to clean up the DHS statement prior to it being sent, but it had already been disseminated,” said another source familiar with the episode.
President Trump was kept apprised of the statement by Miller and Noem’s top adviser, Corey Lewandowski, one of Trump’s former campaign managers in 2016, according to two sources.
Minutes after the DHS statement, Miller posted on X and called Pretti “an assassin,” which a source said was also based on a preliminary report from Customs and Border Patrol.

Vice President Vance then reposted it on his page.
Noem subsequently used that language at a news conference, as did the Border Patrol commander then overseeing operations in the Twin Cities, Greg Bovino.
“Bovino should be blamed” for the misinformation about Pretti, “not Stephen,” a White House source said, adding that Bovino supplied the details about the shooting to those in D.C.
During her news conference, Noem also inaccurately suggested Pretti was “brandishing” his weapon, although videos showed he never reached for his weapon and had been disarmed before he was shot.
Zoom out: As more videos from bystanders and observers contradicted the official narrative over the weekend, Trump became agitated with what he saw on TV and social media and decided to make changes in the Minnesota operation.

On Monday, he dispatched border czar Tom Homan, a critic of the heavy-handed law-enforcement efforts pushed by Miller.

Between the lines: Miller said the Minnesota operation didn’t follow the guidelines established by the White House in the aftermath of the Jan. 7 shooting of another Minneapolis demonstrator, Renee Good.

Specifically, Miller said, Bovino’s crew was supposed to divide its force into two groups: One unit was supposed to handle the arrests of specifically targeted “criminal aliens” and the other squad was in charge of crowd control to keep “disruptors” from interfering.
“The White House provided clear guidance to DHS that the extra personnel that had been sent to Minnesota for force protection should be used for conducting fugitive operations to create a physical barrier between the arrest teams and the disruptors,” Miller said.
“We are evaluating why the CBP team may not have been following that protocol.”
Inside the room: Noem on Monday night had a two-hour meeting in the White House with Trump to discuss the matter, the New York Times first reported.

“She’s a loyal person and she wanted her voice heard,” one source said. “She made sure to convey her loyalty.”
Miller wasn’t in the meeting. Neither was Homan, with whom Noem has feuded. Homan was en route to Minnesota by then.
Noem has complained to others that she feels she’s being hung out to dry over the episode and has made sure to emphasize she took direction from Miller and the president, a source told Axios.
Between the lines: Trump’s move was a rare break from Miller, who remains one of the president’s closest advisers, sources said.

“Stephen Miller is one of President Trump’s most trusted and longest-serving aides. The president loves Stephen,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Axios.
Trump and Leavitt also repeatedly praised Noem. Despite rumors to the contrary, Noem’s job is safe, White House officials say.
“She’s doing the job the president wants her to do,” one official said. “There’s no daylight here.”

Democrats should “play hardball” ahead of a looming partial government shutdown and use their “leverage to reform ICE,” according to a new polling memo circulating among Democratic senators Tuesday.

The polling, in the field January 23 to 26 during the height of public backlash to Alex Pretti’s killing in Minneapolis, found that 58 percent of likely midterm voters want ICE to be reined in. More voters prefer reforming ICE than the number who prefer eliminating the agency entirely by 30 percent to 19 percent, according to the survey shared first with POLITICO.

“Voters want ICE to follow the law, and focus enforcement on people who pose a threat to public safety. They want to see tangible changes to ICE operations and oppose letting ICE detain U.S. citizens, enter homes without warrants, or fail to wear identifying uniforms,” according to the memo. “There is a desire for immigration enforcement that is lawful, reasonable, and effective. “

The memo was written by Adam Jentleson, the former chief of staff to Sen. John Fetterman (D-Penn.) and top aide to former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), for his organization the Searchlight Institute, which conducted the 1,502-person online survey alongside Tavern Research.

The influential new think tank seeks to push the Democratic Party toward broadly popular positions, regardless of ideology. In the case of ICE, Jentleson writes, Democrats should embrace reforming, not abolishing, the agency.

“Democrats should use their leverage to demand commonsense reforms to ICE that have the backing of broad bipartisan majorities of Americans,” Jentleson writes in the memo, which came across the desk of aides to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer Tuesday and continued to make the rounds among Senate Democrats early Wednesday.

A spokesperson for Schumer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Searchlight’s latest survey finds that “bipartisan majorities of voters oppose ICE’s lawless tactics, including detaining U.S. citizens (73 percent), entering people’s homes without warrants (79 percent), and failing to wear clearly identifying uniforms (70 percent)”, according to the memo.

The polling comes as Senate Democrats are demanding to re-negotiate a hulking DHS funding bill ahead of a Friday midnight deadline for a partial government shutdown, carving it off from a six-bill appropriations package.

The Trump administration’s immigration crackdown over the last year has gone from uncomfortable to untenable for Ileana Garcia, a Republican state senator in Florida.

A Transportation Security Administration officer at the Tallahassee airport overheard her speaking Spanish and asked whether Ms. Garcia, who was born in Miami, was an American citizen. She worried for the first time that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents might stop her son, a young adult, because he looks Hispanic. Constituents have asked her for help finding immigrant relatives arrested by ICE.

Ms. Garcia, 56, has had enough. The Republican Party is in trouble, she said in an interview, predicting that it will lose this year’s midterm elections if the White House does not soon reconsider its harsh immigration enforcement tactics.

“We should not be afraid as a party to speak up, to course correct,” she said. That was before Saturday, when Border Patrol agents shot and killed Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old I.C.U. nurse who was protesting in Minneapolis, and federal officials sought to portray him as a “domestic terrorist.” Ms. Garcia said she was “dumbfounded.”

“It’s gone too far,” she said. “What happened Saturday was abhorrent.”

What a little-known state senator in a state that no longer appears to be a political battleground thinks might seem of little consequence. But Ms. Garcia, who is Cuban American, was once such a true believer in President Trump that she went all-in on his 2016 campaign, leaving her career in Spanish-language media to co-found “Latinas for Trump,” a national organization that drew attention at the time.

She then moved to Washington to work for Mr. Trump’s first administration, in the public affairs office of the Department of Homeland Security, which enforces immigration laws.

Back then, Mr. Trump was focused on closing the U.S.-Mexico border and building a border wall, both policies she supported. Now he has gone much further, Ms. Garcia said. She blamed Stephen Miller, the president’s deputy chief of staff for policy and homeland security adviser, for tactics that include yanking people out of cars and trying to remove children who crossed the border on their own from foster care homes and deport them.

“I do think that he will lose the midterms because of Stephen Miller,” she said of Mr. Trump.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on Monday about Ms. Garcia’s assertion but pointed to remarks by Karoline Leavitt, the press secretary, about Mr. Pretti’s death.

“Nobody in the White House, including President Trump, wants to see people getting hurt or killed in America’s streets,” she said, claiming that the killing “occurred as a result of a deliberate and hostile resistance by Democrat leaders in Minnesota.”

Ms. Garcia said she knew Mr. Miller during the president’s first term and did not like him then, either. But he had less power than he does now, she said. Was she blaming Mr. Miller for the administration’s immigration policies but absolving Mr. Trump?

“I’m not absolving him,” Ms. Garcia said. “I’m not justifying the things that we’re seeing.”

But, she was quick to add, “There’s no perfect administration.” She remembered being a guest at Mr. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach in late 2023 and talking to him about immigrants who were brought into the country illegally as children, known as Dreamers. She found Mr. Trump receptive to the argument that they should be allowed to stay, and she still likes him, she said.

Ms. Garcia’s blunt criticism is unusual even among Florida’s Hispanic lawmakers. Representative María Elvira Salazar, one of Miami’s three Cuban American Republicans in Congress, has disagreed with the Trump administration on immigration and other policies, but her comments have tended to be more conciliatory than Ms. Garcia’s.

Last year, Ms. Garcia voted for an immigration enforcement bill in the Legislature that created a new state board of immigration enforcement. But she opposed another bill that made it a state crime for unauthorized immigrants to enter Florida and ended a policy allowing Florida residents who had been brought into the country illegally as children to pay in-state tuition at public universities.

“Most people will come in and whisper in my ear, ‘Aren’t you afraid they’re going to primary you?’” said Ms. Garcia, who is up for re-election this year. “No, I’m not.”

“I’m afraid of someone stopping my son,” she added. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

Ms. Garcia has been speaking out for months in social media posts and statements to local news outlets. She received death threats in June after condemning the Trump administration’s mass deportations as “unacceptable and inhumane.”

She discussed her unease over lunch last month in Coral Gables, an upscale Miami suburb in her district, which stretches across central Miami-Dade County to Miami Beach, and again by phone in mid-January. Miami voters elected their first Democratic mayor in nearly 30 years in December, and Ms. Garcia agreed with those who credited Eileen Higgins’ resounding victory in part to voters’ disgust over the immigration crackdown.

“Republicans stayed home — I wonder why?” Ms. Garcia said. “I think they’re embarrassed. I think that they feel that they might have gotten the wool pulled over their eyes. And this was their way of pushing back.”

Ms. Garcia is well aware of critics who say that Republicans like her should have foreseen the second Trump administration’s aggressive immigration tactics. She thought the White House would focus on limiting border crossings, vetting new immigrants and removing criminals, all of which she supports.

She has been especially offended by the deportations of Cubans who had committed nonviolent criminal offenses but had been in the country for decades and of Venezuelans and other immigrants from politically unstable countries who had been granted temporary permission to live and work in the United States.

To go after people like that “doesn’t make sense,” Ms. Garcia said, adding that it has wreaked havoc on families and communities and is “inhumane.”

She has been disappointed not only with regards to immigration. The Trump administration, she said, is also “gaslighting” Americans on the economy.

“In 2016 to 2020, the rhetoric matched the reality,” she added. “The economy was good. People were working. People were happy. But now, they are saying the economy is better. I am sorry, respectfully: I shop for my parents, and I count coupons.”

She sees herself as a truth-teller within her party. Too many of her fellow Republicans are scared to say how they feel, a self-censorship that frightens her. “It’s almost like the stories that my mother would tell me of what she lived in Cuba, and we’re seeing it here,” she said.

She rejected any suggestion that she could afford to speak out because redistricting has made Florida legislative elections less competitive than they once were. (She won her first election in 2020 by a mere 32 votes.)

“I don’t know if anybody is really safe anymore, at least in Miami-Dade County,” she said. “There are so many mixed feelings.”

When she started criticizing the Trump administration last year, she said, a man she knows told her that she had gone too far. “‘I can’t believe you jumped over to the dark side,’” she recounted him saying.

She has since heard back from the same man, she said. This time, he told her she was right.

• Lawmaker attacked: Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar was sprayed with an unknown substance during a town hall in Minneapolis. She said the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in the Twin Cities is antithetical to “the America we love.”

• Trump weighs in: President Donald Trump said he plans to “de-escalate” the situation in Minnesota, as the White House signaled new willingness to cooperate with the state’s Democratic elected officials.

• Gun laws: Trump said he does not believe Alex Pretti, who was fatally shot by federal agents, was an “assassin,” contradicting his top administration officials. But he also said the ICU nurse shouldn’t have been carrying a gun, even though there is no law barring participation in a peaceful protest while carrying a concealed weapon.

The posts have referred to neo-Nazi literature, ethnic cleansing and QAnon conspiracies, mused about deporting nearly a third of the U.S. population, and promoted lyrics from an anthem bellowed by the far-right militants of the Proud Boys.

Their authors are not on society’s fringe. They are in the offices of the White House and the departments of Homeland Security and Labor, using official government accounts.

To some people, the administration’s posts sound patriotic. Others might sense at most a faint dog whistle to extremists. Some posts may just look odd. But those well-versed in the abstruse codes of right-wing extremism hear klaxons.

This month, the White House and the Department of Homeland Security jointly posted a recruitment ad for Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Instagram, Facebook and X, overlaid with the words “WE’LL HAVE OUR HOME AGAIN.”

That’s also the name of a song, written by members of a self-described “pro-White fraternal order,” that has been embraced by the Proud Boys and other white-nationalist groups. Hundreds of explicitly neo-Nazi and white-supremacist accounts have shared the song on Telegram, an encrypted messaging app, since 2020. The white supremacist who killed three Black people at a Jacksonville, Fla., dollar store in 2023 included lyrics from the song in his writing.

“There are two types of people to whom these messages will quickly look familiar,” Oren Segal, a vice president for counterextremism at the Anti-Defamation League, said of the panoply of postings, “white supremacists, and those who study white supremacists.”

A Homeland Security spokeswoman, Tricia McLaughlin, said that if the ICE recruiting post were actually about the song, it “would be a problem” and “morally repugnant.” But, she said, the post had no relation to the white-supremacist anthem.

“There are plenty of references to those words in books and poems,” she said, adding that she was “in charge of everything” posted on the department’s social media accounts.

But when the post was opened on Instagram’s mobile app, audio from the chorus of the song played in the background. After a reporter pointed this out, Ms. McLaughlin said The Times was participating in a left-wing conspiracy theory.

“I’m telling you it’s not there,” she said.

Less than 40 minutes after the interview on Thursday, the Instagram post — including audio from the song — disappeared from social media. Posts on X and Facebook, which did not include an audio component, are still visible.

It was The Times, Ms. McLaughlin said, that was “mainstreaming racism” by tying the agency’s post to the white nationalist anthem.

Richard Hanania, a political scientist who once wrote for white-nationalist publications under a pseudonym before moderating his views, said such accusations were part of the game.

“They do everything up to the line; it’s kind of clever,” he said. “‘We’ll Have Our Home Again’ is a white-nationalist song.” He added that to his knowledge, no other groups would use it.

In the past month, government agencies have made dozens more social-media posts that include iconography associated with far-right extremist groups.

As President Trump escalated his campaign to seize control of Greenland this month, the White House’s X account posted an image of a crossroads, with a sun-drenched White House on the left and Russia and China to the right. The caption read, “Which way, Greenland man?” Last year, an ICE recruitment post on Homeland Security’s X account asked, “Which way, American man?”

The slogans echo the title of a 1978 book — “Which Way Western Man?” — that white-supremacist groups treat “as foundational,” said Robert Futrell, a sociologist at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. The book claims that Jewish people are plotting to destroy Western civilization, that Adolf Hitler was right and that violence against Jews is justified.

This month, the Labor Department posted a noir-style image with the words “TRUST THE PLAN.” That’s also a central catchphrase of QAnon, an internet conspiracy theory that falsely claims the world is run by a cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles, and that Mr. Trump has been chosen to sunder it.

On New Year’s Eve, the White House’s X account posted a photo of Mr. Trump alongside the word “remigration.” That is a decades-old European concept centered on the expulsion of nonwhite people and immigrants deemed “unassimilated,” said Wendy Via, co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism.

Tens of thousands of Germans protested the concept two years ago after the country’s far-right Alternative für Deutschland party secretly met with neo-Nazis to discuss plans to implement it. (More than a dozen AfD politicians have reposted Mr. Trump’s “remigration” photo on X.)

Also this month, the Labor Department posted a video captioned “One Homeland. One People. One Heritage.” That phrase resembled a German slogan used by Nazis during World War II, “Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Führer,” or “One People, One Realm, One Leader.”

The Department of Labor did not respond to multiple requests for comment, but Abigail Jackson, a White House spokeswoman, dismissed any connections between the government posts and extremism.

“It seems that the mainstream media has become a meme of their own: the deranged leftist who claims everything they dislike must be Nazi propaganda,” she said, adding, “Get a grip.”

Those who study the online right said one or two posts might be coincidental. But “when you add it all together,” said William Braniff, director of the Polarization and Extremism Research and Innovation Lab at American University, “it’s much harder to dismiss.”

Other experts were equally certain the apparent allusions were not an accident.

“These people used to be in the dark corners of the internet,” said Jessie Daniels, a sociologist at Hunter College who has studied online extremism for 30 years. “Now, they are holding public office.”

Part of the draw of the posts could be their potentially secret codes and numerological clues, especially in the recruitment images. They appear to be an appeal to “a very specific segment” of Americans, young men who live online and are disaffected by what they see as unwanted changes in American life, said Peter Simi, a Chapman University sociologist who studies extremist groups.

Shirin Sinnar, a Stanford law professor who studies the legal treatment of political violence, said “they are plainly trying to recruit a segment of the population that’s moved by this rhetoric.”

For years, Mr. Trump and his campaign have dealt with and rejected accusations that officials in the Trump inner circle were surreptitiously appealing to racists and antisemites. A Twitter post by the candidate in 2016 depicting Hillary Clinton beside a Jewish star, before piles of money, had previously appeared on a message board known for antisemitism and white supremacy.

Mr. Trump’s final campaign commercial that year featured grainy images of George Soros, the liberal American financier; Janet L. Yellen, then the chairwoman of the Federal Reserve; and Lloyd C. Blankfein, then the chairman of Goldman Sachs — all of them Jewish — as Mr. Trump warned darkly about the “global special interests.”

“It’s just a straight line between these ideas and the modern Trump administration,” Mr. Hanania said.

The Trump administration is “mobilizing these people and having them flood Twitter and create this environment that they’re winning,” he said. “The fact that the media and liberals react so strongly to this is kind of a badge of honor.”

Scott Greer, a right-wing podcaster and writer who considers himself part of the “online right” that these posts are ostensibly targeting, is not so sure of the administration’s motivation. Some on the Internet-obsessed right think the posts “are meant to bamboozle them into liking Trump,” he said. For his part, he added, even though some of the posts go “too far with what the normal, not-so-online MAGA base may be for,” he now thinks they reflect the broader trend of politicians “taking this more irreverent tone and using memes from the right and left.”

“We accept it as more a normal part of politics,” he said.

Many Republican leaders vehemently denounce antisemitism, and the Trump administration has put pressure on universities and other parts of American society to protect Jews from hate speech and attacks. But in recent months, some members of the party have openly wrestled with whether to reject some Trump supporters who have made antisemitic, bigoted or extremist remarks.

When asked in December whether far-right extremists and conspiracy theorists should be embraced as part of the Trump coalition, Vice President JD Vance declined to rule them out. In contrast, Mr. Trump said of antisemites in an interview this month with The Times, “I think we don’t need them,” emphasizing, “I think we don’t like them.”

Still, most of the social media posts remain, despite the scrutiny over possible allusions to extremism

Trump’s immigration tactics cause unease among voters, potentially threaten Republican midterm prospects
Republican strategists warn of political risks from aggressive immigration enforcement
Democrats see opportunity in opposing Trump’s immigration crackdown, aim to mobilize voters
WASHINGTON, Jan 28 (Reuters) – President Donald Trump’s hardline immigration agenda, a key force behind his return to the White House in 2024, is increasingly showing signs of becoming a liability, threatening Republican prospects in the November midterm elections.
What was once his most potent campaign issue is now driving unease among voters unsettled by the administration’s aggressive tactics in its immigration crackdown, including the targeting of U.S. citizens and violent measures against peaceful protesters.

Illegal immigration and inflation were the twin issues that helped Trump win the election. Now, opinion polls show a growing number of Americans, including key independent voters, are unhappy with Trump’s handling of both, putting Republicans on the defensive ahead of the midterms.
The polling shows most Republicans still back Trump’s push for mass deportations, but a sizeable minority are uneasy with a heavy-handed approach by federal immigration agents, which led to the shooting deaths of a mother of three and a nurse in Minneapolis this month.

Just 39% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of immigration, the lowest since his inauguration, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll published on Monday. While 84% of Republican respondents said they support Trump on the issue, a fifth of them said federal agents had gone “too far” in their crackdown.
If those sentiments persist, they could spell trouble for Republicans in November, when Democrats are aiming to take control of Congress and block the president’s agenda.

“This was one of the president’s number one advantages and it has become a political liability for him,” said John Feehery, a Republican strategist. “The base is still pretty comfortable with what Trump is doing. But it’s not just about the base, it’s about swing voters.”
White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson defended the administration’s approach to immigration.
“President Trump wants all Americans to feel safe in their communities. That guiding principle is why the President has promised to remove dangerous criminal illegal aliens from our country, urged local Democrat leaders to work with federal law enforcement, and called for a fact-based investigation into the tragic death of Mr. Pretti,” she said in a statement.

Dubbed Operation Metro Surge, the December deployment of nearly 3,000 federal immigration agents to Minneapolis and St. Paul provoked a national uproar with the fatal shootings of Renee Good on January 7 and then Alex Pretti on January 24. Both were killed during confrontations with immigration agents at protests.
Trump has taken steps in recent days to ease tensions in Minneapolis, dispatching his border czar to oversee the operation and signaling a willingness to work with state officials.
It remains unclear whether these moves reflect a recognition of the political risks to Republicans in November midterms, or are simply an effort to regain control of an operation that has produced daily images of masked federal agents responding aggressively to protesters confronting them in the streets.
Trump spent the weekend huddling with senior advisers about how to recalibrate his immigration strategy, according to a White House official and a source familiar with the talks. The discussions included a possible reduction of agents deployed to Minnesota and narrowing the focus there to deportations rather than broad enforcement operations, the sources said.
Some Republican strategists warned that a renewed focus on deporting the “worst of the worst,” as Trump promised during the campaign, was necessary to retain support from moderate Republicans and independents in November.
“Americans support secure borders, and they’re willing to forgive mistakes when you’re cleaning up the previous administration’s fiasco – provided you’re seen as targeting criminals,” said Giancarlo Sopo, a Republican media strategist who worked on Hispanic outreach for Trump’s 2020 campaign.
“The margin for error narrows dramatically if you’re perceived as going after gardeners and taco truck ladies.”
SOME REPUBLICAN OFFICIALS PUSH BACK
Trump’s softening of his tone and sidelining of Gregory Bovino – a top Border Patrol official and a lightning rod for opponents of the crackdown – followed days of criticism from a number of Republican lawmakers and governors.
A Republican candidate for Minnesota governor, Chris Madel, made headlines for his decision to quit the race over the tactics being used by federal agents in Minneapolis and what he described as indiscriminate arrests.
Zach Duckworth, a Republican state senator who was recently activated in the Minnesota Army National Guard to support local law enforcement, said he was so alarmed by top Trump officials labeling Pretti a “domestic terrorist” that he wrote to FBI Director Kash Patel, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, and others to object to the characterization.
He told Reuters that was a “tipping point,” saying many of his constituents in the Minneapolis suburbs are centrists and support removing violent criminals, but are alarmed by the scope and tactics of Trump’s operations, which have also swept up people in the country legally.
Democratic strategists see opportunity for their party, which polls show is not trusted by most Americans to handle immigration, especially after former President Joe Biden’s slow reaction to stem immigrants entering the country illegally.
Michael LaRosa, a former Biden White House official, told Reuters the overwhelming opposition by Democrats to Trump’s crackdown would help to drive both progressive and moderate voters to the polls in November.
While an increasing number of traditional, moderate Republicans now oppose Trump’s immigration crackdown, Democrats are at risk of misdiagnosing the moment and overplaying their hand, said Scott Rasmussen, a veteran pollster.
“Where the left is making a mistake on this issue is they think they’re winning a fight to build support for illegal immigrants,” Rasmussen said. “Where the right, especially the MAGA right, is wrong, is they are thinking everybody voted for what’s happening in Minneapolis.”
In interviews with eight Trump supporters in Delano, a Republican-leaning town just 10 miles (16 km) west of downtown Minneapolis, all said they stood squarely behind the president’s immigration crackdown and would vote Republican in the midterms.
But they also acknowledged that immigration agents appeared poorly trained and ill-prepared for the task before them, and expressed worries that widespread criticism of ICE’s tactics could hurt Republicans at the ballot box.
Jake Blackowiak, 33, worried the controversy could contribute to the party losing at least one chamber of Congress in the midterms.
“The Republicans aren’t going to be able to pass any more laws or advance the agenda he promised,” he said.
Former Republican Minnesota congressman Gil Gutknecht urged the White House to clarify its enforcement targets.
“To say that all the people who are being rounded up are violent criminals is an exaggeration,” Gutknecht said in an interview. “They’re not all murderers and rapists.”
He said it was too early to tell whether the deaths in Minnesota would impact the midterms, but the White House should continue its immigration enforcement operation.
Reporting by Bo Erickson, Brad Brooks, Tim Reid and Nathan Layne. Additional reporting by Nandita Bose and Jason Lange; Editing by Ross Colvin and Nia Williams

Senate Democrats are demanding that Republicans renegotiate the House-passed funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security. Federal disaster aid and mitigation programs could get caught in the crossfire.

The Democrats’ last-minute push to separate the fiscal 2026 Homeland Security legislation from a package of five other House-passed spending measures comes amid broader backlash to DHS’s immigration enforcement operations, which have left two people dead in Minnesota.

Some House Republicans have signaled they would be unwilling to revisit the Homeland Security bill they already passed, but Democrats are doubling down. The impasse significantly raises the chances of a partial shutdown this weekend, and DHS, which houses the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is among the agencies most likely to be impacted.

FEMA’s disaster recovery work would continue during a shutdown. But failure to pass the Homeland Security spending measure this week would indefinitely delay the enactment of fresh funding and directive language that lawmakers negotiated on a bipartisan basis for fiscal 2026.

That includes language to check FEMA’s efforts to cancel unilaterally or postpone disaster grants and reimbursements — something Democrats and disaster reform advocates fought for amid the Trump administration’s historic slow-walking of disaster aid.

Democrats say they’re clear-eyed about the impacts their gambit could have on FEMA, especially just days before Friday’s funding deadline. Still, the desire to push back on DHS violence, they say, supersedes any reservations about short-term impacts to disaster aid.

Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, the top Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee, has vowed to oppose a spending bill he helped craft as his party demands a renegotiated version.

“We can’t fund a lawless Department of Homeland Security,” Murphy said Tuesday evening. “I mean, just because there are important things in that bill doesn’t mean that I am forced to vote for a bill that also funds brazen illegality.”

Asked Tuesday whether he has concerns about undercutting FEMA to try to hold DHS accountable, Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vt.), a vocal supporter of disaster funding, said he has “enormous concern.”

“No one wants a shutdown; we want accountability, and we have to have it,” Welch said. “If we get a separate vote, we’re going to be able to do that.”

The Senate is preparing to take an initial procedural vote on the full, six-bill appropriations package later this week.

Senate Republican leaders have floated the possibility of voting on the full spending package while promising Democrats a separate vote on legislation that would rein in some Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations. Another solution could involve an agreement for the White House to implement specific changes at ICE.

But Democrats have not been satisfied by those proposals, and leaders Tuesday evening were not close to finding a bipartisan solution.

The appropriations package includes the Homeland Security, Defense, Financial Services-General Government, Labor-HHS-Education, State-Foreign Operations and Transportation-HUD bills. It covers the vast majority of discretionary federal funding.

Congress already passed six other fiscal 2026 bills, including the Energy-Water, Interior-Environment and Agriculture-FDA measures.

Disaster provisions in limbo
If senators cannot come to an agreement and a partial shutdown begins Saturday, FEMA’s disaster recovery work will continue as mandated by statute.

And because FEMA has delayed billions of dollars in reimbursements, the agency’s disaster relief fund is believed to still have roughly $7 billion left over from last year that it could tap into. Congress could also pass a supplemental funding bill to refill those coffers during a shutdown if necessary.

Still, the jettisoning of the fiscal 2026 Homeland Security bill this week would mean that the disaster relief fund would not immediately get the $26.4 billion infusion appropriators proposed for this fiscal year.

It would also leave in limbo a number of provisions meant to impose guardrails on the Trump administration’s handling of disaster dollars, including a section that would impose financial penalties on DHS if it unnecessarily delays reimbursements to states.

Appropriators included language in support of the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program, which FEMA terminated last year without consulting appropriators. The program provides grants to help localities prevent disaster-related damage.

The spending measure would require a report “justifying forgoing long-term savings associated with investing in predisaster mitigation.”

If the Senate does not pass the entire six-bill funding package or a continuing resolution before Saturday, the authorization for the National Flood Insurance Program would lapse. Its expiration would affect thousands of homeowners and realtors who would be unable to buy, sell or renew flood insurance policies until Congress enacts a reauthorization.

Other programs that help Americans manage the impacts of extreme weather would be impacted, too, including the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, funding for climate and energy resilience on military bases, and millions of dollars in earmarks for local emergency operations and infrastructure projects.

Working toward a deal
Democrats say they do not want another shutdown, but their insistence on splitting up the House-passed spending package — and Republicans’ refusal so far to do so — could trigger one Saturday.

Senators on both sides of the aisle held separate meetings in the Capitol on Tuesday night to discuss potential paths forward. Some have signaled a desire to pass a supplemental funding bill with disaster aid and other funding if the DHS bill does not pass imminently.

“Democrats are ready to quickly pass the other five spending bills to keep government open — and ready to take action to ensure FEMA and other important agencies have the resources they need while urgent work to rein in ICE and [Customs and Border Protection] occurs,” said Senate Appropriations ranking member Patty Murray (D-Wash.) in a statement to POLITICO’s E&E News.

“This is the commonsense path forward that the vast majority of Americans support,” Murray added, “and it’s critical that Republicans work with us to get this done.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) urged members to keep the conversations going in the coming days. A number of Republicans have expressed concerns about DHS violence, and Thune is holding out hope that members of both parties can strike a deal with the White House.

“Productive talks are ongoing, and I urge my Democrat colleagues to continue their engagement and find a path forward that will avoid a needless shutdown and not jeopardize full funding for key agencies like FEMA and the Coast Guard,” Thune said on the Senate floor Tuesday.

He added, “We need to fund these and other essential agencies and finish our 2026 appropriations work now.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) appeared to reject any deal that relies on White House action, saying, “The fix should come from Congress.

“The public can’t trust the administration to do the right thing on its own, and Republicans and Democrats must work together to make that happen,” Schumer said.

In an additional sign that congressional leaders and appropriators are serious about finding a bipartisan solution, Sen. Katie Britt (R-Ala.), chair of the Senate Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee, said in a statement Monday that she “remain[s] committed to finding a pathway forward.”

Thousands of children remain in custody without access to legal counsel; a situation the experts warn is forcing minors to navigate complex immigration proceedings alone and undermining their fundamental rights.

The three Special Rapporteurs, appointed by the UN Human Rights Council, said they are in contact with the US Government on the issue.

that under the 2008 Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA), the US Office of Refugee Resettlement is responsible for the care and custody of unaccompanied children.

The law requires the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to protect children from mistreatment, exploitation and trafficking in persons.

It also guarantees that unaccompanied children in federal custody have access to legal counsel and should not be subjected to expedited removal – that is, deportation without a court hearing.

Legal support ended
The experts noted, however, that on 18 February 2025, the US Department of the Interior ordered nonprofit legal service providers to halt work and ended funding for attorneys representing unaccompanied children.

Although the development has been challenged in the courts, many of the 26,000 affected children lost legal counsel and remain at risk of forced removal.

Reports indicate that young migrants are being held in windowless cells, denied adequate medical care and separated from their parents or caregivers for long periods.

In fact, between January and August 2025, average custody time rose from roughly one month to six, while releases to family caregivers dropped by more than half: from approximately 95 per cent to 45 per cent.

Pressured or paid to self-deport
“There have been consistent accounts of unlawful deportations of unaccompanied children, in breach of the obligation of non-refoulement, including child victims of trafficking, and children at risk of trafficking in persons,” the independent experts said.

Children have been reportedly pressured to either accept a $2,500 cash payment to self-deport or face indefinite detention and transfer to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody upon turning 18.

 The experts stressed that children should have access to administrative and judicial remedies against decisions affecting their own situation, or that of their parents or caregivers.

Measures should be taken also to avoid undue procedural delays that could negatively affect their rights.

 “Expedited proceedings should only be pursued when they are consistent with the child’s best interests and without restricting any due process guarantees,” they said.

Independent voices
The three Special Rapporteurs receive separate mandates from the UN Human Rights Council to report on trafficking in persons, especially women and children; the human rights of migrants, and the independence of judges and lawyers.

They are not UN staff and do not receive payment for their work.

Democrats are grappling with how to handle the complex political issue of immigration reform and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on the heels of two fatal shootings by federal authorities in Minneapolis.

Immigration reform has always been a slippery issue for Democrats, and they are haunted by the 2024 presidential election, when President Trump was able to win over voters by making the border — and perception of Democratic weakness on the issue — one of his strengths.

But Democrats are starting to think the issue could work in their favor going forward.

“The mistake in 2024 was that Democrats didn’t want to talk about immigration so they only talked about it when they were asked about it,” said Democratic strategist Jamal Simmons, who served as communications director for former Vice President Kamala Harris when she was the Democratic nominee.

He said the issue now “works in Democrats favor” because Trump’s approval ratings on the subject are upside down and his administration has had to reverse course on its handling of ICE amid the furor over the shootings.

Democrats, seeking to put Republicans back on their heels, are vowing not to fund ICE, a move that could put spending for the Pentagon and other departments at risk.

Still, Democrats are torn on how to proceed long term. Some progressives, for example, want to abolish ICE, while others talk about reform.

One Democratic operative who has been at the center of discussions on how to handle the overall issue called it a “stubborn clash of perspectives” between the strategist class who “over-index for how the language of the moment will age” and the grassroots organizations “who have a finger on the pulse of where opinion lies.”

“Both of those perspectives could probably benefit from some humility that people’s opinions are constantly shifting based on what they are experiencing,” the operative said.

For now, it appears public sentiment may be moving toward the position of progressives.

A YouGov poll released last week showed that 46 percent of those surveyed — including 19 percent of Republicans — said they would support abolishing ICE. The poll showed that 41 percent opposed abolishing ICE.

It’s a significant shift from June, when just 27 percent of those surveyed — and 9 percent of Republicans — supported abolishing ICE.

The poll also showed that closing the agency has gained approval among independents: 47 percent backed eliminating ICE, a notable increase since June when only 25 percent supported the shuttering of the agency.

Public opinion is also changing overall on the issue, with more people saying ICE tactics have “gone too far,” according to a New York Times/Siena poll released last week, before Alex Pretti was killed by a Border Patrol agent in Minnesota.

The poll found 9 in 10 Democrats, roughly 7 in 10 independents and 2 in 10 Republicans thought ICE tactics had gone too far. The survey showed that only 26 percent of those polled said ICE’s tactics were “about right.”

Some Democrats said their leadership — including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (N.Y.) — needed to take a tougher stance.

“We’re living in a wild world when Schumer and Jeffries are to the right of Fox News and the Catholic Church, whose leaders have called to defund ICE and even the Department of Homeland Security,” said Christy Setzer, a democratic strategist.

“ICE doesn’t need ‘reform,’ it needs to be shut down completely, and anything short of that should be a nonstarter. If morality isn’t compelling to Democratic leadership, they could also read a poll: A majority support abolishing ICE, regardless of what our side’s most feckless consultants might argue,” Setzer said.

A handful of Democratic presidential contenders — not just the progressive leader Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.), but also Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker — have called for ICE to be abolished.

Others are taking a more moderate tone. California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who many see as the front-runner in the 2028 race, said he doesn’t agree with the shuttering of the agency but that he supports “comprehensive immigration reform.”

In a memo this week, Third Way, a Democratic think tank, said the agency needed “a top to bottom overhaul.”

“Immigration enforcement is necessary—but it must be safe, disciplined, and professional,” the memo said. “Show Americans that accountability and professionalism are not optional in federal law enforcement.”

In an effort to strike a more conciliatory tone, Trump on Monday called Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey (D) following the fatal shooting, and said both conversations were “very good.”

During a briefing with reporters, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt also said that “nobody here at the White House, including the president of the United States, wants to see Americans hurt or killed and losing their lives.”

“There’s been a noticeable shift from the first 24 hours of messaging from the administration, which reflects some concerns from congressional allies and leading voices around the country,” Republican strategist Kevin Madden said.

“The Republican Party’s grassroots has strong Second Amendment and Fourth Amendment coalitions, and this incident has elicited enough concerns to generate a shift in tactics and approach,” Madden added.

“We’re already seeing this carry over to funding debates taking place in Congress,” he said. “Whether it leads to another shutdown and contributes to another degree of polarization remains to be seen.”

Simmons and other Democrats say the party can’t simply push for the shuttering of ICE or for significant reforms without offering solutions.

“Democrats have to talk about it proactively,” Simmons said. “The ideas have to go hand in hand. The trick is to assert their strength on keeping the border secure while assuring the public that they can do that in a more just fashion.”

“The risk for Democrats is to be too tepid,” he added. “They have to pick the right fights and fight like hell on them.”

The U.S. population growth slowed sharply last year due to a steep drop in immigration.

An annual estimate from the Census Bureau Tuesday shows the nation’s population grew by just 1.8 million people during the 12 months ending last June. That’s about half the growth rate of the previous year.

A major factor behind that slowing growth was the foreign-born population, which grew by 1.3 million during the year, a 52% smaller increase than the previous 12 months. That drop results from fewer people entering the country through legal channels as well as the voluntary or forced departure of some living in the country illegally.

Census forecasters say if current trends continue, net immigration could drop by another million people in the current year.

The slowdown in population growth has major implications for the U.S. economy. Immigrants have accounted for much of the growth in the workforce in recent years. Immigrants also boost demand. The Trump administration has suggested that widespread deportations have helped take pressure of rents in communities with a large concentration of foreign-born families.

Meanwhile, growth in the native-born population was fairly stable last year, but has declined sharply from previous decades. Births outnumbered deaths by only about half a million in the 12 months ending in June. That’s less than half the natural increase in years before the pandemic.

The U.S. population as of last July is estimated at 341.8 million. The slowdown in population growth was seen throughout the country.

President Donald Trump’s stern nationwide campaign against illegal immigration has reached boiling temperatures that could scald Republicans in battleground states and districts ahead of the 2026 midterms.

Outrage over immigration enforcement tactics in Minnesota and elsewhere had been building among Democrats and progressives for months, but the fatal shootings of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti this month have further exposed the country’s raw nerves.

Surveys show a large share of Americans are uncomfortable with the Trump administration’s approach to deportation, such as a Jan. 13 poll by Quinnipiac University that found 57% of voters disapprove of the way Immigration and Customs Enforcement is enforcing immigration laws, versus 40% who approve.

That discontent is likely to continue spilling over this week, whether in Congress or across the nation, as the administration reportedly reconfigures tactics and messaging amid a public backlash.

After top administration officials initially defended Pretti’s killing by alleging − in apparent contrast to what video of his shooting shows − that the victim was a “would-be assassin” who “committed an act of domestic terrorism,” White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a Jan. 26 press conference that no one in the administration, including the president, wants to see people getting hurt or killed in America’s streets.

Wary Republican lawmakers, candidates and other figures had already begun mapping the fallout by taking a noticeable tone shift, either calling for investigations or suggesting the White House back off.

“Escalating the rhetoric doesn’t help and it actually loses credibility,” Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said during a Jan. 25 episode of his podcast, “The Verdict” a day after Pretti’s shooting. “And so, I would encourage the administration to be more measured, to recognize the tragedy and to say, ‘we don’t want anyone’s lives to be lost.'”

Others have asserted that the pair of killings is too much to withstand, however.

“I cannot support the national Republicans’ stated retribution on the citizens of our state nor can I count myself a member of a party that would do so,” Chris Madel, a Republican candidate for governor of Minnesota, said in a Jan. 26 video message posted on X, where he announced dropping out of the campaign for the GOP nomination.

As the on-street clashes intensify, Republican candidates in toss-up contests are now being watched for how they are teetering on the issue.

But strategists say not to expect most Republicans to back down in defending the president’s biggest campaign promise, even as some conservatives share their misgivings publicly about some aggressive tactics and fatal outcomes.

John Feehery, a former top Republican congressional aide turned GOP strategist, told USA TODAY he doesn’t expect a significant herd of conservatives to break with Trump, but it will become a political disaster in the fall if the White House doesn’t get a better handle on these enforcement operations.

“There’s an element you’re seeing where Republicans acknowledge we need to be smarter about this,” he said. “Then there are the personal reactions, you know, people don’t want to see liberal protesters get gunned down and they don’t like it. I don’t blame them. I don’t like it either.”

‘Two too many’: Minnesota GOP contenders slam Democratic leaders

Other Republicans running for office in the Land of 10,000 Lakes were steadfast in supporting the president’s massive deportation effort, even as Trump was beginning to pivot.

They argue that rather than encouraging demonstrators or blaming the Trump administration for flooding areas with ICE agents, state and local officials should cooperate with the president in apprehending those living in the U.S. illegally to avoid further violence.

In a Jan. 24 message hours after Pretti’s shooting, former sportscaster Michele Tafoya, who is running for the U.S. Senate in Minnesota, encouraged people to “stay away from the affected areas, and wait for the facts.” She pointed out that Democratic Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey were both in office in 2020 when clashes occurred amid protests against the murder of George Floyd.

“We can never let that happen again,” Tafoya said.

David Hann, a former Minnesota Republican Party chairman, who is also running in the Aug. 11 GOP Senate primary, said the pair of killings was “two too many.” While he stated that “Minnesotans are not political pawns,” he reiterated that calming the waters is mainly a responsibility of Democratic leaders in the state rather than the Trump administration.

Trump’s supporters in Minnesota are pointing to a potential reset since the president announced he is dispatching Tom Homan, the administration’s so-called border czar, to oversee operations in Minnesota following the second fatal shooting.

“It’s certainly a great opportunity for Walz, Frey, and the rest to reset their stance and begin taking federal authority seriously. We’ll see,” Walter Hudson, a GOP Minnesota legislator, who has defended the crackdown, said in a Jan. 26 post on X.

By the late afternoon, Walz and his team had announced the governor had spoken with Trump after months of bitter verbal jabs, saying the president would consider reducing the number of immigration agents in the state. The governor’s office said they were also assured Minnesota investigators can independently probe the Pretti shooting.

Collins staying mostly quiet as ICE operations swarm Maine

The administration’s next steps will be critical, GOP strategists say, especially as voters weigh the responses by Republicans in battleground areas where ICE deployments are taking place.

In the wake of Good’s death, the administration launched another immigration enforcement operation in Maine, where the parties are locked in a battle over the Senate seat currently held by five-term GOP incumbent Susan Collins, a moderate known for occasionally breaking with Trump.

Dubbed “Operation Catch of the Day,” the administration did not announce how many ICE agents were sent to the Pine Tree State, nor did it outline where its operations would be focused or how long the mission would last.

“The brave men and women of ICE have already arrested more than 200 illegal aliens in Maine in the last five days,” the Department of Homeland Security announced Monday afternoon.

While the department says it is gathering “the worst of the worst,” immigrant advocates in Maine say most of those arrested are in legal immigration processes and have no criminal record, and that many have been racially profiled and subjected to inhumane conditions in detention.

The Collins campaign did not respond to USA TODAY’s request for comment and the senator hasn’t issued a new statement since the second shooting in Minnesota. In the wake of Good’s death, Collins issued a statement echoing some of the administration’s talking points, saying people who are protesting, “should be careful not to interfere with law enforcement efforts while doing so.”

But the agency’s deployment into Maine has ignited a furious response from the top two Democrats seeking to boot Collins from office, which may determine the balance of the Senate later this year.

“It’s simple — Congress needs to stand up today and tell this president that Kristi Noem must go and ICE must be withdrawn,” said Gov. Janet Mills, a Trump foil who was recruited to run by Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer, in a Jan. 26 interview on MS Now’s (formerly MSNBC) Morning Joe. She has criticized Collins, who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee, for not taking part in the Democrat-led effort to withhold ICE funding unless new safeguards are added to its tactics.

Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner, a more populist-aligned Democratic contender supported by grassroots progressives, said Americans have “the right and the duty to resist ICE.”

“People need to get off the couch, join groups and take part,” he said in an MS Now interview over the weekend.

Republicans defend ICE, Trump’s actions but cracks show on gun rights

Immigration enforcement remains one of Trump’s best issues on the political right, but there are noticeable disagreements among the MAGA coalition, including concerns expressed by gun rights groups who expressed dismay that administration officials justified Pretti’s shooting because he was carrying a legal firearm at the time of his death.

Noem said at a news conference hours after the shooting that it is a “violent riot when you have someone showing up with weapons,” a notion that was denounced by conservative lawmakers and gun rights activists.

In a Jan. 26 statement, former Vice President Mike Pence said the administration’s focus now should be to bring together law enforcement at every level to address the community’s concerns, “even while ensuring that dangerous illegal aliens are apprehended” in Minnesota.

“The American people deserve to have safe streets, our laws enforced and our constitutional rights of freedom of speech, peaceable assembly and the right to keep and bear arms respected and preserved all at the same time,” Pence said.

Feehery, the GOP strategist, said Republicans by and large still support many of the enforcement activities, but that Trump will have to be more disciplined and avoid further escalation to help protect Republican candidates in swing areas.

In the Quinnipiac survey, for instance, 84% of Republican voters said they approve of the way ICE is enforcing the country’s immigration laws. That is the reverse of how Democrats see things, the poll shows, with 94% of Democrats and 64% of independent voters disapproving.

“Immigration is one of his biggest promises and it’s one of his greatest accomplishments,” Feehery said. “Now it’s becoming a political liability.”

Pretti’s death has already ignited the liberal activists who are pressuring congressional Democrats, demanding they refuse to support any further ICE funding.

Vanessa Cárdenas, executive director of America’s Voice, a liberal-leaning immigration reform group, said tepid Republican opposition isn’t good enough, and that means Trump’s opposition in Washington must be more courageous.

“We are seeing what an enforcement-only, violent approach looks like in real time and Americans are rejecting that,” she said. “It is absolutely reasonable for Democrats to demand that not one more penny goes to ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.”

But GOP contenders are eager for Democrats in swing districts to embrace what grassroots progressives want, especially if stripping away the agency’s funding leads to a budget standoff resulting in another government shutdown.

Officials with the National Republican Congressional Committee, which serves as the House GOP’s political arm, told USA TODAY they have been focusing on liberal incumbents and challengers in more than a dozen areas for weeks. Many have publicly criticized ICE and questioned the agency’s mission, which the NRCC sees as a liability for those Democrats in competitive races.

Among the top targets in 2026 will be Democratic Rep. Greg Landsman, of Ohio. After the Republican-controlled state legislature’s successful redistricting effort last year, Landsman’s reelection hopes became more vulnerable, according to the Cook Political Report, which forecasts races.

The 49-year-old incumbent, who represents much of Cincinnati’s inner suburbs, said ICE agents committed “murder” against Good and that Noem should “step down” as a result.

“The radical ‘abolish ICE’ crusade from far-left Democrats seemed like a relic of the past, but it’s the brand-new litmus test for Democrats who are barely hanging on and begging on their knees to get approval from their socialist base,” Mike Marinella, an NRCC spokesman, told USA TODAY. “The full embrace of their deeply unpopular, lunatic policies exposes the brain rot that has taken over the Democrat Party.”

Gregory Bovino has been removed from his role as Border Patrol “commander at large” and will return to his former job in El Centro, California, where he is expected to retire soon, according to a DHS official and two people with knowledge of the change.
Bovino’s sudden demotion is the clearest sign yet that the Trump administration is reconsidering its most aggressive tactics after the killing Saturday of 37-year-old Alex Pretti by Border Patrol agents under Bovino’s command.

Earlier today, President Trump appeared to signal in a series of social-media posts a tactical shift in the administration’s mass-deportation campaign. Trump wrote that he spoke with Minnesota Governor Tim Walz—whom the White House has blamed for inciting violence—and the two men are now on “a similar wavelength.” Tom Homan, the former ICE chief whom Trump has designated “border czar,” will head to Minnesota to assume command of the federal mobilization there, Trump said.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and her close adviser Corey Lewandowski, who were Bovino’s biggest backers at DHS, are also at risk of losing their jobs, two of the people told me.

For the past seven months, Bovino has been the public face of a traveling immigration crackdown on cities governed by Democrats. Noem and other Trump officials gave Bovino the “commander” title and sent him and his masked border agents to Chicago, Charlotte, New Orleans, and then Minneapolis. Bovino became a MAGA social-media star as he traveled the country with his own film crew and used social media to hit back at Democratic politicians and random critics online. Veteran ICE and CBP officials grew more and more uneasy as Bovino worked outside his agency’s chain of command and appeared to relish his role as a political actor.
In Minneapolis, the Trump administration used Bovino as its lead spokesperson, scheduling daily press conferences where he defended agents’ rough tactics and cast blame on protesters and local officials. Border Patrol commanders typically avoid engaging in political arguments with elected officials.

Bovino’s fall comes two days after Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis fatally shot Pretti, an intensive-care nurse who worked with veterans. Hours after the shooting, Bovino appeared at a press conference and echoed statements by the Department of Homeland Security alleging Pretti sought to “massacre” the federal agents. Bovino repeatedly claimed that Border Patrol agents, not Pretti, were the victims.
Videos of the encounter showed no evidence for his claims. Pretti, who was licensed to carry a concealed weapon, did not draw a firearm or attack the agents. The videos show one agent disarming Pretti in the moments just before another agent shot him in the back.

DHS and U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials did not immediately respond to questions about Bovino’s departure from Minnesota and his current role. Asked about Bovino and Noem, a White House spokesperson referred to Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt’s statement today that Noem has the president’s “utmost confidence and trust.”
In another post, Trump said he also spoke with Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey. “Lots of progress is being made!” the president wrote. “Tom Homan will be meeting with him tomorrow in order to continue the discussion.”

The Trump administration is planning to move Gregory Bovino, a Border Patrol official whose tactics in major American cities have drawn controversy, out of Minneapolis, according to two officials with knowledge of the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to share the information publicly.

The decision to move Mr. Bovino was the latest signal that the Trump administration is attempting to scale back its aggressive immigration enforcement effort in Minnesota. It came hours after President Trump said he was sending his border czar, Tom Homan, to oversee ICE operations in the state.

Several other Border Patrol agents are expected to leave with Mr. Bovino.

Mr. Bovino’s operations in major American cities across the country have sparked lawsuits and protests. Mr. Bovino, a sector chief in one part of the California border, first became a fixture after he led immigration operations following protests in Los Angeles in June. Since then, he has been deployed to Chicago, Charlotte, New Orleans and Minneapolis.

As of this weekend, there were more than 1,000 U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers and agents in the city. That’s along with a force of up to 2,000 from ICE.

On Monday, Mr. Trump changed course on his operation in Minneapolis, announcing on social media that he was deploying Mr. Homan to the state. White House officials said that Mr. Homan would take the lead on the immigration operation in the state.

“I am sending Tom Homan to Minnesota tonight,” Mr. Trump wrote. “He has not been involved in that area, but knows and likes many of the people there. Tom is tough but fair, and will report directly to me.”

President Trump met Monday evening in the Oval Office with Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, and Corey Lewandowski, her top aide, for nearly two hours, as his administration tries to shift its strategy after federal agents killed a second Minneapolis resident over the weekend, according to two people briefed on the meeting.

The meeting came after Ms. Noem requested to see the president, the people said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss a private meeting.

Mr. Trump did not suggest during the meeting that either Ms. Noem’s or Mr. Lewandowski’s jobs were at risk, the people said. But it was the latest sign the president is concerned about the bipartisan criticism of the administration’s response to the killing of Alex Pretti, who was shot at roughly 10 times by immigration agents on Saturday after he was apparently filming them with his phone camera.

Ms. Noem has been the face of the administration’s immigration crackdown, and she has been among the most vocal in spreading false accusations against Mr. Pretti, including labeling him a “domestic terrorist.”

The Oval Office meeting also included several of Mr. Trump’s top aides, including Susie Wiles, his chief of staff, Karoline Leavitt, his press secretary, and Steven Cheung, his communications director. Stephen Miller, a top aide to Mr. Trump who oversees the administration’s immigration strategy, was not part of the meeting.

The meeting came the same day Mr. Trump announced he was sending Tom Homan, his border czar, to oversee the operation in Minneapolis. The move was seen as a way to elevate an official who is steeped in Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s longstanding practice of prioritizing targeted arrests, rather than the kinds of sweeping raids that the Trump administration has carried out in cities across the country.

At the same time, the administration was planning to move Gregory Bovino, a Border Patrol official whose harsh tactics have drawn sharp criticism, out of the city, according to two officials with knowledge of the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino is expected to leave Minneapolis on Tuesday, according to a person familiar with the matter, as the Trump administration reshuffles leadership of its immigration enforcement operation and scales back the federal presence after a second fatal shooting by federal officers.

President Donald Trump said he was placing his border czar, Tom Homan, in charge of the mission, with Homan reporting directly to the White House, after Bovino drew condemnation for claiming the man who was killed, Alex Pretti, had been planning to “massacre” law enforcement officers, a characterization that authorities had not substantiated.

Saturday’s fatal shooting of Pretti, an ICU nurse, by Border Patrol agents ignited political backlash and raised fresh questions about how the operation was being run.

Bovino’s leadership of highly visible federal crackdowns, including operations that sparked mass demonstrations in Los Angeles, Chicago, Charlotte and Minneapolis, has drawn fierce criticism from local officials, civil rights advocates and congressional Democrats.

A person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press that Bovino is among the federal agents leaving Minneapolis. The person was not authorized to publicly discuss details of the operation and spoke to AP on condition of anonymity.

The departure accompanies a softer tone from Trump on the Minnesota crackdown, including the president’s touting of productive conversations with the governor and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey.

The mayor said he asked Trump in a phone call to end the immigration enforcement surge, and Trump agreed the present situation cannot continue. Frey said he would keep pushing for others involved in Operation Metro Surge to go.

Homan will take charge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in Minnesota. Frey said he planned to meet Homan on Tuesday.

Trump has call with Minnesota governor
Trump and Democratic Gov. Tim Walz spoke in a phone call and later offered comments that were a marked change from the critical statements they have exchanged in the past. Their conversation happened on the same day a federal judge heard arguments in a lawsuit aimed at halting the federal immigration enforcement surge in the state.

“We, actually, seemed to be on a similar wavelength,” the president wrote in a social media post.

Walz, in a statement, said the call was “productive” and that impartial investigations into the shootings were needed. Trump said his administration was looking for “any and all” criminals the state has in their custody. Walz said the state Department of Corrections honors federal requests for people in its custody.

Meanwhile, attorneys for the administration, the state and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul appeared Monday before U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez, who is considering whether to grant requests to temporarily halt the immigration operation.

She said the case was a priority, but in an order later Monday, she told the federal government’s attorneys to file an additional brief by 6 p.m. Wednesday. She told them to address, among other things, the assertion by the state and cities that the purpose of Operation Metro Surge is to punish them for their sanctuary laws and policies.

Lawyers for the state and the Twin Cities argued the situation on the street is so dire it requires the court to halt the federal government’s enforcement actions.

“If this is not stopped right here, right now, I don’t think anybody who is seriously looking at this problem can have much faith in how our republic is going to go in the future,” Minnesota Assistant Attorney General Brian Carter said.

Judge questions government’s motives
The judge questioned the government’s motivation behind the crackdown and expressed skepticism about a letter Attorney General Pam Bondi recently sent to Walz. The letter asked the state to give the federal government access to voter rolls, to turn over state Medicaid and food assistance records, and to repeal sanctuary policies.

“I mean, is there no limit to what the executive can do under the guise of enforcing immigration law?” Menendez asked. She noted that the federal requests are the subject of litigation.

Brantley Mayers, a Justice Department attorney, said the government’s goal is to enforce federal law. Mayers said one lawful action should not be used to discredit another lawful action.

Menendez questioned where the line was between violating the Constitution and the executive’s power to enforce the law. She also asked whether she was being asked to decide between state and federal policies.

“That begins to feel very much like I am deciding which policy approach is best,” she said.

At one point, while discussing the prospect of federal officers entering residences without a warrant, the judge expressed reluctance to decide issues not yet raised in a lawsuit before her.

The state of Minnesota and the cities sued the Department of Homeland Security earlier this month, five days after Renee Good was shot by an Immigration and Customs officer. Pretti’s shooting added urgency to the case.

Late Monday, a federal appeals court declined to lift a temporary hold on a ruling Menendez issued in a separate case on Jan. 16. She ruled then that federal officers in Minnesota cannot detain or tear gas peaceful protesters who are not obstructing authorities, including people who follow and observe agents. A three-judge panel of the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals said that ruling was unlikely to hold up on appeal.

Homan to report to Trump
News of Bovino’s departure didn’t stop dozens of protestors from gathering outside a hotel where they believed Bovino was staying. They blew whistles, banged pots and one person blasted a trombone. Police watched and kept them away from the hotel entrance.

Trump posted Monday on social media that Homan would report directly to him.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Homan would be “the main point of contact on the ground in Minneapolis” during continued operations by federal immigration officers.

In court Monday, an attorney for the administration said about 2,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers were on ground, along with at least 1,000 Border Patrol officers.

The lawsuit asks the judge to order a reduction in the number of federal law enforcement officers and agents in Minnesota back to the level before the surge and to limit the scope of the enforcement operation.

The case has implications for other states that have been or could become targets of ramped-up federal immigration enforcement operations. Attorneys general from 19 states plus the District of Columbia, led by California, filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting Minnesota.

In yet another case, a different federal judge, Eric Tostrud, took under advisement a request from the Justice Department to lift an order he issued late Saturday blocking the Trump administration from “destroying or altering evidence” related to Saturday’s shooting.

Attorneys for the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension told the judge they can’t trust the federal government to preserve the evidence, citing the lack of cooperation the state is getting from federal authorities after they said they were blocked from the scene.

But the federal government’s attorneys argued that the temporary restraining order should be dissolved because its investigators are already following proper preservation procedures, and they’d object to “micromanaging” from the court what evidence the state can examine while the federal investigation is ongoing.

Last Thursday, I sat idling in my car, waiting for a photographer colleague to finish an assignment. An SUV pulled up in front of me. A middle-aged white woman, with a no-nonsense haircut, dressed in a puffy coat and big sunglasses, opened the car door. She leaned out of the driver’s seat and stared at me for a while. I realized she was trying to decide if I was an ICE officer.

I took the large press badge sitting on my dashboard and raised it for her to see. She waved and got back inside her car. A moment later, a woman who looked Latina stepped out of the passenger side, and walked to the house across the street.

I saw my first ICE vehicle in Minneapolis at the very start of the new year. It passed in front of the car I was in with my husband, and entered an alley a few blocks from my home, the slogan Defend The Homeland written on its side. Later, the vehicles would rarely be marked.

I ate arepas that night with friends at a restaurant where, a month earlier, immigration agents without a signed judicial warrant were turned away. The restaurant’s owner was praised for knowing her rights as a business owner.

Over the course of the last three weeks, I have had the experience of being a member of this community while also reporting on it, alongside local reporters: Minnesota Public Radio, Sahan Journal, The Minnesota Star Tribune, The Minnesota Reformer, and others.

I cover criminal justice nationally for NPR, and I live in Minneapolis. For the last year, I have been reporting occasionally on the massive immigration enforcement campaign across the country, sticking mostly to the moments it intersected clearly with my beat. Late last year, for instance, I reported a story on shuttered prisons — almost all owned by private prison companies — reopening as immigration detention centers across a dozen states. But in early December, the Trump administration announced a surge in immigration enforcement in my city.

On Jan. 7, news began to circulate that an ICE agent had shot a woman a short drive from my house. I quickly interviewed two witnesses by phone. One told me she watched as Renee Good received conflicting orders from multiple officers before she tried to leave. Another said she saw people eventually pull Good from her car and carry her by her limbs to a snowbank. “She had red on her,” the witness told me.

When I arrived at the intersection a few hours after the shooting, I was surprised to see Good’s car was still there, smashed into another vehicle, a bullet hole clearly visible through the windshield. A protester showed me a photo on his phone of a bright splash of blood on the white snow. You could feel the weight of the crowd’s growing anger, like ice cracking underneath a boot.

The next Saturday, observers stopped a group of ICE agents outside my home. I filmed from my front porch, as one observer yelled, “murderer, murderer, murderer.” He asked if the agents would shoot him too. In the video, my dog Leo whimpers at the sound of whistles.

Five days after Good was shot, I arrived at a volatile scene a few blocks from where she was killed. Immigration officers had rear-ended a man’s car. The driver and his wife, both U.S. citizens, told me and my colleague, Sergio Martínez-Beltrán, that they were on their way to a mechanic. The man said he made eye contact with the immigration agents. Then, he said, they started chasing him, rammed into his vehicle, and asked about his immigration status.

A crowd formed. First, more protesters. Then, more immigration agents. Honking. Whistling. Yelling. Eventually, tear gas. I was standing pretty far back, but close enough for it to burn my eyes and throat. I drove the five minutes to my home. I took a shower and washed residue off my glasses. I wrote a story about what I had seen. My husband and I made miso salmon (very good, by the way) and watched the new Naked Gun (very funny, by the way).

A few days later, I described the day – the juxtaposition of the very normal and the very not normal – to my colleague Kat Lonsdorf, who has covered the war in Ukraine. She told me that sounded like Kyiv to her. Some days, you’re interviewing people about the horrors they’ve seen. Other days, you’re eating arepas at a restaurant. Life more or less continues, until it doesn’t.

Many of my own national colleagues are here now, reporting on the city. Kat traced the throughline of neighborhood support all the way from the 2020 murder of George Floyd to the present moment. Jasmine Garsd told the story of a 12-year-old girl who got her first period while afraid to leave her home, and the network of volunteers who worked together to provide her with her first menstrual pad.

My own experience has been one of blurred lines between the professional and the personal. When my colleagues arrived from Texas and Washington and New York, I wanted to tell them about all the great things in Minneapolis: Here are the restaurants I love. Here are the parks and museums. I love this place. Please love it too.

The lives of nearly everyone I know have been disrupted: They’re raising money to cover rent, medical bills and legal fees for immigrant families, buying and delivering groceries to people afraid to leave their homes, organizing and giving rides to people afraid to go out alone, standing guard outside schools, daycares and immigrant-owned businesses, adding whistles to their key chains. One family told a friend that, in their native country, they had helped neighbors during COVID when they didn’t have food. They never imagined they would be in a place of needing the same.

As I drove around the city, interviewing parents patrolling outside of schools and watching as observers whistled at immigration officers, I wondered if those officers were making note of my license plate when I showed up to report on their actions.

My dog still demanded his daily walks. Our neighborhood is filled with dog treat bins set on stoops and outside stores, and he knows where every single one is within a mile radius. Every walk is a negotiation for which we will visit. Now, many stores are keeping their doors locked. Outside the door of our local butcher shop, he sat looking up at me, wondering why he couldn’t get a treat anymore.

I filed a news spot on a press conference where state officials said the FBI took over the investigation of Good’s killing, and state authorities no longer had access to evidence in the case.

A friend who lives in the suburbs called to say immigration officers blocked her car and approached her vehicle from both sides. They told her they were “out doing checks” and she was free to go. It left her feeling terrified.

Another friend, a pediatrician who has known my husband since high school, told me about a fifth grader he saw, who is now anxiously picking his skin until it bleeds.

I wrote a story explaining the Insurrection Act, which President Trump has threatened to invoke. It would give him sweeping powers to deploy the military here without the state’s consent.

A friend who works for a local labor union texted me to say several of their members were detained. They’re good people, he said. But my journalist brain is now calibrated differently: Were the officers violent? Is being detained by federal authorities enough to make the news?

My husband and I have seven nieces and nephews in the Twin Cities. For their birthdays, our tradition is to take them somewhere fun. We took our 9-year-old nephew to an indoor mini golf place, which was surprisingly crowded. I gave him my phone to see the photo of himself posing after his hole-in-one. He scrolled backward, and saw a photo I had taken while interviewing people at a protest — a person holding a sign that said “F*** ICE.” That’s a bad word, he said. Yes, I told him, people are upset and sad. I didn’t tell him they are also afraid.

I interviewed a woman and her 8-year-old daughter inside their apartment, with the blinds drawn. They haven’t been outside in a month.

My best friend, a woman I lived with in my early 20s, told me about an exchange with a Native American man she knows who works at a nearby shop: He told her he now carries his federal tribal license around. My friend, an Asian woman, flashed her passport. They agreed to look out for one another.

On Friday, my colleagues went to cover a protest and sent me quotes from people there, for a story on the rally’s massive turnout in downtown Minneapolis, despite the subzero temperatures.

On Saturday, I was putting on my winter coat to head to the gym, when a text came from a friend: They shot another person outside Glam Doll Donuts.

Then a barrage of other texts:

Everyone doing ok?

Do you need help?

When will this end?

I love you.

In Donald Trump’s United States, where immigration agents have fatally shot two citizens in the past three weeks, calls are growing to shut down the agency tasked with carrying out the anti-immigrant crusade launched by the White House. The Abolish ICE movement is not new, but in recent weeks it has gained unprecedented momentum as citizens demand the abolition of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The effort to dismantle the agency has divided not only Democrats and Republicans in Congress, but also the Democrats among themselves, amid a debate over whether to defund, eliminate, or simply redirect ICE’s tactics, especially now that another federal government shutdown is at stake.

However, on the streets of cities besieged by Trump’s immigration agents, the demand is more drastic and unambiguous: people are calling for the disbanding of the agency responsible for the recent deaths that have shaken the nation. “ICE must be abolished and replaced with systems that prioritize due process, community safety, and human rights,” states the group Abolish ICE Georgia, which coordinates student walkouts in that state and peaceful protests as part of the national movement to abolish the agency. “In practice, ICE has functioned as a punitive law enforcement agency rather than a public safety agency, targeting immigrant communities through fear, surveillance, and detention, instead of addressing serious threats.”

The toll of ICE’s crusade continues to rise: the latest victims are Renee Good and Alex Pretti, shot dead in the streets of Minneapolis; Good by an ICE agent and Pretti by Border Patrol officers. But the crackdown also includes the detention of five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and at least four other children from Minnesota; the more than 70,000 people held in detention centers, some caught in surprise immigration raids; the 32 deaths in custody throughout 2025, and the six recorded in the first days of 2026, among them Geraldo Lunas Campos, a 55-year-old Cuban, allegedly murdered in a Texas facility.

Recent events in Minneapolis have made it clear that not even American citizens are immune to the pervasive violence in the country, leading people to take to the streets with the direct demand to abolish ICE. While a July poll by The Economist/YouGov found that only 27% of respondents supported abolishing ICE, the results of the same survey conducted a few days ago confirm that opinions have shifted: 46% now support the elimination of the best-funded federal agency in U.S. history. With his tax and spending reform, dubbed the “Big, Beautiful Bill,” Trump added $75 billion to the agency’s existing $11 billion budget.

Merriam, a Chicago resident who prefers to remain anonymous and has joined the call to end ICE in her community, says there are far better ways the government could spend taxpayer money. “Economic inequality, fascism, and the upward transfer of wealth go hand-in-hand. The way our money is used to fund oppression and violence in America does not reflect what most people want. With that money, we could forgive student loans, reduce chronic illnesses, and empower future generations. Abolishing ICE is crucial and represents one of the most important acts toward restoring humanity,” she insists.

The desire of some to see the demise of an agency they have dubbed “the modern-day Gestapo” has intensified in recent weeks, but it’s a call that dates back to the Obama administration, when the Democratic president launched a historic deportation campaign. The Abolish ICE movement once again became a focus of public outcry in 2018 when family separations became the central issue for many activists and politicians during the first Trump term. Among the most outspoken was New York representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who at the time made immigration a key part of her campaign and demanded the dismantling of ICE.

During Joe Biden’s administration attention was centered on the border crisis and less on the agency. But now, the call to abolish ICE has resurfaced with much greater force.

Abolish or reform
The continued existence of the agency is at the center of a heated debate in Washington and across the country. Republicans insist it is a body meant to guarantee national security, despite the fact that the aforementioned poll shows 47% of Americans believe ICE actually makes them feel less safe. Some Democrats, meanwhile, unequivocally advocate for abolishing immigration enforcement, especially after the deaths of Pretti and Good and following Trump’s threat to invoke the Insurrection Act to deploy the military against the protests sparked by the recent killings, which the government has attempted to justify.

Democratic Representative Shri Thanedar of Michigan introduced an ICE Abolition Act, arguing that Good’s murder “proved that ICE is out of control and beyond reform.” “We must fundamentally change the way we approach immigration: it’s time to abolish ICE,” the representative for Michigan’s 13th Congressional District said in a statement. If enacted, the bill would prohibit the use of federal funds “to carry out any of the functions, duties, or responsibilities assigned or delegated to the Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement pursuant to the Homeland Security Act of 2002.” Others, such as Democratic Representative Delia Ramirez of Illinois, have also advocated for defunding the agency.

However, now that both parties are negotiating the fiscal year 2026 budget for the Department of Homeland Security, ICE’s parent agency, some Democrats continue to advocate for reforming the agency rather than abolishing it. They propose, for example, requiring agents to wear body cameras, not masks, and undergo additional training. The House of Representatives passed a funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security of approximately $64.4 billion and $10 billion for ICE, which received the support of seven Democrats. The package will now go to the Senate.

Following Pretti’s death, some Democratic senators have stated they will not vote in favor of funding as long as ICE continues to operate as it does. “What’s happening in Minnesota is appalling — and unacceptable in any American city,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Saturday on X. “Democrats sought common sense reforms in the Department of Homeland Security spending bill, but because of Republicans’ refusal to stand up to President Trump, the DHS bill is woefully inadequate to rein in the abuses of ICE. I will vote no.”

Until now, the Democratic argument for supporting ICE funding was based on the idea that eliminating the agency entirely would ultimately benefit Republicans. “Every call to abolish ICE risks squandering one of the clearest opportunities in years to achieve meaningful immigration enforcement reform, while giving Republicans exactly the battle they want,” Third Way, a centrist think tank based in Washington, said in a memo.

While politicians from both parties play their cards before Friday night — the deadline for the partial government shutdown — ordinary citizens continue to demand the elimination of the agency responsible for bringing terror to neighborhoods across the country. “ICE has never fit into what a safe, inclusive, and progressive society stands for. It must go,” Merriam says from Chicago. “The physical, psychological, and emotional toll that ICE has taken on communities is immeasurable. It’s important to note that a single act of terror by a government agency should be grounds for freezing its funding; ICE has committed countless such acts.”

Good morning. As federal immigration agents in Minneapolis and Maine engage in tactics that most law enforcement agencies do not, current and former police officers are speaking out.

But first, here’s what else is going on:

Some New England communities are still digging out from under nearly two feet of snow. Boston’s 12th-largest snowfall on record led to sledding and a snowball fight on the Common, and dozens of Massachusetts schools remain closed today.
The death toll remained unclear after a private jet crashed at Bangor International Airport in Maine. Federal authorities said Sunday’s crash killed seven and injured a crew member. Bangor police and airport officials said only six people were aboard and that all were presumed dead.
Private, pay-to-play club teams dominate the landscape for young Massachusetts athletes. Some parents worry they’re steering kids in the wrong direction.

TODAY’S STARTING POINT
Before Mark Dion became the mayor of Portland, Maine’s largest city, he was a police officer. Over his 32-year career, including more than a decade as the sheriff of Cumberland County, he occasionally worked alongside ICE agents operating in the state.

“I considered them incredibly professional and competent,” Dion told me this month, shortly before ICE ramped up its operations in Maine. “In my interactions, their history has reflected significant training and intentional experiences that made them the best possible agents they could be.”

FEATURED VIDEO

Things have changed.

Before ICE descended on his city last week, Dion hoped that agents would exercise restraint, as police are increasingly trained to. But in Maine, Minneapolis, and elsewhere, immigration officials seem to be operating with a degree of impunity foreign to other US law-enforcement agencies.

Growing backlash
Footage from around the country shows masked federal agents — often wearing plainclothes, paramilitary gear, or vests that say “police” — deploying en masse, arresting people who appear to lack criminal records, and clashing with protesters in conspicuous shows of force.

That’s a big change from how Dion remembers agents behaving, and from how he approached his own police work. “When I was a detective and I went out with an ICE agent, it was incredibly low-key, and the goal was to go in, do our work, and leave,” he said. “We didn’t wear masks.”

Those changes followed new policies under President Trump. Last summer, congressional Republicans gave ICE an $85 billion budget, larger than any other law enforcement agency in the country. To beef up operations quickly, the Trump administration cut new agents’ training time to just 42 days — less than almost every police department requires.

Today, many police departments teach officers to deescalate situations and respect constitutional rights. But in Minneapolis, federal agents have liberally used tear gas and pepper spray on protesters and appear to have killed Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse, after stripping him of a holstered gun he was licensed to carry. Most major police departments also bar officers from shooting at moving vehicles. But an ICE agent did just that this month, killing Renee Good, a Minneapolis mother of three, in her car.

Most police officers see themselves as part of the community they’re policing, Dion said. The Trump administration, by contrast, has cast immigration agents as akin to soldiers deploying to enemy territory. “It’s a war from within,” Trump said of Democratic-led cities last year. In Minnesota, federal agents have reportedly stopped off-duty police officers of color, demanding — at least once at gunpoint — to know their citizenship status.

Accountability
Despite recent reforms, it’s often difficult to hold police officers accountable for their actions. But the Trump administration has resisted doing so for immigration agents. Top officials, without evidence, characterized Good and Pretti as domestic terrorists and tried to stop local police from investigating their deaths.

Still, a growing number of Republicans are demanding information about Pretti’s killing or distancing themselves from agents’ actions. A GOP candidate for Minnesota governor, an attorney who represented the agent who shot Good, dropped out of the race yesterday and called ICE operations there an “unmitigated disaster.”

Is a retreat next?
Yesterday, after Trump spoke with Minnesota’s Democratic governor, news broke that some immigration agents would leave Minneapolis — including Gregory Bovino, who accused Pretti of wanting to “massacre law enforcement” and has reportedly been demoted.

But in Maine, Dion isn’t the only person with police experience to find that ICE has changed. Kevin Joyce, who succeeded him as Cumberland County sheriff, met with Trump’s border czar last year about deporting undocumented people with criminal convictions. Last week, Joyce accused agents of forcibly detaining one of his corrections officers, who is authorized to work in the US and has no criminal history, and leaving his car running on the streets of Portland.

Joyce called it “bush-league” policing. “We don’t do that as law enforcement officers.”

Read more:

The ICE operation in Maine has yielded over 200 arrests, Trump officials said. Immigrant advocates say many detainees have no criminal histories.
The surge has intensified Maine’s Senate primary between Democratic Governor Janet Mills and Graham Platner, an upstart progressive. It’s also a test for Senator Susan Collins, the Republican they’re running to unseat.
“I want my mom”: A 5-year-old Biddeford girl is among the children whose detained parents have been transferred far away.
Immigration used to be Trump’s strongest political issue. Polls now show voters souring on how he’s handling it.

POINTS OF INTEREST
ICE in Boston: The city’s police department ignored all 57 federal requests it received last year to detain immigrants, following a law that bars local police from working on most immigration cases.

Out in the cold: A transmission line Governor Maura Healey said would bring hydropower from Canada to Massachusetts provided little energy to the state during Sunday’s storm.

Power move: When outages make ice deliveries to convenience stores and restaurants essential, Marc Savenor of the Acme Dry Ice Company in Cambridge answers the call.

Networking with a twist: To get beyond the elbow-rubbing chatter of most professional get-togethers, this event series encourages people to share their (mostly harmless) workplace screwups.

World Cup: The MBTA could get $8 million or more in congressional funding to prepare for the World Cup, which includes matches near Boston. Meanwhile, a former FIFA president suggested he supported fans who plan to boycott matches in the US because of ICE activity. (Guardian)

President Donald Trump has his back against a wall amid an unexpected government shutdown fight — and he and his party are acting like it.

Faced with a set of difficult options to address the national uproar over two deadly shootings by federal agents in Minneapolis, Trump has adopted an unusually conciliatory posture that underscores his political vulnerability.

Top Senate Republicans followed suit. A chorus of GOP senators began speaking out Monday in ways that validated Democrats’ concerns about ICE and CBP’s hard-edged immigration crackdown under Trump.

Rather than digging their heels in as the Jan. 30 funding deadline approaches, GOP appropriators are making clear they’re searching for an escape hatch to avert a partial government shutdown.

Yet no one is certain what kind of compromise can be reached. Unlike the record-setting government shutdown last fall, key Republicans and the White House are saying at the outset that they’re willing to negotiate around Democrats’ demands. Senators have begun initial cross-aisle conversations, with Republicans floating potential offers that wouldn’t require amending the funding package.

For their part, Democrats believe the political environment is such that they can extract real concessions, citing Trump’s unmistakable shift and Hill Republicans’ uneasiness with the administration’s handling of the fallout from Saturday’s shooting.

Not so fast. Republicans are dismissing Democrats’ push to renegotiate full-year funding for DHS and ICE by splitting it off from the five other bills in the FY2026 funding package. Such a move would require a new vote in the House, which is on recess this week. There would be a short-term shutdown at a minimum — or maybe worse. We’ll get into that.

Instead, Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Sen. Katie Britt (R-Ala.), who helped end the last shutdown, told us Monday that the initial discussions center around actions by Trump that can be taken “outside of” the legislative process. Democrats have already said this won’t be enough.

But GOP congressional leaders and the White House are desperate to avoid a scenario in which the funding package has to go back to the House, which explains their opposition to splitting off the DHS bill.

Here’s the concern gripping the top levels of the Trump administration — the House simply can’t pass another DHS funding bill under any circumstances.

Even if Trump were to cut a deal with Democrats that can get through the Senate, House Republicans believe they can’t round up 218 votes to pass a rule to get it on the House floor. Or alternatively, find 290 lawmakers willing to pass it under suspension of the rules. Republicans just don’t believe there’s a coalition in the House that can pass another DHS bill.

That’s why Trump has been focused on “de-escalatory measures,” as one administration official told us, a first step toward placating Democrats.

The Trump administration has already kneecapped Gregory Bovino, the CBP official in charge of operations in Minneapolis. Trump has tapped Tom Homan, the border czar, to take over in Bovino’s place. Trump spoke by phone with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey on Monday. Later, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem finally agreed to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee after months of stonewalling. Noem — who has a real problem on both sides of the aisle on the Hill — and her top aide, Corey Lewandowski, met for two hours with Trump on Monday night.

Yet Democrats have made clear to us they simply won’t accept — nor do they trust — executive actions alone. There has to be some legislative fix. Some Republicans have floated a separate legislative vehicle to address ICE reforms. But this also would be met with heavy skepticism from Democrats.

Remember: There’s no deal that will get 47 Democratic votes in the Senate. ICE funding is way too controversial. Plus, even if only a limited number of Senate Democrats favor a DHS deal, it would be difficult for them to vote that way without a signoff from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

Inside Dems’ thinking. Senate Democrats want concrete changes to the way the Trump administration conducts immigration enforcement. Some of the options they’ve discussed include forcing ICE and CBP officers to adhere to standard warrant procedures, wear body cameras, lose the face masks and be limited by use-of-force standards.

While Democrats believe they have the upper hand in this fight, there’s a question of how far they should go with their demands. Specific, targeted policy changes and reforms are likely to be taken seriously by a White House desperate to move past this chapter. Calls to “abolish ICE” won’t be treated with the same level of deference.

It’s also worth remembering that it was less than two weeks ago that Schumer met with Trump in the Oval Office — at the president’s request. Is it time for Schumer to try to talk to Trump directly again? It may be too early for that. But it could be a smart tactical move as Friday’s funding deadline gets closer.

There’s also the obvious risk for Democrats: The political fallout from triggering a partial government shutdown just a couple of months after instigating a record 43-day funding lapse. And for DHS, this would hit FEMA at a time when much of the country is dealing with the aftermath of a severe winter storm. The Coast Guard and TSA are under DHS too. Plus, ICE would be funded anyway because of the cash infusion it got from the GOP’s One Big Beautiful Bill last year.

Failing to pass the six-bill funds package by Friday means the Pentagon could run out of money, potentially impacting troop pay and other critical operations if the White House doesn’t find a workaround again. A shutdown would also impact the Labor, Transportation and HUD departments, among several other agencies.

The White House is scrambling on Minnesota. Karoline Leavitt says Donald Trump has the “utmost confidence” in Kristi Noem, but the president is sending Tom Homan to Minneapolis to oversee ICE operations there — and he said the border czar would “report directly to me.”

“That is intentional,” an administration official told Politico. “Tom needs to be in charge.”

Gregory Bovino may be the administration’s fall guy. Leavitt called the Border Patrol commander a “wonderful man” today, but an administration official confirmed to NOTUS that he will leave Minnesota tomorrow.

Here’s how quickly things are changing. Facing damning videos and blowback from some Republicans in Congress, the Trump administration backpedaled on multiple fronts today.

Over the weekend: Trump called Tim Walz a “sanctimonious political fool” who was “inciting insurrection” with “pompous, dangerous and arrogant rhetoric.”

Today: Trump said he had “a very good call” with Walz and “seemed to be on a similar wavelength” with him.

Over the weekend: Attorney General Pam Bondi seemed to tie any de-escalation in Minnesota to her demand that the state turn over both its voter rolls and its Medicaid and SNAP records.

Today: Leavitt didn’t mention those preconditions at the White House press briefing, instead saying that CBP could leave Minnesota if state officials would agree to cooperate with ICE.

Over the weekend: Stephen Miller called Alex Pretti “a domestic terrorist” who “tried to assassinate law enforcement,” while Noem said what Pretti did “is the definition of domestic terrorism.”

Today: Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said: “I don’t think anybody thinks they were comparing what happened on Saturday to the legal definition of domestic terrorism.”

Some Republican backlash is building. Some of it’s coming from the usual Trump critics — Rand Paul, Thomas Massie, et al. — but some of it is not:

Tom Cole: “The president himself said, ‘Look, mistakes will be made.’ This is a high-pressure situation, and we need to determine what happened in that situation. I’m not going to try to play judge and jury. I’m not going to reflexively defend something.”

Ted Cruz: “What I think the administration could do better is the tone with which they’re describing this — that immediately when an incident like this happens, they come out guns blazing that we took out a violent terrorist, hooray!”

John Curtis: “Officials who rush to judgment before all the facts are known undermine public trust and the law-enforcement mission. I disagree with Secretary Noem’s premature DHS response, which came before all the facts were known and weakened confidence.”

Jerry Moran: “I am deeply troubled by the shootings in Minneapolis involving federal agents. Our Constitution provides citizens protection from the government. We have a right to free speech, to peaceably assemble and to bear arms.”

Two-thirds of House Democrats support impeaching Noem. More than 20 additional Democrats added their names to Rep. Robin Kelly’s resolution today.

And yes, a government shutdown is looming. The Senate was out for a snow day, but Democrats continue to insist they won’t approve DHS funding without new constraints on ICE — and Republicans continue to insist they won’t pull DHS funding out of the spending package.

Democratic Rep. Tom Suozzi voted in favor of the DHS funding. He wishes he hadn’t.

Walz said his call with Trump was ‘productive.’ The governor said he told the president that he needed to reduce the number of federal agents in Minnesota — and that state officials need to be involved in any investigations of the shootings. It was the first time the two had spoken in at least a year.

A top GOP candidate pulled out of the Minnesota governor’s race. Chris Madel said he cannot support Trump’s plan for “retribution on the citizens of our state, nor can I count myself a member of a party that would do that.”

Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.), the co-chair of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, said in a statement Monday that he “failed” in voting for a bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security and ICE last week.

Why it matters: The statement marks a significant tonal shift from one of Congress’ most prominent Democratic centrists following the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis on Saturday.

Suozzi isn’t alone in that shift: Rep. Laura Gillen (D-N.Y.), another of the seven Democrats to vote for the DHS funding bill, announced Sunday she was supporting impeachment against DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.
Suozzi is the only one of the seven thus far to explicitly express regret for the vote.
What they’re saying: “I failed to view the DHS funding vote as a referendum on the illegal and immoral conduct of ICE in Minneapolis,” Suozzi said in a statement posted to social media.

“I hear the anger from my constituents, and I take responsibility for that,” he continued. “I have long been critical of ICE’s unlawful behavior and I must do a better job demonstrating that.”
Suozzi called Pretti’s killing “senseless and tragic” and called for President Trump to end the surge of federal immigration agents in Minnesota.
Zoom out: Suozzi’s statement comes as Democrats are taking an increasingly hard line against ICE, DHS and Noem.

Senate Democrats are lining up against a government funding package unless the DHS portion of it is removed and renegotiated, effectively threatening to shut the government down.
And articles of impeachment against Noem stood at 145 House Democratic co-sponsors as of Monday afternoon, more than two-thirds of the caucus.

Poll shows 58% say ICE crackdown has gone too far
Trump’s overall approval rating falls to 38%, tied for lowest of his term
Republicans still have an edge of Democrats on immigration policy
WASHINGTON, Jan 26 (Reuters) – American approval of U.S. President Donald Trump’s immigration policy fell to its lowest level since his return to the White House in a new Reuters/Ipsos poll, with a majority of Americans saying his crackdown on immigration has gone too far.
The poll, conducted nationwide Friday through Sunday, gathered responses before and after immigration officers on Saturday killed a second U.S. citizen in Minneapolis during confrontations with protesters over Trump’s deployment of immigration agents to cities across the U.S.

Just 39% of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing on immigration, down from 41% earlier this month, while 53% disapprove, the poll found. Immigration was a brighter spot for Trump’s popularity in the weeks following his January inauguration. In February, 50% approved and 41% disapproved.

Trump won the 2024 presidential election after promising a historic surge in deportations. Masked immigration officers, often in tactical military-style gear, have become a common sight across the country and protests against the crackdown have erupted in several cities, including Minneapolis, where immigration agents have responded with deadly force.

Trump administration officials have accused 37-year-old nurse, Alex Pretti, of assaulting officers during a protest in Minneapolis before an agent shot him dead, though that account has appeared at odds with videos recorded by bystanders. Weeks earlier in Minneapolis, an immigration agent shot dead 37-year-old Renee Good, another U.S. citizen, during an immigration raid.

MAJORITY SAY ICE GOES TOO FAR
Some 58% of poll respondents said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have gone “too far” in their crackdown, while 12% said they had not gone far enough and 26% said the agents’ efforts were “about right.” About nine in 10 Democrats said the agents have gone too far, compared to two in 10 Republicans and six in 10 independents.

Viral videos of clashes have caused unease among Republican lawmakers, many of whom are already confronting voter anger over rising prices ahead of November’s midterm elections when control of Congress and most state governorships are up for grabs.
A leading Republican candidate for Minnesota’s governor’s race, Chris Madel, dropped his bid on Monday, saying the crackdown had gone too far and had made the race unwinnable for a Republican.

Trump has blamed Democrats for the shooting deaths but on Monday appeared less confrontational, saying he was “on a similar wavelength” with the Democratic governor of Minnesota. Trump said he and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz had a “very good call.”
OVERALL RATING TIES TERM LOW
The latest Reuters/Ipsos poll showed Trump’s overall approval rating sinking to 38%, tying the lowest level of his current term as it dropped from 41% in the prior Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted January 12-13.

While Trump’s ratings have fallen, he continues to perform considerably better on immigration than his predecessor in office, former Democratic President Joe Biden. Americans also continue to have more confidence in Trump’s Republican Party on the issue, with 37% of respondents in the latest poll saying Republicans have the better approach on immigration, compared to 32% who prefer Democrats. The rest said they weren’t sure or that neither party was better.
The latest poll, conducted online nationwide, gathered responses from 1,139 U.S. adults and had a margin of error of about 3 percentage points.

n the wake of the killings of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Jeffrey Pretti by federal agents amid the Trump Administration’s immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, voters’ support for abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is spiking—including among President Donald Trump’s own party.

A new YouGov poll taken on Saturday, the day of Pretti’s fatal shooting, showed 19 percent of Republicans and 48 percent of American adults across the political spectrum voicing support for abolishing ICE.

That marks a notable shift from when YouGov pollsters asked the same question last June, as Trump was ramping up his immigration crackdown. At that time only 9 percent of Republicans and 27 percent of Americans overall backed abolishing ICE. Support for shuttering the agency has also surged among independents, with 47 percent backing its elimination in the Saturday poll compared to 25 percent in June.

Good and Pretti’s fatal shootings have heightened scrutiny of the aggressive tactics being used by federal immigration agents under Trump’s second Administration. Following Pretti’s killing, several congressional Republicans have joined Democrats in calling for an investigation into the incident.

Other recent polls have shown support declining for how Trump is carrying out the mass deportation effort that he successfully campaigned on in 2024 as ICE’s operations in the interior U.S. come under fire.

A New York Times/Siena poll conducted from January 12 to 17, after Good’s killing on January 7, found that a majority of voters disapproved of Trump’s handling of several issues—immigration included—and ​​49 percent said the country was worse off than a year ago, compared with 32 percent who said it was better off.

Regarding immigration specifically, 58 percent of respondents disapproved of how Trump was handling the issue, up from 52 percent in a previous Times/Siena poll conducted in September. A larger portion of around half of respondents backed the Administration’s deportation of illegal immigrants and the President’s handling of the U.S.’s southern border in the recent poll. But the reality of ICE’s enforcement tactics drew censure from most Americans: 61 percent—including 19 percent of Republicans, compared to 94 percent of Democrats and 71 percent of independents—said that ICE tactics had “gone too far.”

Trump attacked the Times/Siena poll on Truth Social the day it was released, calling the results “fake” and “heavily skewed toward Democrats.” (Among the registered voters who responded to the poll, 45 percent identified as Democrats or Democratic-leaning compared to 44 percent who identified as Republicans or Republican-leaning.) In a separate post, he said that “Fake and Fraudulent Polling should be, virtually, a criminal offense.”

Yet, the poll is part of a larger trend of surveys that have documented growing disapproval of ICE’s tactics, especially after Good’s deadly shooting, which sparked protests in Minneapolis and around the country, and follows a longer decline in support for Trump’s handling of immigration.

A poll conducted for CNN by SSRS from January 9 to 12 found that 56 percent of respondents said that the shooting was an “inappropriate use of force” by federal officers, and 51 percent said that ICE enforcement actions were making cities less safe rather than safer. More than half of independent respondents were among those who said that ICE enforcement was making cities less safe. And while a majority of Republicans—56 percent—said the shooting represented an appropriate use of force, 21 percent said it was an inappropriate use of force, with 7 percent saying it was inappropriate but an isolated incident and 14 percent saying it was both inappropriate and reflected a bigger problem with ICE’s operations.

Another survey, taken by Ipsos January 16 to 18, similarly found that 52 percent of Americans felt Good’s shooting marked an excessive use of force, including 19 percent of Republicans and 54 percent of independents.

And a separate poll by Quinnipiac conducted from January 8 to 12 found that 57 percent of registered voters disapproved of ICE’s handling of immigration enforcement, including 64 percent of independents and 12 percent of Republicans.

Backing for Trump’s broader handling of immigration had also been falling for months even before the recent shootings, according to a number of polls. Recent approval numbers on the issue differ markedly from polling taken in the weeks after Trump took office last year. A Pew Research Center survey taken last February, for instance, found that 59 percent of U.S. adults said they approved of Trump increasing efforts to deport people. In December, in contrast, Pew found that 53 percent of Americans said he was doing “too much” to deport illegal immigrants, with that sentiment rising among both Democrat sand Republicans.

That approval of Trump’s immigration agenda was already waning by the spring and summer. An Ipsos poll from April 2025 found Americans slightly more disapproving (53 percent) than approving (46 percent) of his handling of immigration.

Shandy Priddy, a delivery driver for Target in Portland, Maine, was dropping off a package at an apartment complex on Friday morning when a stranger approached with a startling question: Would Ms. Priddy drive her son to school?

On the fourth day of an unprecedented federal immigration crackdown in the state, Ms. Priddy, 48, a mother of three, said she understood instantly.

“She looked petrified, like she did not want to step out of that corridor,” said Ms. Priddy, adding how the woman had explained that she was an immigrant from the Democratic Republic of Congo and that her husband had been taken by immigration agents the previous day.

“I know that pressure,” Ms. Priddy said, “of having security and then not having it.”

As the federal surge began last week, officials with the Department of Homeland Security said that it was targeting 1,400 “criminal illegal aliens who have terrorized communities” in Maine. On Monday, the department said that immigration agents had arrested more than 200 people so far. Several Democratic elected officials and lawyers for detained immigrants have said that at least some have no criminal records.

In Portland, a city of about 70,000 people that is home to many of the state’s estimated 50,000 immigrants, federal officers have been stopping cars, detaining motorists and staking out apartment buildings.

As of Monday, more than 60 people arrested in the Maine operation had sought emergency legal help from the Immigrant Legal Advocacy Project of Portland, its leaders said. At least eight detained Maine residents had been sent to detention centers in Louisiana.

As unmarked S.U.V.s circulated in the small city and social media filled with reports of arrests, some of the most consequential impacts were quietly felt at public schools, where teachers and administrators tracked escalating student absences and tried to offer families assurances of safety.

Though Maine is one of the whitest states in the nation, Portland’s school system is a testament to the significant number of immigrants, many from African countries, who have settled in the state in the past two decades. More than half of the system’s 6,200 students are Black, Hispanic, Native American, Asian or multiracial. Nearly 30 percent are English language learners; students speak more than 60 languages.

At some schools, 25 to 30 percent of students were absent last week, many of them immigrants or children of immigrants. Some did not show up because their parents had been detained. Others were kept at home by fearful family members who stayed inside to reduce their risk of encountering agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Absences were higher among some groups, said Sarah Lentz, chair of the Portland Board of Public Education: 41 percent of multilingual students, 39 percent of Hispanic and Latino students, and 34 percent of Black students were absent districtwide on Thursday, compared with 6 percent of white students.

In missing school, children are also losing access to other essentials, school leaders said, including free breakfasts, lunches and snacks; bags of food sent home to their families on weekends; counseling and legal services; and the use of showers and laundry facilities that were unavailable to some at home.

“We have almost 500 students who are housing insecure,” Ms. Lentz said. “If kids are not in school, their basic needs are challenged.”

In one elementary school classroom in Portland, roughly half of students were missing each day last week, said their teacher, who declined to be identified because she was not authorized by the school district to speak to the news media.

When students put on their coats and hats to go outside for recess on Thursday, after several days of indoor play, some of the 6-year-olds asked an anxious question, the teacher recalled: “What about the ICE people?”

At another school, where kindergartners blow a kiss every morning for each absent classmate, children sent kiss after kiss into the air last week.

On Monday, city schools were closed after a storm left 12 inches of snow on the ground. School officials are planning to discuss options for limited remote learning at a meeting on Tuesday, but said in a letter to parents that “we will not shift to remote learning across schools unless necessary for safety reasons.”

Across the city last week, nonimmigrant parents and community members organized “watch” teams to help at-risk families feel safer, with volunteers in bright yellow and orange vests patrolling playgrounds and school entrances daily, carrying whistles and keeping eyes on student pickups and drop-offs.

“We’re here in Portland because of the diversity — it’s a huge asset — and now our kids’ friends no longer feel safe coming to school,” said Katie Mears, 44, a parent who helped organize watches at one elementary school. “If we can use our privilege in a useful way, and stand out in the cold for an hour or two to make people feel safer, it’s 1,000 percent worth it.”

Their efforts took on new urgency after an ICE action unfolded a block or two from the school on Thursday, stoking fears. In another incident reported last week, a mother was detained while driving home from dropping off her child at Portland High School. One of the woman’s daughters told The Portland Press Herald that her mother is an immigrant from the Democratic Republic of Congo with a pending asylum application, four children and no criminal record.

She is also an employee of the school district, the superintendent, Ryan Scallon, wrote in an email to families on Saturday, calling her “a valued member” of its facilities team. He said the woman is legally approved to work in the U.S. and passed a background check clearing her to work in schools.

In Lewiston, a smaller city 30 miles to the north that is a focus of the ICE operation, African refugees and migrants started settling in large numbers more than two decades ago, including thousands who fled civil war in Somalia. State education officials said that Lewiston was also among the cities reporting widespread student absences last week, along with Westbrook, South Portland and Biddeford.

Multilingual students in the state had been scheduled to take a federally required English proficiency test last week. State officials said that in response to widespread absences, they had sought and were granted an extension for the testing.

Nsiona Nguizani, 42, an immigrant from Angola and an organizer with Portland Empowered, a nonprofit that helps immigrant children adjust to American schools, said he was concerned that students who were already behind would lose more ground if the federal crackdown persisted.

“The gap is so big,” he said, “and we cannot afford to stay home while schools keep going.”

Even if virtual schooling is offered, he said, younger children cannot be left alone, forcing parents to stay home or find other caregivers and adding to families’ financial burdens. He said he was encouraging parents to send their children to school, and to resist fear tactics that might be intended to pressure them to self-deport.

Families must balance the need to “keep people safe and at the same time keep living,” he said.

Classrooms were not the only place where children’s absences spurred concern. Doctors said that they, too, were taking note of canceled appointments — and worrying about missed vaccinations and screenings, and emerging health concerns that might go untreated

“Kids are already missing appointments, especially newborns,” said Dr. Cheryl Blank, a Portland pediatrician. “If they’re not going to the doctor, there’s a chance you’re missing something that you could potentially catch.”

In South Portland on Friday morning, Ms. Priddy said she had happily taken a break from making deliveries to drive a panicked stranger’s second grader to his school. The mother rode along with her, feeling safer because a white U.S. citizen was at the wheel, Ms. Priddy said. The woman shared that she was nine months pregnant, that her husband had done nothing wrong and that they had no other family nearby, Ms. Priddy said.

When they went their separate ways, she said, she gave the woman her cellphone number and told her to call if she needed anything.

“It takes a community,” Ms. Priddy said. “I told her, you don’t know me, but I will do my best.”

The deadly shooting of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old Veterans Affairs intensive care nurse, in Minneapolis on Saturday has Colorado leaders, immigrant rights groups and residents speaking out against the violent enforcement tactics caught on camera.

And many are wondering: Could we see a similar surge of federal agents and violence here?

Arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Colorado have quadrupled since President Donald Trump’s inauguration last January, including raids at apartment complexes, a night club and work places, sweeping up mostly people who do not have criminal records.

But the prospect of an influx of thousands of agents outnumbering local law enforcement in a metro area — what Minnesota leaders are calling an occupation — has some worried about how the state government and organizations would respond.

“It’s already come here,” said Enrique Orozco-Perez, co-executive director of Compañeros: Four Corners Immigrant Resource Center in Durango. “We’ve already seen the violence. ICE agents abducted two children from our community,” he said referring to the ICE arrest of two children and their father on their way to school there in October.

At the Colorado Capitol on Monday, Democratic state lawmakers said they stand with protestors in Minneapolis resisting ICE’s enforcement and expressed solidarity with Pretti’s parents, who live in Colorado.

“Our constituents are asking us, what happens when Colorado is next?” said House Speaker Julie McCluskie, D-Dillon. “Will they be able to exercise their constitutionally protected right to peacefully protest against a government they disagree with without weighing their life to do so?”

Republican Sen. Larry Liston of Colorado Springs appeared to blame the actions of Pretti and Renee Good, the 37-year-old mom who an immigration officer shot and killed in Minneapolis this month, for their deaths.

“It’s very unfortunate, but a normal, reasonable person would not bring a loaded 9 millimeter handgun to a demonstration,” Liston said. “I do not fear law enforcement, I support law enforcement. All we have to do is simply follow the directives that they give us and these kinds of incidents would not happen.”

Republican Sen. Mark Baisley of Woodland Park, who is running for U.S. Senate, blamed recently arrived immigrants for the “chaos,” drawing rebuke from Democrats.

Sen. Lindsey Daugherty, D-Arvada, tearfully described reading the news of Pretti’s killing while playing with her toddler. She is due to have another baby in a week, she said.

“What I would like to believe is that we can all agree that American citizens being shot and murdered on the streets during a protest should not be happening,” she said. “It is terrifying to bring children into this world while that is happening.”

Democrats have introduced a bill that would allow Coloradans to hold federal immigration officers accountable for abuses in state court and plan on introducing more bills next month that would require all law enforcement officers to display their name or identification number and increase state oversight of federal immigration detention centers, among other measures.

Attorney General Phil Weiser said his office received 180 reports over the last year of ICE agents acting dangerously which led him to open a portal this month so that the public could report incidents that will be reviewed by the Colorado Department of Law.

Weiser said he has talked to Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, also a Democrat, since this weekend about the cases Ellison is bringing against the Trump administration to preserve evidence in the Pretti killing and halt the ICE operation in the state.

“I would be prepared to do the same thing,” he said. “This is a moment that we’re testing the rule of law, and just because someone gets a badge, you give them a gun, doesn’t mean they can break the law.”

There is no indication that federal immigration authorities are planning to swarm Colorado and launch a similar enforcement campaign.

Senators from Colorado vow to vote against ICE funding
Democrats in Colorado’s congressional delegation — U.S. Sens. Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper, and U.S. Reps. Brittany Pettersen, Diana DeGette, Joe Neguse and Jason Crow — have condemned Pretti’s killing, and some have called for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to resign. Bennet and Hickenlooper have vowed to vote against a government funding bill that includes $64.4 billion for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, including $10 billion for ICE, risking another government shutdown. Democratic representatives from Colorado already voted no.

Republican U.S. Rep. Jeff Hurd called Pretti’s killing “a serious incident that warrants a full, independent, and transparent investigation before conclusions are drawn,” in a post on the social media site X. Republican Reps. Lauren Boebert, Jeff Crank and Gabe Evans have not released statements about the shooting.

ICE agents are already barred by a federal court from doing warrantless arrests in Colorado unless they document the probable cause beforehand that the person is violating immigration law and is a flight risk.

ACLU Legal Director Tim Macdonald, who brought the case against ICE along with two Denver law firms, said the court’s injunction prevents ICE from doing the kind of mass roundups of immigrants seen in Los Angeles, Chicago and now Minneapolis.

“It remains to be seen whether this administration, this ICE, will comply with federal court orders, or whether they will continue to engage in ways that threaten the very foundation of our democracy,” Macdonald said.

Already, the increased immigration crackdowns in Colorado have especially been felt by the restaurant industry, which has had to deal with surprise visits from ICE agents. Restaurant owners have reached out to the Colorado Restaurant Association for legal advice and support, said Sonia Riggs, the organization’s president and CEO.

“Last week, a member called us very scared because they thought there was an ICE raid happening across the street,” Riggs said. “When they ask us, we share the resources we’ve compiled from our legal partners, including emergency hotlines, best practices for completing I-9 audits, and what their rights are in the presence of DHS activity.”

Rural immigrant groups say they won’t back down
In Durango, where ICE has a field office, immigrant advocates say they already are dealing with harassment from agents.

An ICE agent driving by Orozco-Perez, opened his vehicle window recently and said, “Hey Enrique.”

Orozco-Perez took it as part of an intimidation campaign. ICE agents have held photocopied printouts of Compañeros volunteers’ driver’s licenses out their vehicle windows as they roll by, he said.

ICE officials did not respond Monday to a request for comment from The Colorado Sun.

If an ICE operation like the one in Minnesota comes to Colorado, Orozco-Perez believes the federal government would target Durango along with Denver. Conflict between agents and Compañeros advocates has been intense all year. At a protest after federal agents detained a father and his two children on the way to school in October, ICE agents fired rubber bullets and sprayed pepper spray at protestors.

At the request of Durango Police Chief Brice Current, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation is investigating whether an agent violated state criminal law when he threw a 57-year-old woman to the ground.

A group that ranges from 20 to 150 people protests against ICE weekly in Durango. Larger protests, including one in honor of Good, the woman who was shot and killed by an ICE agent in Minneapolis, drew crowds in the hundreds, Orozco-Perez said.

Compañeros has a network of about 100 people who work to confirm suspected ICE vehicles and communicate what they find to immigrants via social media and other channels that Orozco-Perez declined to reveal. On Monday morning, some of those “confirmers” investigated a report of a suspicious vehicle outside a mobile home park. It turned out it was a construction crew.

Each school day morning beginning at 6 a.m., volunteers are stationed at bus stops to make sure children get to school. They return from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m., walking children home. Another group of volunteers escorts people to the combined courthouse in La Plata County, which has city, state and federal courts in one spot.

The organization has counted 40 detentions in the region, which also includes Montezuma, Dolores and San Juan counties, in the past year, including four this month.

Going forward, Compañeros is planning more demonstrations.

“ICE can walk around this town and say my name and try to intimidate me, but we are in this fight,” Orozco-Perez said. “Everything we do is backed by the Constitution and the law.”

As for training for those participating in protests, Orozco-Perez said he cannot guarantee volunteers’ safety.

“As a country we have to understand that there is no safety anymore,” he said. “Let’s be honest about that. We understand the risk we take by fighting in the public eye.”

He did offer some advice, however. “If you are going to protest, stay peaceful, stay vigilant. Cotton is not good if you are getting doused with pepper spray. Mask up. Protect your eyes.”

Surveillance of ICE along I-70
Community surveillance to track ICE vehicles is also going on in mountain communities along Interstate 70 on the west side of the mountains.

Voces Unidas, a nonprofit based in Glenwood Springs, only shares the information with the immigrant community if staff find evidence of ongoing ICE activity. They don’t want to alarm residents for no reason if, for example, someone reports an ICE sighting at a gas station. Their service area includes Glenwood Springs, Vail and Silverthorne, all along I-70, where government vehicles pass through daily.

Employees check with local law enforcement in order to rule out their vehicles, and seek firsthand accounts, photos and videos from bystanders who witnessed ICE action. Voces Unidas doesn’t release information on detentions until it has confirmation from family members, including names and the detained person’s “A number,” the alien identification number assigned by the DHS.

Voces Unidas staffs a hotline 24 hours per day, taking reports of ICE sightings and calls from family and friends of those who have been detained. The organization pivoted when President Trump took office a year ago, hiring two new employees and turning its focus toward helping people detained in western Colorado and transported to the ICE detention center in Aurora. The nonprofit spent about $300,000 in the past year to hire staff and build an infrastructure that provides at least one hour of legal advice to those in ICE detention.

In one case, Voces Unidas helped a man with a green card who was held for 30 days, until a judge ruled his detention was unconstitutional, said Alex Sánchez, the nonprofit’s president and CEO. “The federal government wanted to fight,” he said.

The group’s research found that immigrants from rural Colorado are less likely to have attorneys than those living in Denver, mostly because immigrant services in rural areas are far more spread out and less known.

Voces Unidas staffs a hotline 24 hours per day, taking reports of ICE sightings and calls from family and friends of those who have been detained. The organization pivoted when President Trump took office a year ago, hiring two new employees and turning its focus toward helping people detained in western Colorado and transported to the ICE detention center in Aurora. The nonprofit spent about $300,000 in the past year to hire staff and build an infrastructure that provides at least one hour of legal advice to those in ICE detention.

In one case, Voces Unidas helped a man with a green card who was held for 30 days, until a judge ruled his detention was unconstitutional, said Alex Sánchez, the nonprofit’s president and CEO. “The federal government wanted to fight,” he said.

The group’s research found that immigrants from rural Colorado are less likely to have attorneys than those living in Denver, mostly because immigrant services in rural areas are far more spread out and less known.

“People are enraged and want to be doing something,” he said. “These are the moments where people ask, ‘Are we going to do the right thing or not?’ That is encouraging to me.”

As federal immigration authorities continue to defend the killing of 37-year-old Alex Pretti by a U.S. Border Patrol officer in Minneapolis Saturday, Gov. Kevin Stitt is among Republican elected leaders speaking out against the violence.
Stitt chairs the National Governors’ Association (NGA), a non-profit aimed at helping governors find bipartisan solutions to shared issues.

In light of the second killing this month at the hands of federal immigration authorities in Minneapolis, Stitt and NGA Vice Chair, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, a Democrat, issued a joint statement calling for a “reset” of federal immigration enforcement strategies. They’d like to see an approach that includes states and their elected officials.

“The use of federal authority should be guided by a transparent strategy that complements – rather than supplants – state and local efforts to uphold the law,” the statement reads. “As governors, we urge leaders at all levels to exercise wisdom and consider a reset of strategy toward a unified vision for immigration enforcement.”

“Governors are closest to conditions on the ground and best positioned to respond to their state’s matters of public safety,” the statement continues. “Scenes of violence and chaos on our streets are unacceptable and do not reflect who we are.”

Stitt appeared on CNN over the weekend and said Trump is getting “bad advice” from inside his administration.

“We have to enforce federal laws, but we need to know what the end game is,” Stitt said in the interview on CNN’s State of the Union. “And I don’t think it’s to deport every single non-U.S. citizen.”

Monday morning, Stitt commended President Trump for sending his appointed “border czar,” Tom Homan, to Minnesota. Homan is to act as a pair of “fresh eyes” on the ground there, following a conversation between Trump and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

The deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis this month were tragic and preventable. No matter where you stand on immigration enforcement, the shootings show that what the country has been doing is not working.

The loudest voices on each extreme have retreated to their usual corners. They have an interest in keeping our immigration problems unsolved and politically divisive. Everyone else must see that Congress and the president need to embrace a new comprehensive national immigration policy that acknowledges Americans’ many legitimate concerns about how the government has conducted immigration policy.

That starts with reviewing how we got here. During President Joe Biden’s term, lenient border policies and foolish state and local laws offering shelter and benefits to illegal immigrants resulted in millions of migrants entering the United States, overwhelming our cities, our legal and public education systems, and our social safety net.

Americans demanded action, electing Donald Trump in 2024. Now, just months from the November midterm elections, polls suggest that Americans are increasingly concerned about the Department of Homeland Security’s enforcement operations, including in Minneapolis. Americans do not want chaos. They want a common-sense bipartisan solution.

During the Biden and Trump administrations I have helped write bills with anyone from any party who would collaborate with me on finding that solution. A workable plan requires a secure border. Thankfully, the Trump administration has effectively stopped illegal border crossings and deported, by its own count, over 675,000 illegal immigrants. Any balanced immigration policy would preserve and expand on this progress — but humanely.

Agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection are conducting forceful operations in American communities. They should reassess their current tactics.

Irresponsible politicians have increased the danger by delegitimizing ICE — with some calling to abolish it — and standing behind sanctuary city policies that restrict necessary cooperation between immigration enforcement officers and state and local police. Local police departments are better suited to interact with the public. Collaboration among federal, state and local law enforcement officials might have prevented some of the chaos in Minneapolis.

Collaboration should start now. The F.B.I. and state and local departments should together investigate the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. A transparent and accountable process that protects the rights of everyone involved, including the deceased and their families, would ensure all relevant evidence is collected and bolster the public’s confidence in immigration enforcement and our justice system.

Congressional scrutiny would help, too. Lawmakers should immediately convene hearings with the leadership of Homeland Security, ICE, the Border Patrol and Citizenship and Immigration Services — not to provide a platform for partisan grandstanding, but to promote an honest national conversation about immigration enforcement.

After tensions have calmed, Congress can then piece together the rest of an immigration plan that settles the issue. Along with building on Mr. Trump’s border policies, a realistic plan would provide a path to legal status — not citizenship — for long-term illegal immigrants without criminal records. This path would be rigorous and fair, and it would aim to keep families together. Fair means those who benefit would face mandatory work requirements, forgo public assistance and pay fines and any back taxes they might owe.

Congress would have to change the legal immigration system, too. Lawmakers should create a system in which applicants’ merit matters more than it does now, better accounting for the country’s economic needs. I am the husband of a naturalized citizen. My wife came to the United States in pursuit of a better life. I will always fight to provide opportunity to others who have the potential and desire to contribute to America’s success.

We must be a nation of laws but also one that offers dignity and compassion to those seeking to pursue their American dream. The events of the past several years show that there will be no Democratic or Republican solution on immigration, only an American one.

After 40 years of failure — and, now, two more deaths that did not need to occur — my colleagues and I should feel only more profoundly the responsibility to rebuild trust and act in America’s common interest.

It took only a few minutes before everyone in the church knew that another person had been shot. I was sitting with Trygve Olsen, a big man in a wool hat and puffy vest, who lifted his phone to show me a text with the news. It was his 50th birthday, and one of the coldest days of the year. I asked him whether he was doing anything special to celebrate. “What should I be doing?” he replied. “Should I sit at home and open presents? This is where I’m supposed to be.”

He had come to Iglesia Cristiana La Viña Burnsville, about 15 miles south of the Twin Cities, to pick up food for families who are too afraid to go out—some have barely left home since federal immigration agents deployed to Minnesota two months ago. The church was filled with pallets of frozen meat and vegetables, diapers, fruit, and toilet paper. Outside, a man wearing a leather biker vest bearing the insignia of the Latin American Motorcycle Association, his blond beard flecked with ice crystals, directed a line of cars through the snow.

The man who had been shot—fatally, we later learned—was Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse who had been recording agents outside a donut shop. Officials at the Department of Homeland Security claimed that he had threatened agents with a gun; videos of the shooting show him holding only his phone when he is pushed down by masked federal agents and beaten, his licensed sidearm removed from its holster by one agent before another unloads several shots into his back. Pretti’s death was a reminder—if anyone in Minnesota still needed one—that people had reason to be hiding, and that those trying to help them, protect them, or protest on their behalf had reason to be scared.

The church has a mostly Hispanic and working-class flock. Its pastor, Miguel Aviles, who goes by Pastor Miguel, told me that it had sent out about 2,000 packages of food since the federal agents had arrived. Many of the people in hiding, he said, “have asylum cases pending. They already have work permits and stuff, but some of them are legal residents and still they’re afraid to go out. Because of their skin color, they are afraid to go out.”
Federal agents have arrested about 3,000 people in the state, but they have released the names of only about 240 of those detained, leaving unclear how many of the larger number have committed any crimes. Many more thousands of people have been affected by the arrests and the fear they have instilled. Minneapolis Public Radio estimates that in school districts “with widespread federal activity, as many as 20 to 40 percent of students have been absent in recent weeks.”

I don’t know what the feds expected when they surged into Minnesota. In late November, The New York Times reported on a public-benefit fraud scheme in the state that was executed mainly by people of Somali descent. Federal prosecutors under the Biden administration had already indicted dozens of people, but after the Times story broke, President Trump began ranting about Somalis, whom he referred to as “garbage”; declared that he didn’t want Somali immigrants in the country; and announced that he was sending thousands of armed federal immigration agents to Minneapolis. This weekend, he posted on social media that the agents were there because of “massive monetary fraud.” The real reason may be that a majority of Minnesotans did not vote for him. Trump has said that “I won Minnesota three times, and I didn’t get credit for it. That’s a crooked state.” He has never won Minnesota.

Perhaps the Trump-administration officials had hoped that a few rabble-rousers would get violent, justifying the kind of crackdown he seems to fantasize about. Maybe they had assumed that they would find only a caricature of “the resistance”—people who seethed about Trump online but would be unwilling to do anything to defend themselves against him.
Instead, what they discovered in the frozen North was something different: a real resistance, broad and organized and overwhelmingly nonviolent, the kind of movement that emerges only under sustained attacks by an oppressive state. Tens of thousands of volunteers—at the very least—are risking their safety to defend their neighbors and their freedom. They aren’t looking for attention or likes on social media. Unless they are killed by federal agents, as Pretti and Renee Good were, other activists do not even necessarily know their names. Many use a handle or code name out of fear of government retaliation. Their concerns are justified: A number of people working as volunteers or observers told me that they had been trailed home by ICE agents, and some of their communications have already been infiltrated, screenshotted, and posted online, forcing them to use new text chains and code names. One urgent question among observers, as the videos of Pretti’s killing spread, was what his handle might have been.

Olsen had originally used the handle “Redbear” in communicating with me, but later said I could name him. He had agreed to let me ride along while he did his deliveries. As he loaded up his truck with supplies, he wore just a long-sleeved red shirt and vest, apparently unfazed by the Minnesota cold.
“This is my first occupation,” Olsen said as I climbed into the truck. “Welcome to the underground, I guess.”

The number of Minnesotans resisting the federal occupation is so large that relatively few could be characterized as career activists. They are ordinary Americans—people with jobs, moms and dads, friends and neighbors. They can be divided into roughly three groups.

The largest is the protesters, who show up at events such as Friday’s march in downtown Minneapolis, and at the airport, where deportation flights take off. Many protesters have faced tear gas and pepper spray, and below-zero temperatures—during the Twin Cities march on Friday, I couldn’t take notes; the ink in my pens had frozen.
Then there are the people who load up their car with food, toiletries, and school supplies from churches or schools to take to families in hiding. They also help families who cannot work meet their rent or mortgage payments. In addition to driving around with Olsen, I rode along with a Twin Cities mom of young kids named Amanda as she did deliveries (she asked me to use only her first name). Riding in her small car—her back row was taken up by three child seats and a smattering of stray toys—she told me that she’d gotten involved after more than 100 students at her kids’ elementary school simply stopped coming in. Parents got organized to provide the families with food, to shepherd their kids to school, and to arrange playdates for those stuck inside.
Amanda’s father and husband are immigrants, she said, and she speaks Spanish. “I can be a conduit between those who want to help and those who need help,” she told me. She calls each family before knocking on the door, so they don’t have to worry that they are being tricked by ICE. At one home, a woman asked us to go around back because a suspicious vehicle was idling out front. At another home, a little girl in pigtails beamed as Amanda handed her a Target bag full of school supplies.
Finally, there’s those most at risk of coming into violent contact with federal agents, a group that’s come to be popularly known as ICE Watch, although the designation is unofficial—as far as I can tell, you’re in ICE Watch if you watch ICE. These are the whistle-wielding pedestrians and drivers calling themselves “observers” or “commuters” who patrol for federal agents (usually identifiable by their SUVs with out-of-state plates) and alert the neighborhood to their presence. Pretti and Good, the two Minneapolis residents killed by federal agents, fit in this category.
Trump-administration officials and MAGA influencers have repeatedly called these activists “violent” and said they are involved in “riots.” But the resistance in Minnesota is largely characterized by a conscious, strategic absence of physical confrontation. Activists have made the decision to emphasize protection, aid, and observation. When matters escalate, it is usually the choice of the federal agents. Of the three homicides in Minneapolis this year, two were committed by federal agents.
“There’s been an incredible, incredible response from the community. I’ve seen our neighbors go straight from allies to family—more than family—checking in on each other, offering food and rides for kids and all kinds of support, alerting each other if there’s ICE or any kind of danger,” Malika Dahir, a local activist of Somali descent, told me.
If the Minnesota resistance has an overarching ideology, you could call it “neighborism”—a commitment to protecting the people around you, no matter who they are or where they came from. The contrast with the philosophy guiding the Trump administration couldn’t be more extreme. Vice President Vance has said that “it is totally reasonable and acceptable for American citizens to look at their next-door neighbors and say, ‘I want to live next to people who I have something in common with. I don’t want to live next to four families of strangers.’” Minnesotans are insisting that their neighbors are their neighbors whether they were born in Minneapolis or Mogadishu. That is, arguably, a deeply Christian philosophy, one apparently loathed by some of the most powerful Christians in America.

On Wednesday, I met with two volunteers who went by the handles “Green Bean” and “Cobalt.” They picked me up in the parking lot of a Target, not far from where Good was killed two weeks earlier. Cobalt works in tech but has recently been spending more time on patrol than at her day job. Green Bean is a biologist, but she told me the grant that had been funding her work hadn’t been renewed under the Trump administration. Neither of them had imagined doing what they were doing now. “I’m supposed to be creeping around in the woods looking at insects,” Green Bean said.
Most commuters work in pairs—a co-pilot listens in on a dispatcher who provides the locations of ICE encounters and can run plates through a database of cars that federal agents have used in the past. Green Bean explained what happens when they identify an ICE vehicle. (Both ICE and Border Patrol are in Minneapolis, but everyone just calls them ICE.) The commuters will follow the agents, honking loudly, until they leave the neighborhood or stop and get out.
The commuters—as my colleague Robert Worth reported—do not have a centralized leadership but have been trained by local activist groups that have experience from past protests against police killings, and recent immigration-enforcement sweeps in L.A. and Chicago. The observers are taught to conscientiously follow the law, including traffic rules, and to try to avoid physical confrontation with federal agents.
If the agents detain someone, the observers will try to get that person’s name so they can inform the family. But ICE prefers to make arrests—which the ICE Watchers call “abductions”—quietly. More often than not, Green Bean said, when these volunteers draw attention, the agents will “leave rather than dig in.” She added, “They are huge pussies, I will be honest.”
As we cruised through the Powderhorn neighborhood, practically every business had an ICE OUT sign in the window. Graffiti trashing ICE was everywhere, as were posters of Good labeled AMERICAN MOM KILLED BY ICE. Listening to the dispatcher, Cobalt relayed directions to Green Bean about the locations of ICE vehicles, commuters who had been boxed in or threatened by agents, and possible “abductions.”
About 30 minutes into the patrol, Green Bean saw a white Jeep Wagoneer with out-of-state plates and read out the numbers. “Confirmed ICE,” Cobalt said, and we began following the Wagoneer as it drove through the neighborhood. Another car of commuters joined us, making as much noise as possible.
After about 10 minutes, the Wagoneer got onto the highway. Green Bean followed until we could be sure that it wasn’t doubling back to the neighborhood, and then we turned around.

Most encounters with ICE end like that. But sometimes situations deteriorate—as with Good, who was killed while doing a version of what Green Bean and Cobalt were now doing. The task is stressful for the observers, who understand that even minor encounters can turn deadly.
The next day, I drove around with another pair of commuters who went by “Judy” and “Lime.” Both told me they were anti-Zionist Jews who had been involved in pro-Palestinian and Black Lives Matter protests. Lime’s day job is with an abortion-rights organization, and Judy is a rabbi. “I did protective presence in the West Bank,” Lime told me, referring to a form of protest in which activists try to deter settler violence by simply being present in Palestinian communities. “This is very similar.”
About an hour into our drive, we came across an ICE truck. Judy started blaring the horn, and I heard her mutter to herself: “We’re just driving, we’re just driving, which is legal. I hate this.” I asked them both if they were scared. “I do not feel scared, but I probably should,” Lime said.
Judy said she had been out on patrol days after Good was killed, and had gotten boxed in and yelled at by federal agents. “It was very scary,” Judy told me. “Murdering someone definitely works as an intimidation tactic. You just have no idea what is going to happen.” She said that ICE agents had taken a picture of her license plate and then later showed up at her house, leaning out of their car to take another picture—making it clear to Judy that they knew who she was.
Green Bean had told me the same thing—that agents had come to her house, followed her when she left, and then blocked her vehicle and screamed at her to “stop fucking following us. This is your last warning.” Green Bean was able to laugh while retelling this. “I just stared at them until they left,” she said.
We drove past Good’s memorial. Tributes to her—flowers and letters—were still there, covered in a light powder of snow. We didn’t yet know at the time that residents would soon set up another memorial, for Pretti.

The broad nature of the civil resistance in Minnesota should not lead anyone to believe that no one there supports what ICE is doing. Plenty of people do. Trump came close to winning the state in 2024, and many people here, especially outside the Twin Cities, believe the administration’s rhetoric about targeting “the worst of the worst,” despite what the actual statistics reveal.
“You don’t have to go too far south” to find places where Minnesotans “welcome ICE into their restaurants and bars and sort of love what they do,” Tom Jenkins, the lead pastor of Mount Cavalry Lutheran Church in suburban Eagan, which is also helping with food drives, told me. “A lot of people are still cheering ICE on because they don’t think that whatever people are telling them or showing them is real.”
Although most of the coverage has understandably focused on the cities, suburban residents told me that they had seen operations all over the state. “There are mobile homes not far from where I live,” Jenkins said. Agents “were there every day, you know: 10, 15, 20 agents working the bus stops and bus drop-offs.” He added: “They’re all over.”
Even among those involved in opposing ICE in Minnesota, people have a range of political views. The nonviolent nature of the movement, and the focus on caring for neighbors, has drawn in volunteers with many different perspectives on immigration, including people who might have been supportive if the Trump administration’s claims of a targeted effort to deport violent criminals had been sincere.
“One of the things that I believe, and I know most of the Latino community agrees, is that we want the bad people out. We want the criminals out,” Pastor Miguel, who immigrated from Mexico 30 years ago, told me. “All of us came here looking for a better life for us and for our children. So when we have criminals, rapists—when we have people who have done horrible things in our streets, in our communities—we are afraid of them. We don’t want them here.”
The problem is that federal agents are not going after just criminals. Growing distraught, Pastor Miguel said that one of the men who helped organize the food drive, a close friend of his who he believed had legal status, had been picked up by federal agents the day before I visited.
“I just—I didn’t have words,” he said. “And yet I cannot crumble; I cannot fall. Because all these families also need us.”

Two days after Pretti was killed, my colleague Nick Miroff broke the news that Gregory Bovino, the Border Patrol official who had led the operation in Minneapolis, would be leaving the city and replaced by Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan. Bovino, strutting around in body armor or his distinctive long coat, seemed to relish his role as a villain to his critics, encouraging aggressive tactics by federal agents and sometimes engaging in them himself. The day I accompanied Green Bean and Cobalt, Bovino fumbled with a gas canister before throwing it into a sparse crowd of protesters.
Bovino’s departure seemed an admission that Minnesotans aren’t the only Americans who won’t tolerate more deaths at the hands of federal agents. The people of Minnesota have forced the Trump administration into a strategic retreat—one inflicted not as rioters or insurgents, but as neighbors.
After Friday’s protest, when thousands marched in frigid downtown Minneapolis, chanting, “No Trump, no troops, Twin Cities ain’t licking boots!” I spoke with a young protester named Ethan McFarland, who told me that his parents are immigrants from Uganda. He had recently asked his mother to show him her immigration papers, in case she got picked up. This kind of state oppression, he said, is exactly what his mother was “trying to get away from” when she came to the United States.
McFarland’s remarks reminded me of something Stephen Miller, the Trump adviser, had written: “Migrants and their descendants recreate the conditions, and terrors, of their broken homelands.” In Minnesota, the opposite was happening. The “conditions and terrors” of immigrants’ “broken homelands” weren’t being re-created by immigrants. They were being re-created by people like Miller. The immigrants simply have the experience to recognize them.
The federal surge into Minneapolis reflects a series of mistaken MAGA assumptions. The first is the belief that diverse communities aren’t possible: “Social bonds form among people who have something in common,” Vance said in a speech last July. “If you stop importing millions of foreigners into the country, you allow social cohesion to form naturally.” Vance’s remarks are the antithesis to the neighborism of the Twin Cities, whose people do not share the narcissism of being capable of loving only those who are exactly like them.
A second MAGA assumption is that the left is insincere in its values, and that principles of inclusion and unity are superficial forms of virtue signaling. White liberals might put a sign in their front yard saying IMMIGRANTS WELCOME, but they will abandon those immigrants at the first sensation of sustained pressure.
And in Trump’s defense, this has turned out to be true of many liberals in positions of power—university administrators, attorneys at white-shoe law firms, political leaders. But it is not true of millions of ordinary Americans, who have poured into the streets in protest, spoken out against the administration, and, in Minnesota, resisted armed men in masks at the cost of their own life.

The MAGA faith in liberal weakness has been paired with the conviction that real men—Trump’s men—are conversely strong. Consider Miller’s bizarre meltdown while addressing Memphis police in October. “The gangbangers that you deal with—they think that they’re ruthless? They have no idea how ruthless we are. They think they’re tough? They have no idea how tough we are,” Miller said. “They think they’re hard-core? We are so much more hard-core than they are.” Around this time, Miller moved his family onto a military base—for safety reasons.
The federal agents sent to Minnesota wear body armor and masks, and bear long guns and sidearms. But their skittishness and brutality are qualities associated with fear, not resolve. It takes far more courage to stare down the barrel of a gun while you’re armed with only a whistle and a phone than it does to point a gun at an unarmed protester.
Every social theory undergirding Trumpism has been broken on the steel of Minnesotan resolve. The multiracial community in Minneapolis was supposed to shatter. It did not. It held until Bovino was forced out of the Twin Cities with his long coat between his legs.
The secret fear of the morally depraved is that virtue is actually common, and that they’re the ones who are alone. In Minnesota, all of the ideological cornerstones of MAGA have been proved false at once. Minnesotans, not the armed thugs of ICE and the Border Patrol, are brave. Minnesotans have shown that their community is socially cohesive—because of its diversity and not in spite of it. Minnesotans have found and loved one another in a world atomized by social media, where empty men have tried to fill their lonely soul with lies about their own inherent superiority. Minnesotans have preserved everything worthwhile about “Western civilization,” while armed brutes try to tear it down by force.
No matter how many more armed men Trump sends to impose his will on the people of Minnesota, all he can do is accentuate their valor. No application of armed violence can make the men with guns as heroic as the people who choose to stand in their path with empty hands in defense of their neighbors. These agents, and the president who sent them, are no one’s heroes, no one’s saviors—just men with guns who have to hide their faces to shoot a mom in the face, and a nurse in the back.

In the wake of Alex Pretti’s killing by federal agents in south Minneapolis on Saturday, Jan. 24, political and law enforcement leaders in Minnesota spent two days sounding the alarm that federal agents are refusing to follow any semblance of Minnesota law while they carry out Operation Metro Surge.

Late Saturday night, a federal judge ordered federal officials not to destroy any evidence related to the shooting of Pretti after the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office and Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension filed a lawsuit to preserve crime scene materials.

On Sunday, Jan. 25, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem defended the shooting, saying her agents feared for their lives and that her office would lead the federal investigation of their use of force. In Minneapolis, BCA officials were finally able to access the crime scene one day after the shooting, as local officials took steps to ensure a state investigation into the killing.

As the push-and-pull between local and federal law enforcement reaches a previously unimaginable tension, state leaders are struggling with how to change that reality.
Six hours after Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse with the Minneapolis VA, was shot and killed on Eat Street by federal agents, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted a statement to social media that included a simple argument:
“ICE > MN”

If the statement was meant to be provocative — the second-highest ranking military commander in the country belittling his home state as it wrestled with another tragedy — it was also hard to dispute given the facts on the ground.

“This is nothing anybody here, or probably anybody in the country, has ever experienced,” Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty told the Minnesota Star Tribune on Sunday. “Our own federal government not following the law.”

Federal agents move through the city and state in unmarked vehicles. They wear face coverings and often have no visible badge numbers or other identification. Anyone whom they believe is interfering with their operations can be detained and charged with a federal crime.

When federal agents carry out a potential criminal act under Minnesota legal statutes, they do not hesitate to evacuate anyone involved from the scene. Quickly afterward, federal officials as prominent as President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance have made public statements arguing the officers did nothing wrong.

That’s what happened after federal agents shot and killed Renee Good and Pretti. The killings took place 17 days apart and less than 2 miles away from each other in south Minneapolis.

Gov. Tim Walz said on Saturday that it baffles him that federal officers can shoot and kill someone on Minnesota’s streets and simply walk away.

“You kill a man, and then you just leave?” Walz said. “You’re law enforcement, and you just leave. Is there a single case in American history where you just like walk away and say, ‘I guess that just happened’? And we’re not going to clean up our mess?”

Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension Superintendent Drew Evans said local leaders are having active discussions to try to make sure that local, state and federal law enforcement do not end up in an armed standoff if federal officers refuse to follow state laws.

“I will tell you that I and other law enforcement leaders continue to have discussions about this,” Evans said. “It is important for people to understand across Minnesota that there are two different sets of legal entities in the United States that conduct law enforcement operations: state, local and federal and then tribal, territorial. Under normal circumstances, we work hand-in-hand and in partnership on a variety of different criminal investigations.”
After decades of normal relationships, that partnership is deteriorating.

After the shooting of Pretti, a licensed gun owner with a permit to carry and no criminal record, the BCA was physically blocked from accessing the crime scene to conduct an independent investigation. That limits access to evidence like shell casings, DNA samples and witness interviews. The BCA took the extra step of getting a judicial warrant to access the scene. The federal government didn’t abide by the warrant. When Evans tried to speak with the federal government about the investigation, they didn’t respond.

“I attempted to contact the individual I was told was the overall commander at the scene,” Evans said. “I have not received a call back from him.”

The BCA finally accessed the scene on Sunday, and agents were seen moving throughout the area as peaceful protests continued near where Pretti was killed.

Alex Jeffrey Pretti, 37, was an avid outdoorsman who enjoyed getting in adventures with Joule, his beloved Catahoula Leopard dog who also recently died. He worked for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and had participated in protests following the Jan. 7 killing of Renee Good by an Immigration and Customs officer.

“He cared about people deeply and he was very upset with what was happening in Minneapolis and throughout the United States with ICE, as millions of other people are upset,” said Michael Pretti, Alex’s father. “He thought it was terrible, you know, kidnapping children, just grabbing people off the street. He cared about those people, and he knew it was wrong, so he did participate in protests.”

Pretti was a U.S. citizen, born in Illinois. Like Good, court records showed he had no criminal record and his family said he had never had any interactions with law enforcement beyond a handful of traffic tickets.

In a recent conversation with their son, his parents, who live in Colorado, told him to be careful when protesting.

“We had this discussion with him two weeks ago or so, you know, that go ahead and protest, but do not engage, do not do anything stupid, basically,” Michael Pretti said. “And he said he knows that. He knew that.”

The Department of Homeland Security said the man was shot after he “approached” Border Patrol officers with a 9 mm semiautomatic handgun. Officials did not specify if Pretti brandished the gun. In bystander videos of the shooting that emerged soon after, Pretti is seen with a phone in his hand but none appears to show him with a visible weapon.

Family members said Pretti owned a handgun and had a permit to carry a concealed handgun in Minnesota. They said they had never known him to carry it.

Alex Pretti’s family struggles for information about what happened
The family first learned of the shooting when they were called by an Associated Press reporter. They watched the video and said the man killed appeared to be their son. They then tried reaching out to officials in Minnesota.

“I can’t get any information from anybody,” Michael Pretti said Saturday. “The police, they said call Border Patrol, Border Patrol’s closed, the hospitals won’t answer any questions.”

Eventually, the parents called the Hennepin County Medical Examiner, who they said confirmed had a body matching the name and description of their son.

As of Saturday evening, the family said they had still not heard from anyone at a federal law enforcement agency about their son’s death.

After seeing videos of top Trump administration officials suggesting their son was a “domestic terrorist” who attacked the officers who shot him, they issued a written statement describing themselves as both heartbroken and angry.

“The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting,” the family’s statement said. They added that videos showed Alex Pretti was not holding a gun when he was tackled by federal agents, but holding his phone with one hand and using the other to shield a woman who was being pepper-sprayed.

“Please get the truth out about our son. He was a good man,” they said.

Alex Pretti grew up in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where he played football, baseball and ran track for Preble High School. He was a Boy Scout and sang in the Green Bay Boy Choir.

After graduation, he went to the University of Minnesota, graduating in 2011 with a bachelor’s degree in biology, society and the environment, according to the family. He worked as a research scientist before returning to school to become a registered nurse.

Alex Pretti had protested before
Pretti’s ex-wife, who spoke to the AP but later said she didn’t want her name used, said she was not surprised he would have been involved in protesting Trump’s immigration crackdown. She said she had not spoken to him since they divorced more than two years ago and she moved to another state.

She said he was a Democratic voter and that he had participated in the wave of street protests following the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020, not far from the couple’s neighborhood. She described him a someone who might shout at law enforcement officers at a protest, but she had never known him to be physically confrontational.

She said Pretti got a permit to carry a concealed firearm about three years ago and that he owned at least one semiautomatic handgun when they separated.

Pretti had ‘a great heart’
Pretti lived in a four-unit condominium building about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) from where he was shot. Neighbors described him as quiet and warmhearted.

“He’s a wonderful person,” said Sue Gitar, who lived downstairs from Pretti and said he moved into the building about three years ago. “He has a great heart.”

If there was something suspicious going on in the neighborhood, or when they worried the building might have a gas leak, he would jump in to help.

Pretti lived alone and worked long hours as a nurse, but he was not a loner, his neighbors said, and would sometimes have friends over.

His neighbors knew he had guns — he’d occasionally take a rifle to shoot at a gun range — but were surprised at the idea that he might carry a pistol on the streets.

“I never thought of him as a person who carried a gun,” said Gitar.

Pretti was also passionate about the outdoors
A competitive bicycle racer who lavished care on his new Audi, Pretti had also been deeply attached to his dog, who died about a year ago.

His parents said their last conversation with their son was a couple days before his death. They talked about repairs he had done to the garage door of his home. The worker was a Latino man, and they said with all that was happening in Minneapolis he gave the man a $100 tip.

Pretti’s mother said her son cared immensely about the direction the county was headed, especially the Trump administration’s rollback of environmental regulations.

“He hated that, you know, people were just trashing the land,” Susan Pretti said. “He was an outdoorsman. He took his dog everywhere he went. You know, he loved this country, but he hated what people were doing to it.”

Federal officials sought to portray a 37-year-old Minneapolis resident killed by Border Patrol agents on Saturday as a domestic terrorist, saying he wanted to “massacre” law enforcement, even as videos emerged that appeared to directly contradict their account.

The man, Alex Jeffrey Pretti, was an intensive-care nurse described by the Minneapolis police chief as a U.S. citizen with no criminal record. Federal officials said he was armed, but there is no sign in videos analyzed by The New York Times that he pulled his weapon, or that agents even knew he had one until he was already pinned on the sidewalk.

An agent had already removed Mr. Pretti’s gun when two other agents opened fire, shooting him in the back and as he lay on the ground. At least 10 shots were fired, killing him. Mr. Pretti had a legal permit to carry a firearm, said the police chief, Brian O’Hara.

The shooting on a frigid morning in Minneapolis’s Whittier neighborhood renewed protests and clashes with law enforcement in a city where tensions have reached a breaking point after weeks of aggressive federal immigration action. Federal agents deployed tear gas and flash bangs to drive demonstrators away from the shooting scene as they demanded that local police officers arrest the agents who killed Mr. Pretti.

Officials said protests in Minneapolis had remained mostly peaceful, with a few exceptions. But as dusk fell, officials deployed the National Guard to ensure that demonstrations did not turn violent. At least 1,000 people turned out for a vigil for Mr. Pretti in Whittier Park on Saturday night, despite subzero temperatures.

A colleague of Mr. Pretti, Dimitri Drekonja, said he had worked as a nurse at the Veterans Affairs hospital in Minneapolis. “He was a really great colleague and a really great friend,” Mr. Drekonja said. “The default look on his face was a smile.”

Here’s what we’re covering:

Video analysis: Video footage posted to social media and verified by The Times shows Mr. Pretti stepping between a woman and an agent who is pepper spraying her. Other agents then pepper spray Mr. Pretti, who is holding a phone in one hand and nothing in the other. His weapon remains concealed until federal agents find and take it from him. Concealed or open carry is legal for permit holders in Minnesota. Read more ›

Federal claims: President Trump and administration officials declared without evidence that Mr. Pretti intended to attack federal agents. Gregory Bovino, the official in charge of the president’s Border Patrol operations, said that Mr. Pretti was intent on a “massacre.” Kristi Noem, the Homeland Security secretary, said, “This looks like a situation where an individual arrived at the scene to inflict maximum damage.” Their accounts directly contradict video evidence of the encounter. Read more ›

Investigators blocked: Drew Evans, who heads the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, said federal agents had initially barred state investigators from the scene of Saturday’s shooting. Mr. Evans said his agency took the rare step of obtaining a search warrant for access to a public sidewalk, but were still stymied. Federal officials eventually left the scene after clashing with protesters, but the demonstrations had grown large enough by that point to prevent state agents from investigating.

Self-investigation: Federal authorities said the Department of Homeland Security, which includes ICE and Border Patrol, would lead the federal shooting investigation, with assistance from the F.B.I. But senior Homeland Security and Justice Department officials said it was already clear that Mr. Pretti and local officials were to blame.

Minneapolis outrage: Mayor Jacob Frey accused the Trump administration of terrorizing his city. “How many more Americans need to die or get badly hurt for this operation to end?” he asked. At least two other people have been shot there by federal agents this month, including Renee Good, 37, who was killed on Jan. 7. Read more ›

“Force of good”: Accolades poured in for Mr. Pretti from those who knew him. Ruth Anway, another nurse who worked with him, described Mr. Pretti as a passionate colleague and kind friend with a sharp sense of humor. “He wanted to be helpful, to help humanity, and have a career that was a force of good in the world,” she said.

A federal judge in Minnesota will consider an extraordinary legal question on Monday: Can a deployment of federal law enforcement officers be so dangerous and so intrusive that it violates a state’s sovereignty under the 10th Amendment?

Lawyers for the state of Minnesota, along with the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, have claimed that the Trump administration’s surge of some 3,000 immigration agents to the state has crossed the line into an unconstitutional and illegal occupation. They have asked a judge to temporarily halt the surge, which has led to three shootings, thousands of arrests and tense protests.

The Trump administration has dismissed the state’s legal theory, saying in court filings that it “would constitute an unprecedented act of judicial overreach” to expel federal officers from Minnesota. They have argued that Operation Metro Surge, as the administration has named its Minnesota campaign, is fully legal, and that it is up to the federal government to decide when and how to enforce federal laws.

The spotlight on Monday’s hearing in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis intensified over the weekend after federal agents shot and killed Alex Pretti, a local resident and nurse who appeared to be filming agents on the south side of Minneapolis. Federal officials said that Mr. Pretti, a U.S. citizen, had endangered agents. They accused him of engaging in “domestic terrorism” and noted that he was in possession of a gun.

Videos on social media that were verified by The New York Times contradict portions of the Department of Homeland Security’s account of the shooting. Minneapolis officials said Mr. Pretti, who is seen in the videos holding a cellphone, was licensed to legally carry a gun, and a witness who gave a sworn statement in court disputed the federal account of the incident.

In a letter to the judge on Saturday night, hours after the shooting, lawyers for the state and the cities reiterated their calls for an immediate pause of the surge that began late last year, writing that “the situation is grave.”

“This cannot continue,” they wrote. “We need the court to act to stop this surge before yet another resident dies because of Operation Metro Surge.”

What state and city lawyers say
The lawsuit, filed two weeks ago, argues that the surge in immigration enforcement in Minnesota is motivated by a “desire to punish political opponents and score partisan points.” The state and local governments told the judge that the deployment had panicked residents, endangered public safety and infringed on their ability to carry out basic government functions. Local law enforcement is overburdened, they said, and schools have been disrupted.

The case was filed days after the fatal shooting of Renee Good by a federal agent in Minneapolis. It does not seek an end to all immigration enforcement in Minnesota, but asks the judge to order a return to pre-surge levels of agents. It also asks for restrictions on the actions of agents who remain.

“Defendants’ actions appear designed to provoke community outrage, sow fear, and inflict emotional distress, and they are interfering with the ability of state and local officials to protect and care for their residents,” the lawsuit said.

Lawyers for the state and cities have asked Judge Kate M. Menendez to temporarily block Operation Metro Surge and to immediately impose restrictions on the actions of remaining immigration agents. But Judge Menendez, who was nominated to the bench by President Joseph R. Biden Jr., declined to rule on that timetable during a hearing earlier this month, saying that the Trump administration needed time to respond to the case in writing.

Since that hearing, federal agents have been involved in two more shootings in Minneapolis.

What Trump administration lawyers say
Lawyers for the Trump administration have described the state and local governments’ claims as a fundamental misreading of the 10th Amendment, which gives powers not reserved for the federal government to the states.

The “10th Amendment and related claims have not a shred of legal support,” they said in a brief filed with the court.

The administration’s lawyers described Operation Metro Surge as a lawful campaign that had resulted in the arrests of people convicted of serious crimes and had made Minnesota safer. They said the president was acting within his authority and delivering on a campaign promise to crack down on illegal immigration.

“President Trump campaigned and won election on a promise to enforce immigration laws enacted by Congress,” the federal government’s lawyers said. “For the last year, D.H.S. has delivered on that promise by surging resources to the removal of aliens who entered this country illegally.”

The legal backdrop
Judge Menendez is scheduled to hear arguments on whether to grant a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction at the courthouse in downtown Minneapolis on Monday morning. She could rule at any time.

During an earlier hearing, the judge noted that there was limited case law for a state challenging a federal law enforcement deployment on 10th Amendment grounds. Other Democratic-led states have challenged Mr. Trump’s deployment of National Guard members or federal troops during immigration enforcement campaigns.

Fred Smith Jr., a Stanford law professor, said Minnesota’s lawsuit “makes novel claims,” but that the “central government is doing novel things, and so there’s not a lot of precedent.”

A ruling in favor of Minnesota, Mr. Smith said, could “open up a door to kind of a new area of 10th Amendment jurisprudence, where the federal government in the future would have to be mindful about acting in ways that unduly interfered with states’ ability to carry out their own laws.”

On the same day that Minnesota officials sued, Illinois officials filed their own 10th Amendment case asking another judge to block U.S. Customs and Border Protection “from conducting civil immigration enforcement” in the state without “express congressional authorization.” An order has yet to be issued in that case.

Judge Menendez is also presiding over a case filed by Minnesota protesters who accused immigration agents of systematically violating their rights. She issued a preliminary injunction in that case, but that ruling was stayed by an appellate court after the Trump administration appealed.

After weeks of federal raids and aggression, Minneapolis city council member Aisha Chughtai said what her community needs most now “is for ICE to leave Minnesota”.

Chughtai represents the district where 37-year-old nurse Alex Pretti was shot and killed by federal agents on Saturday, the second killing of a Minneapolis resident by a federal agent on the city’s southside this year.

“There have been three homicides in Minneapolis, and two of them have been perpetrated by ICE,” she said. “The number one deadly killer of Minneapolitans right now is ICE.”

The number one deadly killer of Minneapolitans right now is ICE

Aisha Chughtai, Minneapolis city council
On Saturday, she woke up to calls from a neighbor that someone had been shot in the neighborhood. She lives four blocks away and rushed to the scene, arriving as an ambulance was leaving with Pretti. She stayed as dozens of federal agents came in, liberally deploying chemicals into the crowd of residents.

The area is one of the densest in the city, she said – apartment buildings and businesses nearby were filled with teargas. She watched agents tackle someone who was walking down the sidewalk and violently arrest them. When she tried to get away from a cloud of teargas, two agents with guns drawn told her she couldn’t go through.

It was a “devastating day” for the neighborhood, amid more than a month of destruction in south Minneapolis, home to the largest immigrant community in the state. Daily, federal agents roam the area, trying to detain immigrants and arresting or deploying chemicals at people who try to prevent them from taking their neighbors, Chughtai said.

“There’s so much fear and grief, despair, anger, pain in our community, so many folks who are afraid of being in their homes, of leaving their homes, because they don’t know if that will be the last time they ever see their loved ones,” she said.

On the ground, though, Minneapolis residents aren’t giving up the fight. “Our spirit can’t be broken here,” she said. “We’re going to continue to show up for our neighbors.”

As a local official, she is pushing for local leaders to arrest those who killed Pretti and Renee Good and hold them to account. She and the rest of the council are also calling on Minnesota governor Tim Walz to declare a state of emergency and put in place an eviction moratorium. In her district, approximately 80% of people are renters, and the majority of Minneapolis residents are renters. She wants to do “every single thing we can to keep people safe in their homes and unified with their families”.

Minneapolis residents should continue to show up and participate in their neighborhood’s rapid response networks, pick up whistles and get trained on how to be legal observers, she said. For people outside the state, it helps to amplify what is actually happening on the ground and dismantle the federal narrative about Pretti and the city, and find ways to donate to organizations and people helping locally.

We have to keep pushing until we get our city back, our state back
Aisha Chughtai
“The only thing that’s within our control as individuals right now is that we continue to show up, to resist, to be in the streets, to be in our neighborhoods, and continue calling for ICE to to leave our city, to leave our state,” she said. “I think our state and local officials are unified in wanting to see that outcome, and we have to keep pushing until we get our city back, our state back.”

Even if ICE leaves tomorrow – and the Trump administration has given no signs so far it will soon pull its forces out of the state – the impacts of this period in Minneapolis will be felt for much longer. Residents, including children, have been traumatized, witnessed deaths, violence and family separations. But that recovery can’t even begin until ICE leaves, Chughtai said.

But, Chughtai said, “I don’t think that we can even begin to rebuild or recover from this grief and trauma that we’ve been experiencing now for two months until these people leave our state.”

The Department of Homeland Security is coming under unprecedented scrutiny from Congress in the wake of the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, with Democratic attacks more strident and Republican defenses more muted than ever before.

Why it matters: The growing tension could result in a government shutdown, politically charged hearings and even an impeachment vote.

More and more Democrats are signing onto Rep. Robin Kelly’s (D-Ill.) articles of impeachment against DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, with Kelly’s office telling Axios they expect a surge in co-sponsors in the coming day.
Senate Democrats are threatening to allow a partial government shutdown next week unless a DHS funding bill is altered with language reining in the agency.
And Rep. Andrew Garbarino (R-N.Y.), the chair of the House Homeland Security Committee, has asked the heads of ICE, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to testify to his panel.
Driving the news: While many Republican leaders and loyal Trump allies leapt to DHS’ defense in the wake of the shooting, a noticeably large group of GOP lawmakers offered more equivocal statements than in the aftermath of the Renee Good shooting weeks earlier.

Many centered their responses on calling for a full investigation, including Sens. Dave McCormick (R-Pa.), Jon Husted (R-Ohio), Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) and Bill Cassidy (R-La.), and Reps. Dusty Johnson (R-S.D.), Michael Baumgartner (R-Wash.), Max Miller (R-Ohio) and Michael McCaul (R-Texas).
The office of Rep. Kat Cammack (R-Fla.), a staunch conservative and Trump ally, said in a statement: “Leaders at every level must lower the temperature, enforce the law, and protect public safety. In the days ahead, we will work to ensure a full and transparent review of events.”
“Law enforcement should conduct an objective investigation and get the facts. We defend people’s free speech and right to protest,” said Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) in a statement to Axios, though he added that it is “not right to interfere or obstruct law enforcement in their official actions.”
Zoom in: The responses of Rep. Michelle Fischbach (R-Minn.) to two different shootings in her home state offer a revealing picture of how the GOP’s tone has shifted since the start of the year.

After Renee Good was killed on Jan. 7, Fischbach called the incident a “targeted assault on ICE agents” in a post on X, writing, “I stand with the officer who acted in self-defense to save lives.”
On Sunday, she wrote after Pretti was killed: “I am deeply saddened by the tragic loss of life in Minneapolis and fully support the ongoing investigation into this incident.”
Between the lines: Some Republicans also broke with the administration for saying Pretti should not have had a gun on him.

Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) write on X that “ICE should not leave Minnesota” but that “carrying a gun & magazines is not an invitation for cops to shoot you.”

“Fighting cops (esp. w/ a gun) might be,” he added.
The other side: DHS still had a semblance of Democratic support on Capitol Hill before the shooting, but what little was left appears to have evaporated.

Rep. Laura Gillen (D-N.Y.), one of the seven swing-district centrists who voted to pass a DHS funding bill last week, signed on as a co-sponsor to Kelly’s articles of impeachment.
Even some support from senators began to trickle in on Sunday, with centrist Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) calling for Noem’s impeachment.
The articles of impeachment stood at Democratic 120 co-sponsors as of Sunday evening — well over half of the 213 Democrats in the House. Kelly can force them to a vote, though it is not clear if and when she plans to do that.
What to watch: The most immediate impact of the shooting will be in the Senate, where a package of six spending bills is now in significant peril.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said this weekend that Democrats won’t vote for the DHS funding bill.
The package would also fund a huge portion of the federal government beyond DHS, including the Departments of Defense, Health and Human Services, Transportation and Labor.
Several of the Senate Democrats who voted to end the last government shutdown — including Rosen and Sens. Catherine Cortez-Masto (D-Nev.), Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Tim Kaine (D-Va.) — have said they will oppose DHS funding.

Do President Trump’s advisers actively want him to act like a dictator? At the very least, there’s plainly a deep split inside Trumpworld on this question. As deranged as it seems, one faction clearly believes Trump absolutely should project unconstrained tyrannical power, to frighten ordinary voters and institutions into compliance, while another faction thinks acting like a Mad King risks a huge electoral rebuke and, by extension, that normal political patterns still apply.

You can see this tension in Trump’s ugly new comments about invoking the Insurrection Act, which would empower him to use the military for domestic law enforcement. Lately he’s suggested that he might not invoke it after all. And in an interview flagged by Aaron Rupar, Trump said this again.

But this time, Trump added an asterisk:

Asked if he sees the act as “necessary,” Trump said: “I don’t think it is yet. It might be at some point.” Trump added that other presidents have invoked it, and said: “It does make life a lot easier. You don’t go through the court system. It’s just a much easier thing to do.”

Emphasis added. Trump seems to think invoking the Insurrection Act means he’s no longer constrained by the courts. That’s nonsense. Yes, the act would allow him to deploy the military to carry out things that “law enforcement” (a grotesque misnomer for ICE) is doing in places like Minneapolis amid his immigration crackdown. And given that Trump has already sanctioned extraordinary abuses of power—detentions of U.S. citizens, warrantless arrests, excessive violence against protesters, including the occasional killing—empowering the military to do all this is an unsettling prospect.

But it emphatically does not mean Trump can evade the courts. Anything Trump orders the military to do will also be subject to legal limits. As Georgetown law professor Stephen Vladeck emails me: “The same laws and the specter of judicial review that [constrain] what civilian law enforcement agencies can do will also constrain anything the military can do.”

Indeed, it’s likely that the second Trump invoked the act, he’d be hit by lawsuits from, say, the state of Minnesota, presuming he deploys the military there, and from civil society groups representing victims of the crackdown. This would be intensely litigated, with lower courts scrutinizing the invocation’s rationale, fact sets related to the deployment, military conduct on the ground, and so on.

It’s possible that Trump is referring to an 1827 Supreme Court decision suggesting that presidential invocations of the act are not subject to judicial review. But much court precedent and law since then casts doubt on whether that ruling is good law, says Joseph Nunn of the Brennan Center, and even if the administration claims it applies, the courts would hear litigation over that.

“There will be lawsuits—this will be heard in court,” Nunn told me. And no matter what, everything the military actually does on the ground would itself “be subject to judicial review,” Nunn added, because “they still have to follow the law.”

What’s striking here is that Trump believes the act provides him license to circumvent the judiciary. As Vladeck noted: “Trump seems to be under the misimpression that invoking the Insurrection Act is tantamount to imposing military rule.” So this is really a window into Trump’s fantasies about presiding over martial law, or over a military dictatorship.

Trump’s advisers are clearly divided over all this. Recall that Suzie Wiles recently declared it “categorically false” that Trump will use the military to suppress voting in the midterms. She wants to create the impression that Trump isn’t capable of massive abuses of power with the military, probably because it’s political poison in the elections, which she apparently thinks will happen on schedule. You see the influence of this in Trump’s recent softening of his Insurrection Act threats.

Stephen Miller, by contrast, is acting very much like he wants Trump to invoke the act. Last year, Miller refused to say whether he’s discussed this with Trump. He constantly uses public language that’s plainly designed to push Trump in that direction. He regularly describes protesters as insurrectionists and relentlessly lies that court rulings limiting Trump’s crackdowns are illegitimate, even calling the judges themselves insurrectionists. Miller is likely whispering in Trump’s ear that invoking the act means no more pesky judicial interference.

What’s really at stake here runs deeper still. After the killing of Renee Good, administration officials conspicuously did not reassure the public that institutional steps are being taken to avoid future horrors. They didn’t promise an impartial examination to build confidence by involving stakeholders on all sides. Instead, they offered an account that anyone could see with their own eyes was nonsense. As writer Radley Balko notes:

The lies this administration is telling about Ms. Good aren’t those you deploy as part of a cover-up. They’re those you use when you want to show you can get away with anything.

I’d take that further. Miller, JD Vance, and the other ethnonationalists around Trump operate from a worldview dictating that modern levels of immigration profoundly threaten national social cohesion. They think this view is widely shared by a “silent majority.”

But the surprise of the moment has been the extraordinary solidarity that ordinary Americans have shown with immigrants and against Trump-Miller-Vance’s parade of ethnonationalist horrors. Miller is using state-sponsored violence and terror to try to break up that alliance. A big reason Trumpworld is unapologetic about Good—Vance responded by exaggerating the immunity of ICE officers, and Miller kept describing protesters as insurrectionists, meaning it’s open season on them—is to warn Americans showing solidarity with immigrants that they do so at their personal peril.

The fascists around Trump want us to think Trump will circumvent the courts. They want to create the impression that he’s fully capable of presiding over a military dictatorship. They think that will cow Americans and institutions into compliance. But if recent events tell us one thing, it’s this: That absolutely, emphatically is not going to happen.

SHE WILL NEVER FORGET the sight of Renee Nicole Good’s blood on the snow.

Carolina Ortiz is the associate executive director of Communities Organizing Latine Power and Action (COPAL),1 a community-based organization that advocates for Latino families in Minneapolis; it leads the Immigrant Defense Network, a group of 106 organizations like COPAL across the Midwest. She first grasped that something was wrong on January 7 when a colleague known for her cool demeanor in high-stakes situations called Ortiz in a panic. Something horrific had happened.

Ortiz’s team grabbed their gear—neon vests that say “Immigrant Defense Network,” bullhorns, whistles, masks, and first-aid kits—and headed to the site where ICE agent Jonathan Ross had just killed Good.That snowy Minneapolis street has since become familiar to the millions of people who saw the disturbing videos on social media. But Ortiz and her colleagues couldn’t press pause or look away. They were there on the ground.

She witnessed one community member get yelled at and thrown on the ground by an ICE agent for recording, despite being a safe distance from the scene. For about forty-five minutes, the area was blocked off, and then it was cleaned up—long before it was cordoned off as a crime scene, an order of events that struck Ortiz as unusual.

Meanwhile, Ortiz’s staff and others in the growing crowd were starting to be shot at with chemical irritants. Some cried out in fear when the agents started their volley against the crowd; as the masked men shouted at them, Ortiz and her staff didn’t know if the projectiles being fired were chemical devices, rubber bullets, or real bullets. It was chaos.

But what will forever stick with Ortiz was all of the blood. She describes an “extensive” streak of blood across the ground; it painted the snow. The extent of it helps to explain why the cleanup took so long.

Ortiz felt unmoored, scared, and traumatized by what she and her staff saw. In the days since, her constant challenge has been putting those feelings aside to continue doing her work—not only for the sake of her staff, but for the people they’re trying to protect.

“Its scary as hell when you’re in the middle of that, but also scary when you have a staff there that you’re responsible for,” Ortiz told me. “It’s terrifying at a whole other level.” The day of Good’s death, she was trying to keep her team calm and disciplined, even as ICE agents appeared intent on doing everything possible to escalate the situation. She debated whether her people should leave for their safety.

A week later, ICE descended upon Lake Street, a predominantly Latino business corridor. They showed up right outside Ortiz’s office, forcing her group to mobilize. COPAL members saw someone running down the block warning businesses to lock their doors, which many did. Outside, ICE vehicles seemed to appear on every corner. Ortiz jumped into her car to follow ICE and record what was going on, as a cacophony of whistles and honking horns filled the air.

It’s become a common sound in Minneapolis over the last few weeks.

After reading about and reporting on this escalating conflict since the events of January 7, I decided it was time to go to Minneapolis myself to report on the ground.

I spent the day after Martin Luther King Jr. Day with Ortiz. It turned out to be part of a relatively quiet forty-eight-hour period, which unnerved Ortiz and her team rather than calming them. They were still at the ready in case enforcement operations ramped up again.

Ortiz started driving at 5:30 a.m. to drop off groceries to three different people: a community member who had run out of food, plus a family member and a friend of hers who needed food but she also wanted to check in on. We met at 8:00 a.m. for breakfast.

8:18 a.m.: Eerily Quiet
We stop at El Mercado Central, a shopping mall that houses thirty-five Latino-led businesses. The place is usually bustling by this hour, with little parking available, but today we find it deserted. The owner informs us that they’re basically closed and only selling menudo. We head over to Midtown Global Market, another large retail complex that usually has everything inside, even a DMV. Also closed. I tell Ortiz that downtown Minneapolis has been eerily quiet since I arrived. It reminded me of the scenes of deserted streets in Atlanta from the pilot for The Walking Dead. “That’s exactly what it is,” she agrees.

8:28 a.m.: “Don’t Let Anyone Stop You From What You Know Is Right”
Ortiz came to the United States from Zacatecas, Mexico when she was 2 and eventually became a DACA recipient—one of those we call “Dreamers.” As we sit at Pineda Tacos for a chorizo breakfast burrito (one so good it gave me an out-of-body experience), I bring up the scene at Good’s shooting. I ask her about where her spiritual resilience (a term I’ve borrowed from my therapist) comes from—how she’s able to keep going in the face of something so dark. Is it a mantra, maybe, or some wise advice she remembers her abuela once uttered, or a physical item from which she draws encouragement?

The real source, she tells me, is a conversation she recently had with her father.

“As things started to get bad, I was nervous—not for me, but for my parents,” she says. “I talked to my dad and he had a really good conversation with me. He said, ‘I know what you’re doing. I know you’re brave, just do it, don’t let anyone stop you from what you know is right.’ That conversation allowed me to say, ‘Yep, let’s go all in.’”

She tells me more about her father, who is diabetic.

“My worst fear is he’s detained and his sugar levels spike,” she tells me, her eyes glassy, and rose-tinted on the edges. “I don’t know if he would be able to survive that, that is something that is hard to even imagine.”

This was the only time in our entire day together that Ortiz got emotional.

9:00 a.m.: The Immigrant Defense Network
As we head back to the COPAL offices, Ortiz joins a call with other members of the Immigrant Defense Network. They report that they received a staggering 450 phone calls just yesterday, during the federal holiday. About 35 percent of those calls were requests for food to be delivered to homes whose occupants were afraid to leave. Another 30 percent were requests for rent assistance because the callers are unable to work. The rest of the calls were split between legal-aid requests and reports of deportations. The conversation then turns to whether the coalition still has the capacity to give food; they decide to distribute $5,000 to experienced food pantries.

What amazes me, shocks me, depresses me each time I witness it is that these priorities are about basic necessities, something groups like this have done since the pandemic. The focus here isn’t raising awareness or organizing or raising money or influencing legislation. It’s just keeping people alive. Consider again what the federal government is doing to our neighbors, to U.S. citizens, and mixed-status families. Because federal agents are terrorizing the community, community members are going hungry, can’t safely go to work, and can’t pay their bills out of fear that they could be violently thrown against cement, arrested, flown to Texas to be detained, and deported.

In light of these realities, I try to channel some of Ortiz’s spiritual resilience. I allow myself to be amused that the participants in the meeting call St. Paul “San Pablo”—and I think I will, too, from now on.

9:42 a.m.: “We Love Reporters But. . .”
Oops. Despite Ortiz telling people I was on the call, someone says, “We love reporters, but let’s not have them inside the network.” I don’t mind at all. I know it shows pride and protection they feel towards their work. They are cautious because they want to protect something they feel is doing so much good.

Before I leave the call, someone notes the apparent decline in federal enforcement over the last forty-eight hours probably means “something is brewing” because agents haven’t left the city yet.

10:35 a.m.: “Do You Worry These Make You a Target?”
Ortiz introduces me to COPAL employees after the call and tackles her inbox, responding to donors and answering meeting and media requests. She tells me about “constitutional observers,” the term COPAL has given to what’s called “ICE watch” in other cities. She shows me the neon vest and beanies they all get, as well as handbooks, bullhorns, and walkie talkies. I see the neon fits and ask if she worries they mark COPAL people as targets “Of course,” she says. Her staff has been doxxed, and she installed a dash cam on her car and a camera on the front door of her home after threats.

It turns out the assistance COPAL provides isn’t limited to food, rent, and legal assistance. People who are staying at home are being connected with physicians to help get their medical needs met (and veterinarians to help get their pets’ medical needs met).

12:00 p.m.: “A Buffet of Information”
Ortiz has a private, off-the-record call with five dozen lawyers. I won’t recount the discussions except to say one of the participants described the purpose of the call as a chance to share a “buffet of information.” This is the kind of behind-the-scenes legal work that is helping people, defending their rights, and reinforcing their humanity.

12:34 p.m.: “This Has Happened Before”
Ortiz receives a text. Someone with DACA was detained hours earlier and needs legal support. I witness the urgency here, but also note that sometimes helping people during an ICE invasion feels like playing whack-a-mole. The goal in this case is to get this person an attorney who can draft a habeas petition to free them before they are relocated. ICE often keeps the detainee on the move without updating their locator, giving the government time and cover to get them to Texas unimpeded. “This has happened before with DACA recipients, TPS holders, visa holders, and green card holders,” Ortiz tells me, adding that among the hundreds of cases she’s seen, the agents have never had a warrant.

12:43 p.m.: The Need for Lawyers
Ortiz takes a follow-up call on getting more lawyers to volunteer. She needs to start categorizing them by who is pro bono, who is willing to do habeas paperwork, and who can do the work at a “super-low” rate.

1:34 p.m.: Doing It All
Ortiz grabs the keys of an SUV someone dropped off. She takes me with her as she fills up the gas tank for a community member who has legal status but is terrified of even going to the gas station.

1:49 p.m.: Where Are the Workers?
We head to COPAL’s Primero de Mayo Workers’ Center, which teaches computer literacy, offers citizenship and driver’s license classes, puts on health clinics, does intakes for wage theft, and offers career support. Housed in an old union building, the center has served more than 10,000 people over the last year, helping them with over 14,000 cases, and recovering more than $80,000 in wages. Ortiz tells me it’s normally packed, but when we walk in, there’s only one worker being helped despite a handful of employees there.

While Ortiz stays behind, half the staff heads in a van to Mankato, a city almost two hours outside Minneapolis/St. Paul, for the latest installment of COPAL’s new “The Brave of Us” tour, which is visiting thirty cities across Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, South Dakota, and North Dakota in the coming weeks. They will be training 350 constitutional observers in each city, including government leaders and activists who will seed the ground for the coalition as it spreads ahead of a Regional Immigrant Defense Summit planned for April.

2:15 p.m.: Reports
At lunch, Ortiz looks down at her phone. ICE has been spotted at the Maplewood Mall, fifteen minutes to the north. Her team is already looking into it. Sometimes these reports are accurate; sometimes they’re false alarms generated by understandably jittery community members. Either way, COPAL has to run it down.

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2:50 p.m.: An Exclusive Over Lunch
While we eat, Ortiz looks again at her phone, but this time I register her excitement. Before I can ask what’s up, she shares that COPAL is raising $800,000 to give directly to the community for rent and utilities assistance, groceries, mental health efforts, and more. She is comfortable telling me this because the group has already raised close to half a million dollars from individual donors from Minnesota to New York, and Vermont to California.

After spending a day with Ortiz, I can understand at least a little bit how life-changing this money will be. Regardless of how long ICE besieges the Twin Cities, people need food and rent and utilities money. The fact that people are willing to give so generously is hugely encouraging—for Ortiz, I’m sure, but also for me.

4:00 p.m.: “Imagine What Our Lives Would Be If We Chose to Do Nothing?”
Ortiz takes some time at the end of the day personally calling donors and thanking them. Some give her stories in return and she dutifully listens. I think to myself, this is tiring work. Then I hear her say that she “really needed” the message from one donor currently living in Brooklyn.

It turns out the donor is 81, from Minnesota, but had to move away because of the difficulty navigating a wheelchair in the bitter cold. Growing up in the 1960s during the Vietnam War, they took to the streets almost every day to advocate for change.

It’s sad that it feels like we are going back in time, but I am happy to see that Minnesotans are going out and speaking up. We need to speak up and be in solidarity to see change, that is the only way we can turn the tide.

I have my own organization now focused on issues around disabilities, and trust me, at my age, there are days when it might feel like the work is never done. Just when you think you solved one problem, you then realize that we are in a consistent cycle, the problem always comes back around. Unfortunately, prejudice, racism, and the anti-immigrant rhetoric are like a disease without a cure.

But imagine what our lives would be if we chose to do nothing? We have to fight against injustice. When it feels like it’s too much, take the day off, reboot. Deadlines are important, but don’t stress too much, it’s never as urgent as you think it is. Don’t take things personally, otherwise you’ll burn out. Be passionate, work hard—but not to the point of losing yourself in the process. Passion needs balance.

Know that you are making a huge difference. Who else is doing what COPAL is doing? Take pride in that. Be determined but be patient, as well. Even if things get worse, it won’t last forever. People don’t want that, injustice is not okay. I just don’t understand how people can carry so much hate, but if we don’t do anything about it, it won’t change.

5:30 p.m.: Tracking Tips
The hotline tip at the Maplewood Mall didn’t pan out but the team is looking into another tip: ICE was sighted in “San Pablo.” Constitutional observers are on the scene. As my time with Ortiz ends and evening falls over the Twin Cities, she and her colleagues return to their work, unsure of when it will end for the day.

Coda: Remember that quiet forty-eight hours I mentioned? The next day, as I was writing this newsletter, Ortiz sent me a concerned text. Men she believed were federal agents were snooping around outside her home—caught on the camera she has on her front door—and looking in her mailbox. They had serape-like coverings on and easily could have had ICE gear under them. She filed a police report and contacted her lawyer. She and her family are shaken up.

The Trump administration this week started arresting immigrants in Maine as part of a new federal operation targeting the state, the Department of Homeland Security said on Wednesday.

Two U.S. officials said the operation was intended to target immigrants from Somalia, along with other immigrants. People from countries including Sudan, Guatemala and Ethiopia were swept up on the first day of the operations, according to a department statement.

“We arrested illegal aliens convicted of aggravated assault, false imprisonment and endangering the welfare of a child,” Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the department, said in the statement. “Under President Trump and Secretary Noem, we are no longer allowing criminal illegal aliens to terrorize American citizens.”

The operation comes after an enforcement surge in Minnesota, which set off protests. Thousands of D.H.S. officers and agents were deployed there, and their actions have come under scrutiny in the wake of the shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis this month by an ICE officer.

A number of asylum seekers from African countries ​who arrived in the United States during the Biden administration have settled in Maine​, joining a Somali population that started arriving there in the early 2000s​, when refugees from the country began settling in Lewiston. Yet Maine remains an overwhelmingly white state, with one of the oldest populations in the country. Some employers have begun looking to immigrants to fill labor gaps, as native-born employees have either left the work force or retired.

​Democratic lawmakers in Maine, including the mayors of Portland and Lewiston and Gov. Janet Mills, who clashed with Mr. Trump last year, have been warning residents of ICE’s plan to focus on Maine since last week. In a video message last week, Ms. Mills, addressing federal immigration agents, said, “If your plan is to come here to be provocative and to undermine the civil rights of Maine residents, do not be confused: Those tactics are not welcome here.”

In a news conference on Wednesday afternoon, Mayor Mark Dion of Portland described the immigrants in his community as “anxious and fearful,” adding, “We believe in their right to be safe and we’ve tried to direct resources their way to support their capacity to stay here in Portland.”

Mr. Dion said his early impression was that the operation in Maine would not involve “groupings of agents just patrolling,” and that it would instead focus on tracking down certain people “on the basis of an actual court warrant.”

He also warned residents against intervening in ICE’s actions, saying, “The best thing you can do is to be the best possible witness, should the facts that come before you be needed by any future investigation.”

The U.S. attorney’s office in Maine telegraphed the upcoming operation in a statement on Monday advising people to protest peacefully.

“In the coming days, if Maine citizens seek to exercise their rights to assemble and protest, it is vital that these protests remain peaceful,” said Andrew Benson, the U.S. attorney in the state. “Anyone who forcibly assaults or impedes a federal law enforcement officer, willfully destroys government property or unlawfully obstructs federal law enforcement activity commits a federal crime and will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

On Wednesday, Fox News reported that an ICE official took the network on a ride-along in Maine, describing the operation as targeting people with criminal histories.

“We have approximately 1,400 targets here in Maine,” Patricia Hyde, the ICE deputy assistant director, told Fox News.

The Trump administration has put pressure on ICE to ramp up arrests throughout the past year. At one point, White House officials proposed a goal of 3,000 arrests a day — a figure the agency has yet to hit. Despite that, ICE officials have ramped up enforcement across the United States.

Mr. Trump in recent months has particularly focused on Somali immigrants, at one point referring to them as “garbage.”

“When they come from hell and they complain and do nothing but bitch, we don’t want them in our country,” Mr. Trump said in December. “Let them go back to where they came from and fix it.” Mr. Trump also slammed Representative Ilhan Omar, a Democrat and a Somali immigrant, in his tirade against Somalis.

He has repeatedly brought up the topic since then.

n response to the shooting death of Renee Nicole Good by an ICE agent, Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem will send 1,000 additional agents to Minneapolis, Minnesota. This is yet another example of the Trump administration’s strategy of escalating violence to create chaos and show that even the death of a U.S. citizen will not stop them, as they have already blamed her for what happened.

Noem told Fox News on Sunday that the idea is “so that our ICE and Border Patrol agents working in Minneapolis can do so safely.”

The 1,000 agents are in addition to the 2,000 already sent to Minneapolis because it is not a matter of reconsidering the strategy after a tragedy, but of imposing a plan that has nothing to do with security and everything to do with the cheap and dangerous politicking that frames Trump’s immigration policy.

For Noem, it is the agents who must be protected, not the public, who, as was demonstrated last week, can even lose their lives in an interaction with ICE or Border Patrol agents who abuse their authority with total impunity.

Because Trump’s strategy is not merely to detain and deport undocumented “criminals,” but to instill terror in the entire population by militarizing cities to exercise total control. This is why citizens are being indiscriminately detained, even if they show their documents. This is why there are abuses against pregnant women, children, the elderly, the disabled, veterans, and religious people. The message is that no one is safe from the anti-immigrant crusade that disguises his autocratic experiment.

But these intimidation efforts are met with resistance. Minnesota and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul sued DHS and ICE to remove the agents and end what they called a “federal invasion.”

In addition, this past weekend, thousands participated in more than 1,200 demonstrations in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., in repudiation of Good’s murder and the violence that masked federal agents have been unleashing since they were sent, unsolicited, to cities led by Democrats, where they seem to be competing to show their audience, President Trump, who is the toughest. Protesters called for those responsible for the violence to be held accountable.

And the fact is, that violence has been escalating. From smashing car windows to terrorize drivers, they have fired rubber bullets and tear gas, and in Good’s case, the agent shot a 37-year-old unarmed woman in the head, who, according to videos, posed no threat to the agents.

ICE violence occurs at all levels. There are numerous reports of deplorable conditions in detention centers, physical and sexual abuse, deaths due to negligence, and lack of access to medical care and medications to control chronic conditions such as high blood pressure or diabetes. This is another form of violence.

The Guardian reported that last year there were 32 deaths in ICE custody, the highest number in two decades. “They died of seizure and heart failure, stroke, respiratory failure, tuberculosis or suicide…In some cases, their families and lawyers have alleged, they died of neglect, after repeatedly trying and failing to get medical care,” the publication wrote.

And according to the Associated Press, Good’s death is the fifth amid Trump’s repressive immigration operations. In Chicago, on September 12, 2025, ICE shot 38-year-old Silverio Villegas González during a traffic stop. In July 2025, in Camarillo, California, 57-year-old farmworker Jaime Alanís died after falling from the roof of a greenhouse during an operation. In August, in Monrovia, California, a man who was fleeing a raid was struck and killed on a highway adjacent to a Home Depot. And in Virginia, in October 2025, 24-year-old Josué Castro Rivera died after being struck by a vehicle while fleeing a traffic stop by ICE agents.

Communities are not safe either because Trump has diverted some 25,000 officials and employees from various federal agencies such as the FBI, ATF, DEA, IRS, and others from their traditional duties to carry out immigration work, neglecting areas such as drug trafficking, terrorism, tax evasion, fraud, and child exploitation. This affects our national security and that of our communities.

The increasing violence of ICE and CBP has serious and, in some cases, fatal consequences.

The original Spanish version is here.

The House narrowly passed $1.2 trillion in government funding Thursday, overcoming intense Democratic opposition to funding Immigration and Customs Enforcement as the agency surges operations in Minneapolis and other cities.

The Department of Homeland Security funding bill — which would allocate $64.4 billion to it, including $10 billion for ICE — was approved 220-207, with seven Democrats joining all but one Republican in voting yes.

Lawmakers also approved three other bills to fund the Departments of Defense, Labor, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, and Education, by a wider bipartisan margin of 341-88.

With “the passage of this package, Republicans will have finally replaced the last of any Biden-era spending levels with Trump-era spending levels and policies,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) said after the vote.

Congress is supposed to fund the government through 12 annual spending bills, though it often packages many of them together or simply extends current spending levels. The House has now passed all 12, and the Senate is expected to follow suit. The last time Congress approved all 12 appropriations bills was March 2024 under President Joe Biden; since then, it has kept the government open primarily through funding extensions.

The moves should significantly lower the chances of another government shutdown at the end of the month, though the package still needs to pass the Senate before Jan. 30 to become law. Many Senate Democrats are also likely to oppose funding for ICE, but Senate leaders are expected to bundle the bills together to make it tougher for senators to vote against it. Seven Democrats would need to vote with Republicans for the funding package to get around a filibuster and pass.

Democrats have argued Congress should not approve funding for the immigration enforcement agency after officers sent to Minnesota and other states have taken action against U.S. citizens. An ICE officer shot and killed 37-year-old Renée Good this month, prompting mass demonstrations in the Twin Cities. A week later, another ICE officer shot an undocumented Venezuelan man, Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis, in the leg during an arrest in Minneapolis. ICE also began an operation in Maine on Wednesday.

The agency has flooded cities across the country over the past year, which President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem have said is necessary to deport undocumented immigrants with criminal records. But agents have been recorded aggressively detaining individuals, including many U.S. citizens or undocumented immigrants without violent criminal records.

Democratic negotiators on the House Appropriations Committee unsuccessfully pushed to include additional measures in the Homeland Security bill to ensure ICE does not deport U.S. citizens, to force ICE agents to use body cameras and to bar ICE agents from shooting at moving vehicles. The bill does reduce funding for ICE’s enforcement and removal operations by $115 million, decrease the number of detention beds by 5,500, set aside funding for body cameras for agents, and reduce funding for the Border Patrol.

“It’s a joke. Real accountability means that they follow what the laws of this country are. They are moving the goalposts every single minute,” said Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota).

A few Democrats said they shared their colleagues’ outrage over ICE’s actions but argued that denying Homeland Security funding would also affect other key agencies such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Transportation Security Administration. The top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, Rep. Rosa DeLauro (Connecticut), who negotiated the legislation with Republicans, initially argued for the bill but announced Thursday afternoon that she would vote against it.

Those Democrats also argued that a shutdown or funding extension would do little to restrain the agency, which received $75 billion in the Republican tax and spending bill last year that could fund its operations even if the spending bill failed, and that blocking the measure would only give the administration more leeway to decide how Homeland Security money is spent.

Rep. Henry Cuellar (Texas), the top Democrat on the Appropriations subcommittee for Homeland Security, said he told his caucus Wednesday that he believes the bill is better than a temporary extension known as a continuing resolution, which would keep funding levels consistent but would not include the updated provisions.

“I have concerns, and we fought for more oversight,” he said. “The problem is, when you have reconciliation they put $200 billion on [Homeland Security]. If we do a CR, it’s a blank check.”

Republicans, too, struggled to keep their party aligned to squeeze out enough votes necessary to pass the bills without significant Democratic support.

Days before the final vote, a group of Midwestern lawmakers pressed Johnson to include a provision in the appropriations package allowing year-round sales of E-15 ethanol. The gasoline blend is generally barred from being sold in the summer throughout much of the country, and expanding access would be a boost to corn growers and a challenge for members from oil-producing districts.

Members agreed to support the package in exchange for the formation of a working group of members and stakeholders charged with recommending legislation that “balances the interest of refiners and farmers” by Feb. 25, a spokesperson with Rep. Stephanie Bice (R-Oklahoma) told The Washington Post.

Several House Freedom Caucus members also threatened to tank a procedural rule ahead of the final vote after raising concerns over billions of dollars of earmarks in the package, which direct funding to projects in members’ districts. The chamber defeated two amendments to the package that would have eliminated earmarks attached to one of the bills, and 24 Republicans voted against the three-bill package, along with 64 Democrats.

There was one moment of bipartisan unity: Members added a last-minute provision to repeal a law that allows senators — not House members — to sue the federal government for seizing their phone records.

Last year, the Senate tucked the language into the law ending the government shutdown in response to special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into Trump’s involvement in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

The House unanimously voted to repeal it.

The House on Thursday passed a spending package for a broad swath of the government, narrowly mustering the votes to fund the Department of Homeland Security amid a Democratic revolt over spending for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The package, which also would fund the Pentagon and the health and transportation departments, rejects the deepest spending cuts that President Trump requested, including a 50 percent reduction to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and a 40 percent cut to the National Institutes of Health, which would instead receive a $415 million boost. It also rejects Mr. Trump’s request for a $840 million increase in funding for ICE, leaving funding for the agency roughly flat.

It contains the final set of spending bills that must be enacted before next Friday in order to avoid a government shutdown. The legislation still must pass the Senate before it can be sent to Mr. Trump, but it appeared to be on track to clear Congress.

The approval of the package accomplished what is now considered a remarkable feat on Capitol Hill: the successful negotiation and passage of a series of individual government spending bills, without resorting to rolling them all together into a huge take-it-or-leave-it package, or punting altogether and relying on a stopgap, emergency measure to keep funding flat.

But it came over the bitter protests of Democrats, who said they would not vote for legislation that provided funding for ICE — or not without major changes — on the heels of the fatal shooting of Renee Good, a 37-year-old Minneapolis woman, by a federal immigration agent.

In the end, the vote to pass the homeland security funding legislation was 220 to 207, with 206 Democrats voting against it, and seven voting for it. Republican leaders agreed to allow a separate vote on that bill to allow Democrats to register their unhappiness with the measure without imperiling the rest of the spending package. One Republican, Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky, also opposed the bill.

The other three, less divisive spending bills, passed on a vote of 341 to 88.

Top Democrats including Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the minority leader, opposed the homeland security bill.

“We have a broken immigration system that should be fixed in a comprehensive and bipartisan manner,” Mr. Jeffries and his deputies said in a joint statement. “Unfortunately, House Republicans have rejected the effort to address the serious concerns raised by the American people about the lawless conduct by ICE. For this reason, we are voting no on the Homeland Security appropriations bill.”

Democratic negotiators had proposed a series of changes in an attempt to rein in ICE that were rejected out of hand by Republicans.

“They rejected proposals to block funds from being used to detain and deport U.S. citizens,” Representative Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, said. “They blocked our attempts to ensure members of Congress can exercise our lawful oversight of ICE facilities uninhibited.”

Still, some of the tougher checks on the Trump administration included in the spending bills, agreed to by a bipartisan group of appropriators in both the House and Senate, target the Department of Homeland Security. They agreed to reduce funding for the office of Secretary Kristi Noem by $29.5 million and require her to pay for any travel on government aircraft — in this case private jets the Coast Guard bought — out of the budget for her own office.

The bipartisan spending legislation would keep funding for ICE about the same as the previous year, when the agency was operating off funds provided in a stopgap measure.

It also would require the Department of Homeland Security to detail how it is spending the $190 billion Republicans allocated to it in their marquee domestic policy bill, which included $75 billion for ICE.

“In the event of a lapse in funding, ICE would be able to sustain regular operations for multiple years” using that money, “while the other agencies under this bill would likely be forced to furlough workers and reduce operations,” said Ms. DeLauro, who despite having helped to negotiate the homeland security legislation ultimately voted against it.

The seven Democrats who voted in favor of the homeland security spending measure were: Representatives Don Davis of North Carolina, Henry Cuellar of Texas, Laura Gillen of New York, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington, Vicente Gonzalez of Texas, Jared Golden of Maine and Tom Suozzi of New York.

The measure would provide $839.2 billion in funding for the Defense Department, in line with what Congress approved in the annual defense policy bill, and $8 billion above Mr. Trump’s budget request.

Lawmakers also crammed into the legislation a slew of extensions of measures that were set to expire, including the National Flood Insurance Program and the African Growth and Opportunity Act, which provides duty-free access to the U.S. trade market for about three dozen African nations.

And though appropriators in both parties banded together to thwart the largest cuts Mr. Trump had requested, the spending package made small trims across many government agencies, an outcome that Republican leaders heralded.

“As with our previous packages, this outcome reflects the reality of serious governing: shared contributions and shared compromise,” Representative Tom Cole, Republican of Oklahoma and the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, said. His panel, he added, “held the line on spending, putting forward twelve negotiated bills that actually reduce spending relative to what would have been spent in a continuing resolution.”

The Senate’s 2028 Democratic presidential hopefuls are tripping over each other to vote against ICE funding — even if that means opposing money for other programs they support and increasing the risk of another government shutdown.

Why it matters: For the 2028ers, voting “no” on a bill that’s likely to pass the Senate next week is an easy way to signal their outrage at a president whose actions and policies they detest.

But for Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), it’s another reminder that funding a government controlled by President Trump can quickly inflame his base, especially if his colleagues are fanning the flames.
The intrigue: Schumer hasn’t said how he’ll vote on the minibus the House passed Thursday, but, earlier this month, he took the idea of another government shutdown off the table.

Last March, Schumer was filleted for supporting a short-term funding bill.
In September, he course-corrected and touted his willingness to shut down the government.
On its own, the 2028ers’ opposition wouldn’t be enough to derail plans to prevent a government funding lapse after Jan. 30, but that could change if more Democrats join them.
What they are saying: Many of the Democratic senators weighing a run for the White House in 2028 have been vocal on the issue, particularly Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), who has consistently demanded reforms to ICE and threatened to vote against funding for the Department of Homeland Security.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) was also clear on MSNOW on Tuesday night: “I’ve said repeatedly that I will not support one dime of funding for Trump’s lawless ICE operations. I will vote no.”
“Yeah, I am not voting to give whatever ICE has become more taxpayer money,” Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) said on X on Wednesday.
“I will vote against this bill when and if it comes to the Senate,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) said on X on Thursday.

“I will not vote to fund DHS and ICE,” Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) said on X last week.
Between the lines: Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) suggested at an event in Michigan this week that she may not support DHS funding, but hasn’t been definitive.

Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) has not taken a public position.
The other side: House Democrats got a separate vote on funding for ICE, with 206 voting against it and only seven supporting. It passed, 220-207.

Compare that with the remaining three bills — which will fund the Departments of Defense, Labor, HHS, Education, Transportation and HUD — in the minibus. That passed 341-88, with 64 Democrats voting against it.
The bottom line: The minibus — which will include six bills in the Senate — doesn’t appear in danger of failing at the moment, but the margins will be interesting.

So will the post-vote rhetoric from the Democrats who have their eye on the White House.

House Democrats voted overwhelmingly Thursday to block additional funding for ICE, a remarkable shift from when dozens of them voted to expand the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement authority just one year ago — and a sign of how quickly the political ground has moved since President Donald Trump returned to the White House.
Just seven Democrats voted for the Homeland Security spending bill that included billions for Immigration and Customs Enforcement: Reps. Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez of Texas, Jared Golden of Maine, Laura Gillen and Tom Suozzi of New York, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington and Don Davis of North Carolina. All represent tough terrain — Trump carried all of their districts but Gillen’s, which he lost by just over one point.

Other Democrats, incensed by an ICE agent’s shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis, voted against the bill — including many who voted exactly one year ago to pass the Laken Riley Act that allows for the detention of undocumented immigrants accused of certain crimes.
One of them, Rep. Susie Lee (D-Nev.), a top GOP target in the midterms from a district Trump narrowly carried in 2024, argued this vote was different.
“What we have seen time and again is ICE has blatantly violated our Constitution and our law, whether you’re talking about the shooting of a young mother to sending a five year old thousands of miles away to entice his father to turn himself in — this type of shit is not American,” Lee said in an interview Thursday. “ICE has plenty of money … I can’t in good conscience give them any more money until we get some type of guardrails.”

Even the Democrats who voted for the funding were sharply critical of ICE.
“I hate what ICE is doing in my district and across the country. It’s atrocious. It’s appalling. We should find ways to defund those operations in a surgical way,” Gonzalez said in a brief interview, adding that he supported the bill because it also included funding for Coast Guard and FEMA operations. “But voting no, just to make a statement, could have its own repercussions.”
The House passed the DHS funding bill 220 to 207.

Democrats’ near-united stand against the bill comes amid building opposition to Trump’s mass deportation campaign. A 49 percent plurality of voters in a new POLITICO poll conducted Jan. 16 to 19 said the effort — including Trump’s widespread deployment of ICE agents across the U.S. — is too aggressive.
“The shift is dramatic. And I think the reason for the shift is: Last year the debate in the country was about getting control of the borders and out-of-control immigration. Now the entire situation is about ICE itself and its behavior,” Mark Longabaugh, a veteran Democratic strategist, said of the party’s recalibration on immigration.
Amid the growing public furor over ICE’s hardline tactics, congressional Democrats had demanded that any new Homeland Security funding come with more guardrails.

The bill most of them voted against Thursday funds ICE at $10 billion through the rest of the fiscal year that ends in September, while cutting funding for removal and enforcement operations by $115 million and Border Patrol funding by $1.8 billion. It also included some Democratic demands: decreasing the number of detention beds by 5,500, providing $20 million each for body cameras for agents and independent oversight of DHS detention facilities, and directing the department to give officers more training on diffusing conflict while interacting with the public.
It does not include other items Democrats pushed for, however, such as banning agents from wearing masks during operations, requiring judicial warrants, preventing DHS from detaining and deporting U.S. citizens and blocking the department from using other agencies’ personnel for immigration enforcement.

The Democrats who voted in favor of the funding bill argued it was preferable to the alternative — giving Trump what Cuellar described as a “blank check” to carry out his hardline immigration agenda “virtually unchecked.”
And some expressed concerns about ramifications for their districts if other agencies who receive their funding through DHS were cut off. Davis warned of the potential consequences of lapsed FEMA and Coast Guard funding in his home state of North Carolina that has been battered by storms and floods in recent years.

“Obviously we should have the honest conversations about warrants. We should have the honest conversations about taking off the masks,” Davis said Thursday. But “if we can’t consistently predict when disasters are coming our way, then we’re leaving populations of people vulnerable.”

Less than a third of voters think the country is better off than it was when President Trump returned to the White House a year ago, with a wide majority saying he has focused on the wrong issues, according to a new poll from The New York Times and Siena University.

A majority of voters disapprove of how Mr. Trump has handled top issues including the economy, immigration, the war between Russia and Ukraine and his actions in Venezuela. And significantly, a majority of Americans, 51 percent, said that Mr. Trump’s policies had made life less affordable for them.

All told, 49 percent of voters said the country was worse off than a year ago, compared with 32 percent who said it was better.

[See all of the latest polls measuring President Trump’s approval rating.]

The survey also revealed the extent to which Mr. Trump has polarized the nation into its furthest partisan corners, with more voters seeing him as on track to be historically bad or good than merely below or above average. Some 42 percent of voters said he was on track to be one of the worst presidents in American history — and 19 percent said he was headed to be one of the best.

Mr. Trump’s own job approval rating stands at 40 percent, down three points since September. His disapproval rating has crept up to 56 percent.

Only 42 percent of voters rated Mr. Trump’s first year as a success.

One glimmer of good news for Mr. Trump is that the share of voters who say the country is on the right track, while low, has remained largely unchanged since at least April. It also remains higher than it was under his predecessor, Joseph R. Biden Jr., who on this question alienated not just Republicans and independents but also half of Democrats. Under Mr. Trump, most Republicans still feel the country is headed in the right direction.

Still, there were some signs of softening support for Mr. Trump among Republicans when it came to his approach to foreign affairs and addressing the cost of living. His lowest approval rating within his party came on his handling of the release of files related to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein: Only 53 percent of Republicans approved of his handling of that matter.

Overall, only 34 percent of independent voters, who tend to determine who wins elections, approve of the job that Mr. Trump is doing. And twice as many independent voters think the country is worse off now compared with a year ago than better, 52 percent to 24 percent.

In a hypothetical question about the 2026 midterm elections, voters favored a Democratic candidate over a Republican by 5 percentage points, 48 percent to 43 percent. The Democratic edge among independent voters was 15 percentage points, although a sizable share of independent voters declined to pick a preferred party.

Mr. Trump will turn 80 this year and will be the oldest president ever to serve by the end of his term. Voters do not see his age as a hindrance the same way they did for Mr. Biden, with 40 percent saying he is too old to be effective, but 58 percent saying that he is not. That figure is largely unchanged since October 2024.

“I think he must be doing something right when there are so many people opposed to him,” said Paul Minihane, 77, a real estate broker who lives in Dedham, Mass. “I mean, Donald Trump could look at me in the face and tell me to go screw myself. And I’d say, ‘Thank you.’ I think that’s good. I don’t think he’s looking to kiss everybody’s ass. I think he’s going to do what he thinks is the right thing. And I think that’s a positive thing.”

His enduring popularity with the base presents a bind for Republican congressional candidates, who must win over his supporters without repelling swing voters.

In an open-ended question about what emotions Mr. Trump evokes, Democrats expressed outrage, sadness, disgust or fear. Republicans reported pride, satisfaction, hopefulness or relief. A small share of voters who supported Mr. Trump in 2024, around 12 percent, expressed emotions related to outrage, disgust or disappointment.

The economy and related topics — inflation and the cost of living — remain the top issue for American voters by far.

Mr. Trump’s 40 percent approval rating on the economy mirrored his overall standing. But other indicators showed more vulnerability, including that only 24 percent of voters thought he had made life more affordable and only 34 percent believed he had handled the issue of the cost of living well.

“Maybe I have bad public relations people, but we’re not getting it across,” Mr. Trump said at the White House on Tuesday at an event celebrating his one-year mark.

Only 32 percent of voters said the economy was better today than a year ago. At the same time, when asked about the current economy, voters gave a slightly rosier assessment than April 2025, with 29 percent calling the economy good or excellent now, up from 22 percent then.

Overall, 57 percent of voters thought Mr. Trump was focused on the wrong issues — including a whopping 69 percent of voters under 30, more than any other age group.

Voters whose top issue was an economic concern were more likely to say Trump was focused on the wrong issues. Voters whose top issue was immigration thought Trump was focused on the right issues.

On immigration, voters are broadly more favorable toward Mr. Trump’s policies than their implementation, continuing a trend seen in previous Times/Siena polls.

Half of voters said that they supported the Trump administration’s deportations of people living in the United States without legal status, and half approved of his handling of the border between Mexico and the United States.

At the same time, a sizable 61 percent majority, including 71 percent of independents, said the administration’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency had “gone too far” with its tactics, which have driven protests in multiple American cities. Similarly, 63 percent of voters said they disapproved of how ICE is handling its job. The poll was conducted in the aftermath of the shooting of Renee Good by an ICE officer in Minneapolis that spurred national attention and local protests.

“Criminals in the United States that happen to be illegal immigrants, those people need to be deported,” said Jeffrey McGinn, a 55-year-old Republican who works at a health care tech company and lives in Columbia, Tenn. “He’s rounding up soccer moms and trying to ship them out with no due process at all. That is not what America wanted. That’s not what Republicans wanted. The people that voted for Trump did not want that.”

“I do want border security but I want moderation in it,” said Mr. McGinn, who said that he had voted for Mr. Trump in 2016 and 2020, but not in 2024. “I want his focus on jobs. I want to consider paying off the debt. I want to look at taxes and how to make things more efficient and more market oriented. Trump isn’t doing any of that.”

About 17 percent of Republicans said that Mr. Trump has not had a successful year so far as president, with Republicans under 45 more likely to say he was unsuccessful and focused on the wrong issues.

Jeremy Brew, 42, who lives in Superior, Wis., and voted for Mr. Trump in 2024, said that he had been drawn to Mr. Trump’s “America First” agenda but been disappointed by his focus on foreign affairs during the first year of his second term.

“There’s no reason we need to be sending troops in to be taking — whether they’re a dictator or not, you know — taking them out and kidnapping foreign leaders,” he said of the actions in Venezuela.

“It’s not in America’s best interest to be getting involved in all of these foreign affairs,” he added, recalling the mess in Iraq. “It’s always come back to bite us.”

Most voters agree, though, that Mr. Trump had a productive year. A majority said that Mr. Trump has done about what they expected (39 percent) or more (40 percent). Even a majority of Democrats felt the president got done about what they expected or more.

As to the quality of what he accomplished, the partisan divide ran deep: 62 percent of Democrats said Mr. Trump’s second term has been worse than expected, most Republicans said it was about what they expected (48 percent) or better (39 percent).

One of Mr. Trump’s central economic policies has been widespread tariffs, and 54 percent of voters opposed them, including 45 percent who strongly opposed them.

Delila Mustedanagic, a 22-year-old stay at home mother in Portland, Ore., who did not vote in 2024, said that the tariffs had been impacting her life. She said that they had hurt sales at the drywall company where her fiancé works. Her mother’s boyfriend works in a furniture store where sales are lagging because of high shipping prices.

“Those tariffs,” she said, “have been affecting a lot of people’s jobs.”

Roughly half of voters support President Trump’s deportations and his handling of the border with Mexico, but a sizable majority believes that Immigration and Customs Enforcement has gone too far, according to a poll from The New York Times and Siena University.

Fifty percent of voters said that they approved of the Trump administration’s deportations of people living in the country illegally, while 47 percent opposed them. The president’s handling of the southern border was viewed favorably by 50 percent of voters.

But after a year in which Mr. Trump sent large numbers of ICE officers to conduct raids in several largely Democratic-controlled cities, prompting widespread protests and scenes of chaos on the streets, a wide majority of voters takes a dim view of the agency.

Just 36 percent of voters said they approved of the way ICE was handling its job, according to the poll, while 63 percent disapproved — including 70 percent of independent voters. And 61 percent of voters said that ICE had “gone too far” in their tactics, including nearly one in five Republicans.

The poll was conducted after the killing of Renee Good, a 37-year-old woman who was shot in Minneapolis by an ICE officer.

Overall, when voters were asked about how Mr. Trump has handled immigration, 58 percent said that they disapproved and 40 percent said that they approved.

The share of voters who voiced approval for its handling of immigration has dropped slightly since the beginning of Mr. Trump’s second term, according to the Times/Siena poll. And the share of voters who said that they “strongly disapprove” of Mr. Trump’s handling rose to 48 percent, up from 39 percent last April.

More than one in 10 voters named immigration or immigration enforcement when asked about the most important problem facing the country today, according to the poll.

Latino voters were more likely than Black or white voters to identify immigration as the most important problem facing the country. But more Latinos said that they saw the economy as more important. Latino voters were almost evenly divided on Mr. Trump’s handling of the border between the United States and Mexico, but they overwhelmingly disapproved of ICE tactics and said that the agency had gone too far.

Rogelio Salinas, a 59-year-old corrections officer in Lake Jackson, Texas, said that while he believed the country needs strong immigration law to ensure that migrants “do it the right way,” he has balked at the administration’s approach.

“There’s a way to go about it,” he said. “What they’re doing is just, it’s way too much, and it doesn’t need to be done.”

Mr. Salinas, who did not vote in the 2024 election, and is not registered with either party, said that he was particularly frustrated by videos and reports of immigration officers questioning people’s citizenship for no clear reason.

“They’re just ‘Hey, where are you from?’” he said. “So I’m scared. If I go out in town, I’m like: ‘Oh my God, I’m just glad ICE isn’t prevalent in our area.’ ”

Strong partisan divides remain on the issue. Overall, 84 percent of Republicans approve of the administration’s handling of immigration, while 95 percent of Democrats and 62 percent of independents disapprove.

Employers are struggling to navigate an evolving patchwork of unpredictable Trump administration policies disrupting entry to the US from nearly 100 countries.

The latest hurdle erected by the administration earlier this month blocked green cards indefinitely for immigrants from 75 countries who were deemed risks of relying on government benefits. That action followed a revived travel ban from President Donald Trump’s first administration, a halt to the diversity visa green card lottery, and revocations of more than 100,000 visas over the past year. International students and foreign workers seeking to renew visas have also been hit with temporary freezes or delays, sidetracking jobs and college enrollment.

It’s the flip side of the administration’s mass deportation campaign that’s produced tumultuous scenes in US cities, turmoil for businesses, and a spike in deaths in government custody. The government has justified the recurring visa disruptions with needs to screen immigrants for national security or public charge risks.

Immigrants, their families, and employers have often been left with no opportunity to prepare for changes to key programs, leaving hiring and travel plans in disarray.

“It’s policy by maximum chaos, unfortunately,” said James Hollis, an immigration attorney and partner at McEntee Law Group.

The immigrant visa pause, first reported Fox News then confirmed by the State Department on social media hours before an official announcement, was a case in point. Businesses and attorneys were left in the dark on how broadly the ban applied and who may be exempted.

Green Card Disruptions
Most employment-based green cards are issued to immigrants already working in the US with H-1B status or another temporary nonimmigrant status. The green card pause announced Jan. 14 will affect a relatively low number of employment-based visas.

About 9,200 employment-based visas were issued to immigrant workers from countries subject to the pause in fiscal year 2024, led by Brazil and Colombia. That’s compared to more than 64,000 in the “family-preference” category and almost twice that number for immediate relatives of US citizens.

But each visa blocked by the new ban represents a worker who a company has invested time and resources into sponsoring or has demonstrated skills valuable enough that they don’t require a US sponsor, said Ingrid Perez, managing attorney at IBP Immigration Law. That could include registered nurses essential to meeting health-care labor shortages or scientists doing cutting edge research.

“Its changing the rules in the middle of the game for a demographic of very high-skilled foreign nationals whose dream was to come to the US,” Perez said.

It’s unclear exactly how long the latest visa freeze will last. Businesses that had counted on bringing over foreign workers will look at any other options—including temporary visas—to meet labor needs, said Laura Jurcevich, a business immigration attorney and partner at Porter Wright Morris & Arthur LLP.

“Are there any alternatives for, maybe not necessarily this individual, but alternatives to fill employment gaps you’re already facing?” she said. “Those are things we are evaluating for everybody, including health care employers.”

Visa Slowdown Playbook
A State Department spokesperson said that President Trump had made clear immigrants must be financially self-sufficient to protect public benefits for US citizens.

The agency hasn’t said how long the visa pause will remain in effect. The spokesperson said it would take the time necessary “to conduct a full and thorough review.”

Immigrants can still submit visa applications and attend consular interviews, but won’t be issued any visas while the pause is in effect, according to a policy alert on the agency’s website. Dual nationals with a passport from a country not covered by the pause are exempted and temporary non-immigrant aren’t affected.

With the latest freeze, the State Department is following the same approach that caused massive delays for F-1 international students renewing visas last spring and, later, for H-1B workers who left the US before winter holidays with scheduled appointments for visa interviews. The agency cited new social media screening policies to stop interviews or push appointments months into next year.

“It’s any barrier that can be implemented in order for any immigration at all—legal immigration included—to be stopped,” Jurcevich said.

In the past, consulates have adopted new screening procedures or eligibility criteria without normal visa services grinding to a halt, attorneys and former department officials said.

A public charge determination has always been a possible ground for visa denial but using a change to the screening process to justify a blanket visa freeze reflects an “unprecedented” approach to the immigration system under Trump, Duden Freeman, a former consular officer and founder of Idelire Consulting. It’s also affected foreign workers and adopted children of US parents who would never have been deemed risks of public charges before, she added.

“When you throw out such a wide net, you end up impacting a huge number of people who should never have been included,” Freeman said.

Green Card Disruptions
Most employment-based green cards are issued to immigrants already working in the US with H-1B status or another temporary nonimmigrant status. The green card pause announced Jan. 14 will affect a relatively low number of employment-based visas.

About 9,200 employment-based visas were issued to immigrant workers from countries subject to the pause in fiscal year 2024, led by Brazil and Colombia. That’s compared to more than 64,000 in the “family-preference” category and almost twice that number for immediate relatives of US citizens.

But each visa blocked by the new ban represents a worker who a company has invested time and resources into sponsoring or has demonstrated skills valuable enough that they don’t require a US sponsor, said Ingrid Perez, managing attorney at IBP Immigration Law. That could include registered nurses essential to meeting health-care labor shortages or scientists doing cutting edge research.

“Its changing the rules in the middle of the game for a demographic of very high-skilled foreign nationals whose dream was to come to the US,” Perez said.

It’s unclear exactly how long the latest visa freeze will last. Businesses that had counted on bringing over foreign workers will look at any other options—including temporary visas—to meet labor needs, said Laura Jurcevich, a business immigration attorney and partner at Porter Wright Morris & Arthur LLP.

“Are there any alternatives for, maybe not necessarily this individual, but alternatives to fill employment gaps you’re already facing?” she said. “Those are things we are evaluating for everybody, including health care employers.”

Visa Slowdown Playbook
A State Department spokesperson said that President Trump had made clear immigrants must be financially self-sufficient to protect public benefits for US citizens.

The agency hasn’t said how long the visa pause will remain in effect. The spokesperson said it would take the time necessary “to conduct a full and thorough review.”

Immigrants can still submit visa applications and attend consular interviews, but won’t be issued any visas while the pause is in effect, according to a policy alert on the agency’s website. Dual nationals with a passport from a country not covered by the pause are exempted and temporary non-immigrant aren’t affected.

With the latest freeze, the State Department is following the same approach that caused massive delays for F-1 international students renewing visas last spring and, later, for H-1B workers who left the US before winter holidays with scheduled appointments for visa interviews. The agency cited new social media screening policies to stop interviews or push appointments months into next year.

“It’s any barrier that can be implemented in order for any immigration at all—legal immigration included—to be stopped,” Jurcevich said.

In the past, consulates have adopted new screening procedures or eligibility criteria without normal visa services grinding to a halt, attorneys and former department officials said.

A public charge determination has always been a possible ground for visa denial but using a change to the screening process to justify a blanket visa freeze reflects an “unprecedented” approach to the immigration system under Trump, Duden Freeman, a former consular officer and founder of Idelire Consulting. It’s also affected foreign workers and adopted children of US parents who would never have been deemed risks of public charges before, she added.

“When you throw out such a wide net, you end up impacting a huge number of people who should never have been included,” Freeman said.

Last August, federal immigration agents in unmarked cars pulled over Francisco Longoria as he drove through a majority Hispanic neighborhood in San Bernardino, California, with his teenage son in the passenger seat.

Cellphone and surveillance videos show masked agents surrounding the pickup truck, at least one with a gun drawn. When Longoria refused to roll down his window, one agent smashed the driver-side glass and reached inside. That’s when Longoria hit the gas and fled, and an agent fired multiple shots at the passenger side of his truck. Longoria and his son were not injured.

That same day, the Department of Homeland Security issued a statement asserting that Longoria “drove his truck at the officers and struck two CBP [Customs and Border Protection] officers with his vehicle,” and that an officer fired his gun “in self-defense.” But video recordings from inside the truck and a nearby business appear to show no agents or vehicles in Longoria’s path as he drove away.

Longoria was charged with assaulting a federal officer with a deadly weapon. Weeks later, during a court hearing, prosecutors acknowledged they couldn’t identify a lawful basis for the stop and had no evidence that any officers were injured. The Department of Justice dropped the case less than a month after filing it.

Like the fatal shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis, the Longoria case is part of a pattern of behavior exhibited by federal immigration agents since the Trump administration escalated its immigration enforcement campaign last summer. According to an MS NOW review of court records and media reports, federal agents – some working for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, others for the Border Patrol, a part of CBP – have shot at people in their cars at least 15 times since July.

These incidents cast new light on the Trump administration’s aggressive and, in the view of critics, reckless federal crackdown on American cities. The shootings occurred most often in places Trump has targeted with federal deployments — mostly Democratic-led jurisdictions with sanctuary policies, including California, Illinois, Minnesota and Washington, D.C.

The agents work in different subdivisions and units under the DHS banner, each agent with a unique combination of training and field experience. All of them were reassigned by the Trump administration to “roving patrols” tasked with arresting as many undocumented immigrants as possible. Jonathan Ross, the agent who killed Good in Minneapolis, had military training and almost 20 years’ experience with both Border Patrol and ICE. But in nearly every other case, the agents remain publicly unidentified, so the nature of their training and experience is unknown.

After each shooting, federal officials and agencies worked promptly to justify their officers’ actions using the same assertion: The drivers attempted to run over or ram agents with their vehicles. In many cases, the government offered this rationale in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, well before officials could produce evidence or file charges, let alone complete an investigation. But the claim frequently falls apart under public scrutiny, when video or other evidence comes to light.

Of the 15 incidents reviewed by MS NOW, eight resulted in criminal cases, four of which were dropped or dismissed by judges, and four of which are ongoing. In three other cases, civilians were placed in deportation proceedings and remain in ICE custody, but have not been criminally charged, despite DHS’s public claims that they committed serious offenses. In two of the incidents, criminal charges were never filed because the civilians were fatally shot. The status of the remaining cases is unclear.

None of the federal agents who fired their weapons at civilians has been charged with a crime. Defense attorneys working on the cases told MS NOW that they haven’t been informed of any agents being placed on administrative leave or subjected to internal discipline.

Former DHS officials and law enforcement experts suggest these shootings are the product of dramatically escalated enforcement tactics deployed during Trump’s second term. But it’s hard to say with certainty whether federal agents are shooting at drivers more frequently today than in previous years. Although DHS publishes partial data for use-of-force incidents, the nature of the data and the Trump administration’s changes to standard operating procedure make historical comparisons difficult. But former officials told MS NOW that this kind of event — agents firing guns at vehicles in urban areas, far away from their standard posts on the border — used to be exceedingly rare.

Police experts who reviewed the cases told MS NOW that almost every officer who fired their weapon acted outside deadly-force guidelines accepted by most of the U.S. law enforcement community.

“The tactics you’re seeing used by ICE and CBP are absolutely not in line with best practices in American policing,” said Art Acevedo, the former police chief in Houston, Miami and other cities. “It’s a recipe for disaster.”

For its part, DHS disputes these assertions.

“The pattern is NOT of law enforcement using deadly force,” DHS Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin told MS NOW. “It’s a pattern of vehicles being used as weapons by violent agitators to attack our law enforcement. … Our officers are experiencing a 3,200% increase in vehicular attacks. When faced with dangerous circumstances, DHS law enforcement used their training to protect themselves, their fellow officers, and the public.”

McLaughlin did not provide evidence to support the claim of a 3,200% increase in vehicular attacks.

“Officer-created jeopardy“
Daniel J. Oates worked for the New York Police Department for 21 years before becoming police chief, a title he held in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Aurora, Colorado, and Miami Beach, Florida. At each of the departments he led, Oates — following the model set by New York in 1972 — imposed rules strictly forbidding officers from firing at moving cars, including in cases when drivers try to ram officers.

“The cops were somewhat resistant, but eventually they accepted the rule and the reasons behind it,” Oates said.

His rationale is simple: The ban makes interactions between officers and civilians safer. One of many concerns is that firing a gun and incapacitating the driver of a moving car puts bystanders in danger. Instead, Oates focuses on training officers to avoid what law enforcement professionals call “officer-created jeopardy” — in other words, police actions that lead people to behave in ways that might justify deadly force.

Oates and other law enforcement experts interviewed by MS NOW suggested that Good’s shooting was a case of officer-created jeopardy. Oates stressed that only a full and impartial investigation could resolve the case. But based on publicly available video, Oates said, it appears that Ross put himself in danger by walking in front of a running vehicle with a driver at the wheel. For this reason, even if Ross genuinely believed Good was trying to run him over, the shooting would be unjustified, Oates said.

“Those of us who have had executive positions and have had to hold cops accountable would not accept that explanation,” Oates said. “If you place yourself in front of the vehicle and then you shoot someone because you’re in front of the vehicle, that’s not acceptable in American policing.”

Strict rules against firing at moving vehicles are now common across local and state law enforcement in the U.S., and are recommended by the Police Executive Research Forum, which advises police on use-of-force standards. ICE and CBP have their own use-of-force standards predating the Trump administration that, while less explicit, embrace similar principles, including keeping officers out of unnecessary danger.

“ICE law enforcement officers are trained to use the minimum amount of force necessary to resolve dangerous situations to prioritize the safety of the public and our officers,” McLaughlin said in her statement. She stressed that many federal immigration agents also have experience with other law enforcement agencies and the U.S. armed forces.

“Officers are highly trained in de-escalation tactics and regularly receive ongoing use of force training,” she said.

Yet federal agents are firing into vehicles at a rate that’s raising concern among experts, who are starting to wonder whether the training McLaughlin touts is effective — or even still in use.

“I would hope that every police officer, anyone who’s allowed to carry a firearm, would be trained not to shoot at a moving vehicle,” said Geoffrey Alpert, a criminologist at the University of South Carolina who specializes in high-risk police activities.

A change in tactics
Before June of last year, ICE and Border Patrol agents very rarely engaged in the kind of operations that are now common in Chicago, Los Angeles, Minneapolis and other American cities: large-scale, indiscriminate sweeps in urban environments, often in the presence of community members observing or actively antagonizing them.

Federal agents’ work used to look much different, especially before Trump’s second term. Officers with ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations, or ERO, typically picked up detainee transfers at local county jails. Border Patrol agents were accustomed to pursuing and detaining people in rural border areas where the agency manages multiple layers of surveillance and exerts near total territorial control.

Tactics changed dramatically last year, when the administration began an aggressive recruiting campaign and directed ICE and Border Patrol to roam metro areas — starting with Los Angeles in June — to detain as many people as possible rather than going after preselected targets.

As a result, streets across the country are flooded with agents who do not necessarily have appropriate training for the operations they’re conducting, according to a former high-level official who was with DHS during the Biden administration. The source spoke on condition of anonymity because they are still employed by the government.

While some units are trained for high-impact urban operations — including ERO’s Fugitive Operations Division and the Border Patrol Tactical Unit (or BORTAC) — even that training, the former official said, is inappropriate for the operations of today, which often involve all kinds of civilians in situations that require tact and care.

“They’re trained to start off at 10 out of 10 as far as aggression and perception of risk,” said the former official.

The shift in tactics has created dangerous conditions for civilians and officers alike, said one former CBP oversight official with experience in internal use-of-force investigations. The official, who worked under both Republican and Democratic administrations, asked not to be named for fear of politicizing the work of their former unit.

“Attempting to conduct enforcement operations in chaotic urban environments where you’re having all kinds of unknown variables injected in the middle of your operation is extremely fraught,” said the former CBP official. “It’s risky for the public and it’s risky for the agents.”

What remains unclear is whether DHS or any of the agencies under its umbrella are following up with officers after their operations go awry. When an agent fires their weapon, standard DHS protocol suggests placing the agent on administrative leave while ensuing investigations run their course. In her statement, McLaughlin said that “every use of force incident and any discharge of an ICE firearm must be properly reported and reviewed by the agency in accordance with agency policy, procedure, and guidelines.” She didn’t respond, however, when asked whether any agents involved in the shootings reviewed by MS NOW were placed on administrative leave.

Meanwhile, Trump administration officials have publicly urged ICE and Border Patrol agents to operate with little restraint. Five days after Good’s killing, DHS’ official X account reposted an October interview with White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller.

“To all ICE officers: You have federal immunity in the conduct of your duties,” Miller said. “You have immunity to perform your duties, and no one — no city official, no state official, no illegal alien, no leftist agitator or domestic insurrectionist — can prevent you from fulfilling your legal obligations and duties.”

“Who shot?”
At least three of the cases examined by MS NOW involved evidentiary and due process failures after the shootings, according to court records and interviews with defense attorneys.

Marimar Martinez, a U.S. citizen who was shot in Chicago in October, was the victim of one of these failures. DHS and federal prosecutors said she rammed her car into a government vehicle driven by the Border Patrol agent who shot her. The agent then drove the vehicle out of state and, with agency authorization, had it cleaned and repaired before Martinez’s defense team could inspect it. The agent also bragged about the hearing in text messages released as evidence in the criminal case, sending one text that read: “I fired 5 rounds and she had 7 holes. Put that in your books boys.”

Prosecutors later dropped the charges against Martinez.

In the case of Carlitos Ricardo Parias — a Mexican national and TikToker known by the moniker Richard LA for filming federal agents in Los Angeles — a federal judge threw out the indictment three days before it was set to go to trial, citing violations of Parias’ constitutional rights.

According to court documents, Border Patrol agents surrounded Parias’ car on Oct. 21 with a warrant for his arrest on immigration violations. Footage from a body camera worn by Border Patrol agent Jaime Avina shows that Parias, with his car boxed between two agents’ vehicles, accelerated in place, producing a thick plume of smoke. After the smoke cleared, Avina — who had his gun drawn — approached the smashed passenger-side window of Parias’ car and, while attempting to open the door from the inside, swapped the gun from his right hand to his left and fired it. The vehicle did not appear to be moving at the time.

“Oh!” Avina can be heard exclaiming in the video after firing the weapon. “Fuck!”

The bullet struck Parias in the elbow and ricocheted, striking an agent with the U.S. Marshals in the hand. Other agents yelled, “Who shot?” Avina backed away from the car and replied, “I shot.”

In a statement, McLaughlin said that Parias had “weaponized his vehicle and began ramming the law enforcement vehicle in an attempt to flee. Fearing for the safety of the public and law enforcement, our officers followed their training and fired defensive shots.”

Parias was charged in federal court with assaulting a federal officer with a deadly weapon, but authorities did not produce the body camera footage that cast doubt on the government’s version of events until six weeks after the incident — five days after the discovery deadline imposed by the court.

A federal judge dismissed the charges, citing the government’s failure to turn over evidence, as well as violations of Parias’ right to counsel. Court documents show that ICE, which had Parias in its custody at the time, repeatedly obstructed his lawyers’ efforts to meet with their client by, among other things, allowing their calls and emails to the ICE detention center to go unanswered for long periods of time.

The Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment in this case, and DHS did not respond specifically to questions about its handling of evidence and due process after the incidents in question.

“As if I was getting carjacked”
In August, federal immigration agents began appearing on patrols in Washington alongside officers from the Metropolitan Police Department, following a Trump administration order temporarily federalizing the city’s police force under a declared “crime emergency.” During the 30-day takeover, ICE and Border Patrol personnel accompanied MPD officers on routine patrols. Although formal federal control expired in September, ICE and CBP agents continued operating in the district in visible coordination with local police.

On Oct. 17, on Benning Road NE, Philip Brown, a Black man and U.S. citizen originally from Brooklyn, New York, was in his Dodge Durango at a stop sign with another vehicle directly in front of him when armed men suddenly approached his car.

“I didn’t even see them,” Brown told MS NOW. “They didn’t pull me over, like with red and blue flashing lights. No, this was me at a stop sign, as if I was getting carjacked.”

An MPD officer present at the scene named Jason Sterling later testified in court that officers stopped Brown over his dark window tinting and a missing front license plate. As they approached, Sterling said he heard Brown’s car rev and then collide with the car in front of him, followed by the sound of gunshots. It was later determined in a preliminary court hearing that an agent with ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations — the agency’s criminal investigations division — fired his gun at Brown’s vehicle at least four times.

The bullets narrowly missed Brown. One went through the collar of his jacket.

“I’m still in shock from it,” Brown said.

Days later, DHS said in a statement that Brown had driven his car at officers “in a deliberate attempt to run them down.” Brown denies this, and Sterling testified in court that there were no officers positioned in front of Brown’s vehicle when he heard the gunshots.

Brown was charged with felony fleeing — not with assault or attempted assault on an officer. During the first hearing in D.C. Superior Court, Sterling admitted that, under the advice of another MPD official, he intentionally omitted the shooting from his police report. The judge dismissed the charges during the hearing, citing a lack of probable cause for the arrest and Sterling’s glaring omission from the charging documents.

Brown’s lawyer, E. Paige White, who used to work as a public defender in Washington, said the MPD officers’ actions were unusual and likely influenced by the presence of armed federal agents.

“The feds being involved makes it totally different,” she told MS NOW. “The MPD is not moving the way the MPD normally moves.”

White is still awaiting the results of an investigation MPD said it was conducting into the incident. Brown, meanwhile, has watched events unfold in Minneapolis and feels grateful to be alive.

“Those three bullets that they let off at [Good] are the same three bullets that they let off at me,” Brown said. “I just so happen to be the survivor. I’m able to see my daughter turn 5 years old.”

If federal agencies continue to subvert law enforcement norms while carrying out Trump’s escalating federal crackdown on American cities, White worries that Brown’s experience — and Good’s — will become more common.

“These agents have escalated what’s always been a problem with policing in America to a level that none of us have seen before,” said White. “I think that we’re going to see a lot more people get killed.”

The 5-year-old boy from Columbia Heights who was detained with his father this week is drawing international attention as both remain in a San Antonio, Texas, family detention facility.
The preschooler, Liam Conejo Ramos, and his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, were detained in their driveway after arriving home from school on Jan. 20.
Photos of the 5-year-old being escorted into a federal vehicle wearing a blue rabbit hat and red backpack spread rapidly on social media and drew international media coverage after leaders of the small north metro Columbia Heights school district chose to speak publicly against enforcement actions they say are “inducing trauma” on students.

More than half of the district’s 3,000 students are Hispanic or Latino.
Asked about the boy while in Minneapolis on Jan. 22, Vice President JD Vance said that, as a father, he was horrified when he first heard the story. But after learning more details, he said he concluded that agents had no other choice. “What are they supposed to do? Are they supposed to let the 5-year-old freeze to death?” Vance said.
Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that ICE “did NOT target a child” and that as agents approached Arias’ car, he fled on foot. “For the child’s safety, one of our ICE officers remained with the child while the other officers apprehended Conejo Arias,” she said.
School leaders say that several bystanders disputed that account, adding that the father ran to the house to alert his wife not to open the door.
School Board Chair Mary Granlund said she arrived while agents were still on scene and heard adults plead with them not to take the child, offering to care for him. She and others also told agents that school officials could help.

“There was ample opportunity to safely hand that child off to adults,” Granlund said. She said she believed the boy’s mother was inside the home and afraid to open the door as agents surrounded it.

Marc Prokosch, the family’s attorney, said they came to the U.S. in 2024 from Ecuador, had an active asylum case and the preschooler should never have been detained. He said the family was properly following immigration rules and Conejo Arias had no criminal history.
Prokosch said he hasn’t been able to directly talk to the family about how they’re doing but said there’s an “urgent” need to free the 5-year-boy.

“We’re looking at our legal options,” he said. “We’re hopeful and we have to be hopeful.”
“We know detaining children and families is wrong,” he added.
The 5-year-old was the fourth — and youngest — student from Columbia Heights Public Schools to be detained by federal agents recently as escalating immigration enforcement directly affects more Twin Cities schools and students. It was the first time a local school district has confirmed students have been detained by federal agents since Operation Metro Surge started, though district leaders say none of the students were detained on school grounds.

According to the National Immigration Law Center, ICE’s policy is that arresting officers should allow a parent to make arrangements for their child’s care. It’s unclear if they did in this situation.

McLaughlin said in another statement that: “ICE does not separate families or deport U.S. citizens. Parents are asked if they want to be removed with their children or if they would like ICE will place the children with a safe person the parent designates.”
Gov. Tim Walz condemned the incident, writing on X that “Minnesotans want safety. They want freedom. They want what’s best for our kids. Masked agents snatching preschoolers off the street and sending them to Texas detention centers serves none of those purposes. This campaign of retribution has got to stop.”
U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar added on X that it’s “absolutely disgraceful. This is what happens when Donald Trump’s government pays bounties for people. Doesn’t matter if they’re legal. Doesn’t matter who they are. Doesn’t matter if they’re five-years-old. How can anyone justify this any more?”

Columbia Heights Superintendent Zena Stenvik said teachers, school staff and community members have rallied together to monitor school buildings for agents and are working hard to otherwise maintain a sense of normalcy for students. But students are paying attention.
After moving recess inside because of nearby enforcement activity, Stenvik said she heard one elementary schooler ask her to confirm if recess couldn’t be outside “because of ICE.”

“They see it on a daily basis in our community,” she said.
Parent-teacher organizations, social workers and community organizations are fundraising to support students in the school district.
A fundraiser for Liam’s family has raised more than $150,000 and noted that “this sudden separation has left their family heartbroken and desperate to bring them back home … It’s unimaginable for a child so young to be in a place like this, far from the comfort and care of his family.”

The fundraiser noted that Liam’s mother is grateful for the overwhelming support and kindness from the community.
Stenvik said her decision to speak publicly was driven by concern for children rather than politics.
“We would like to focus on teaching children and providing learning opportunities,” she said. “That’s our main focus.”

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Insisting that he was in Minnesota to calm tensions, Vice President JD Vance on Thursday blamed “far-left people” and state and local law enforcement officials for the chaos that has unfolded during the White House’s aggressive deportation campaign.

The Republican vice president said, “We’re doing everything that we can to lower the temperature,” adding that Minnesota leaders should “meet us halfway.”

The Justice Department is investigating top Democrats in the state, including Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, over whether they have obstructed or impeded immigration enforcement through their public criticism of the administration. Walz and Frey have described the investigation as an attempt to bully the political opposition.

Federal officers stood in a row behind Vance as he spoke, and there were two U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement vehicles emblazoned with the slogan “Defend the Homeland.”

His visit follows weeks of aggressive rhetoric from the White House, including President Donald Trump, who has threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act — and send in military forces — to crack down on unrest. Asked about that option, Vance said, “Right now, we don’t think that we need that.”

Trump dispatched thousands of federal agents to Minnesota earlier this month after reports of child care fraud by Somali immigrants. Minneapolis-area officials, including Frey, as well as the police, religious leaders and the business community, have pushed back. And outrage grew after an agent fatally shot Renee Good, a U.S. citizen and mother of three, during a confrontation this month.

Walz said the federal government was to blame for the turmoil.

“Take the show of force off the streets and partner with the state on targeted enforcement of violent offenders instead of random, aggressive confrontation,” he wrote on social media.

Frey, speaking from city hall, accused immigration officials of racial profiling, an accusation that Vance had rejected during his visit.

“They are detaining people that have done nothing wrong,” Frey said. “They are going after people exclusively based on the fact that they look like they are Somali or Latino, and no reason beyond that.”

He said the enforcement measures in the city and an influx of some 3,000 federal officers seemed designed as political retaliation, as opposed to getting criminals off the street.

“This is more about, tragically, terrorizing people than it is about safety, than it is even about immigration,” Frey said.

Vance defends actions by ICE agents
Vance has played a leading role in defending the agent who killed Good, and he previously said her death was “a tragedy of her own making.” On Thursday, he repeated claims that Good “rammed” an agent with her car, an account that has been disputed based on videos of the incident.

Minnesota faith leaders, backed by labor unions and hundreds of Minneapolis-area businesses, are planning a day of protests on Friday. Nearly 600 local businesses have announced plans to shut down, while hundreds of “solidarity events” are expected across the country, according to MoveOn spokesperson Britt Jacovich.

Vance defended ICE agents who detained a 5-year-old boy as he was arriving home from preschool.

“When they went to arrest his illegal alien father, the father ran,” Vance said. “So the story is that ICE detained a 5-year-old. Well, what are they supposed to do?”

The boy, who was taken by federal agents along with his father to a detention facility in Texas, was the fourth student from his Minneapolis suburb to be detained by immigration officers in recent weeks.

Asked about reporting that federal authorities are asserting sweeping power to forcibly enter people’s homes without a judge’s warrant, Vance said warrants would still be part of immigration enforcement. But Vance did not specify which kind of warrant he was referring to.

“Nobody is talking about doing immigration enforcement without a warrant,” Vance said. “We’re never going to enter somebody’s house without some kind of warrant, unless of course somebody is firing at an officer and they have to protect themselves.”

The Associated Press reported on Wednesday that federal immigration officers were asserting sweeping power to forcibly enter houses without a judicial warrant, according to an internal ICE memo, in what is a reversal of long-standing guidance meant to respect constitutional limits on government searches.

Instead, the officers can use administrative warrants. Those are issued by ICE officials, as opposed to warrants signed off on by an independent judge.

Vance visited Ohio earlier in the day
During a stop in Toledo, Ohio, on Thursday morning, Vance acknowledged that immigration agents have made mistakes, while declining to be specific.

“Of course there have been mistakes made, because you’re always going to have mistakes made in law enforcement,” he said when asked about Trump’s comments earlier this week that ICE “is going to make mistakes sometimes.”

But Vance said the blame didn’t lie with the federal government.

“The number one way where we could lower the mistakes that are happening, at least with our immigration enforcement, is to have local jurisdictions that are cooperating with us,” he said.

Vance also praised the arrest of protesters who disrupted a church service in Minnesota on Sunday and said he expects more prosecutions to come. The protesters entered the church chanting “ICE out” and “Justice for Renee Good.”

“They’re scaring little kids who are there to worship God on a Sunday morning,” Vance said. He added, “Just as you have the right to protest, they have a right to worship God as they choose. And when you interrupt that, that is a violation of the law.”

Vance took the opportunity to criticize hometown Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur while he was in her Toledo-centered district. A crowded slate of Republicans — including former ICE Deputy Director Madison Sheahan — is vying to take on the longest-serving woman in Congress this fall.

Vance’s stop in Ohio was focused primarily on bolstering the administration’s positive economic message on the heels of Trump’s appearance at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, and he showed support for Republicans such as gubernatorial contender Vivek Ramaswamy and U.S. Sen. Jon Husted.

Convincing voters that the nation is in rosy financial shape has been a persistent challenge for Trump during the first year of his second term. Polling has shown that the public is unconvinced that the economy is in good condition and majorities disapprove of Trump’s handling of foreign policy.

Vance urged voters to be patient with the economy, saying Trump had inherited a bad situation from Democratic President Joe Biden.

“You don’t turn the Titanic around overnight,” Vance said. “It takes time to fix what is broken.”

In Portland, Maine, a liberal, normally laid-back city known for its coastal views and coffee shops, anxiety and anger were palpable on Thursday, the third day of a statewide surge in federal immigration enforcement.

On the wide brick sidewalks of the city’s Old Port district and the snow-lined streets of its West End, residents expressed their resistance to the crackdown, posting “No I.C.E.” signs in windows, filming traffic stops by masked agents and standing guard at school playgrounds. In the city of about 70,000, which in some ways resembles a small town, many residents said the operation felt like an assault on their peaceful neighborhoods.

“This is a close community, where everyone knows everyone, and it’s not a place anyone expected this to happen,” said Anny Fenton, a Portland resident. “It feels very surreal and intense.”

The immigration offensive began in Maine this week, the latest in a series of similar federal campaigns in Democrat-led cities across the country. Officials with the Department of Homeland Security said it was targeting 1,400 “criminal illegal aliens who have terrorized communities” in Maine.

Those detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents since the campaign began on Tuesday include a 64-year-old Lyft driver, whose son said all he knew about his father’s disappearance was what he saw in a bystander’s video of the traffic stop and arrest, and a corrections officer trainee, whose boss, Sheriff Kevin Joyce of Cumberland County, said the man had cleared background checks, had no criminal record and was working legally.

In Portland and in the smaller city of Lewiston, 30 miles to the north, residents scanned the streets for black S.U.V.s, their everyday routines infused with strange new vigilance. At a Petco store in suburban South Portland, near the Maine Mall, employees said ICE agents had repeatedly circled the parking lot in their vehicles on Thursday. In Portland’s Old Port, a tourist area dense with upscale shops and cafes, an owner of one restaurant said employees had observed agents there, too.

The restaurant owner declined to give his name, saying he had already endured days of harassment — including a flood of negative online reviews of his business — after posting a small “No I.C.E.” sign in the front window.

While Portland, like much of Southern Maine, is politically liberal, the state as a whole is more diverse, with particularly strong conservative leanings in its rural northern portion. President Trump won about 45 percent of the statewide vote in 2024.

Even in and around Portland, some residents said they welcomed the arrival of the federal officers, and of immigration enforcement that they considered long overdue.

Barry Askinasi, 70, shopping at a Home Depot in South Portland, said he had no problem with immigrants — he noted that he had raised a son whom he adopted from Guatemala — but “if you’re illegal, you shouldn’t be here.”

“It’s important to let ICE do its job,” he said. “We all pay our taxes. We can afford to take care of some people, but not everyone.”

If city and state leaders would cooperate with federal immigration authorities, Mr. Askinasi added, and help them “get the bad guys,” then ICE would not have to stake out neighborhoods.

Maine, one of the whitest states in the country, has proportionally fewer immigrants than most: people from other countries make up 4 percent of its population, compared with 14 percent of the U.S. population, according to a report last year by the Migration Policy Institute.

But in the sparsely populated state, which has 1.4 million people and an aging, shrinking work force, immigrants play an outsize role. About 45 percent of immigrants in Maine are of prime working age, 25 to 54, the report found, compared to 36 percent of residents born in the United States.

“Businesses are losing employees because they’ve been detained, or aren’t showing up, and they’re very worried about how they’re going to carry on — all kinds of businesses that rely on employees who are here lawfully,” Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat running for U.S. Senate, said at a news conference in Portland on Thursday.

Larger employers in the state quickly felt an impact from the surge, as workers who felt at risk of being detained, and fearful of going outside, chose to stay home this week. At Maine Medical Center in Portland, the state’s largest hospital, at least 18 staff members missed work on Tuesday night, according to a nurse who worked an overnight shift and was told by supervisors that fear of detainment was the main reason for the absences.

The nurse, who declined to be identified because the hospital had not authorized employees to describe staffing, said that most of the missing workers clean rooms. Their absence meant longer waits for patients to be moved from the emergency room into inpatient units.

The hospital’s patient caseload was also affected, a doctor on staff said. In at least one case, a resident of the Portland area whose home care aide was detained by ICE had to be admitted to receive care that would otherwise have been given at home. The doctor also declined to be identified because hospital employees were not authorized to speak to the news media.

“While we are experiencing higher than usual call-outs in some segments of our work force,” a hospital spokesman, John Porter, said in a statement, “we have been able to address any operational challenges that have arisen with no impact on patient care.”

In Lewiston, an old mill town of 37,000 where population decline was reversed in recent decades by a wave of African immigrants fleeing civil war in Somalia, the downtown was unusually quiet on Thursday, residents said.

Kevin Rockwell, 43, an employee at a staffing agency in Lewiston that hires immigrants for jobs including factory work, construction and cleaning after confirming that they can work legally, said some had called to say they could not work this week because they feared being swept up in the surge.

“I’m seeing less people come in looking for jobs,” he said. “Some people don’t even want to talk on the phone.”

Nsiona Nguizani, 42, of Portland, an immigrant from Angola, said even people who are citizens carry their documents while running errands for others because no one knows what agents might demand “so they’ll let you go.”

Fear, he said, is “everywhere.”

A traffic stop in Portland on Thursday morning, close to several administrative offices for the University of Southern Maine, startled employees, one of whom said she went outside and recorded video as bystanders screamed “Show your face!” at masked agents.

A man spotted later near the intersection, as the detained driver’s car was being towed away, identified himself as the son of the detainee. He declined to give his name, but said he was trying to contact a lawyer to assist his father, a 64-year-old Lyft driver in the city.

“He is not a criminal,” the man said. “That’s why I’m not worried.”

In a statement on Wednesday, Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, said the Maine operation is targeting “the worst of the worst,” including people convicted of aggravated assault, false imprisonment, and endangering the welfare of a child.

On Thursday, Maine’s governor questioned those claims, and said that many of the detainments she had heard about appeared to involve people with jobs, children in local schools and no criminal records.

“I’d be shocked if they found 1,400 people with criminal charges against them,” Ms. Mills said.

At her cafe in Portland’s West End neighborhood on Thursday morning, Ilma Lopez was busy greeting customers, baking cream puffs with caramel filling and navigating fallout from the “No I.C.E.” sign in her front window.

A Venezuelan immigrant who moved to Maine from New York 14 years ago because “people are so nice here,” she said she could not have imagined the atmosphere in her adopted city becoming fraught and fearful almost overnight.

“Immigrants are the backbone of the community, in every city,” Ms. Lopez said. “It’s a rare thing now to find someone who’s been here for generations.”

Sitting nearby at the coffee shop’s counter, Jeff Marcus, 40, a tour guide in the city, expressed a similar anger. “It’s disgusting in the general human sense,” he said of the immigration crackdown.

Another customer he had just met had offered to add Mr. Marcus to an online group of community activists who were tracking sightings of federal agents and documenting their actions. He had accepted the invitation.

“I’m furious,” he said, “and I’m tired of waiting around.”

For the past six weeks, federal agents have been trawling the icy streets of the Twin Cities, drawing protests small and large, and arresting thousands of immigrants as part of the Trump administration’s latest deportation surge.

The most consistent demonstrations, however, haven’t taken place in downtown Minneapolis or in the capital, St. Paul, but miles away at the B.H. Whipple Federal Building, a Brutalist structure that sits between a highway and an airport.

Whipple is now the home base for thousands of immigration agents. It is the first stop for those caught in the immigration sweeps throughout Minneapolis-St. Paul,and where, through freezing weather and occasional tear gas, protesters have kept watch, chanting and blowing whistles, as masked agents drive in and out.

The 57-year-old building has long been the center of federal affairs in the Twin Cities area, with hundreds of workers in government offices that include Veterans Affairs, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Department of Homeland Security. There is also an immigration court.

The transformation of this physical manifestation of federal bureaucracy into a rallying point for protesters, and a detention center for citizens and undocumented immigrants alike, has been startling in its speed and scope. Those who have been detained at Whipple describe crowded conditions, huddled families and lots of tears.

People held there, including those released without charges, have described seeing detained immigrants having to go to the bathroom with little privacy and being held in rooms with no beds, so tightly packed that it seemed impossible for them to lie down.

The Department of Homeland Security said in an unsigned statement that any claims about poor conditions were false, and that detainees are given “proper meals, medical treatment, and have opportunities to communicate with their family members and lawyers.”

On the Inside, Distress

One of those detained was Gage Garcia, 23, a gas station auditor who was arrested in a suburb north of Minneapolis last week after he refused to give agents his I.D. and then blew a whistle in one’s face. Mr. Garcia, who said he was a U.S. citizen, said agents drove him around in an unmarked car for about 30 minutes before taking him to Whipple, where he was shackled and held in a small cell with other citizens for several hours.

Inside Whipple, Mr. Garcia said, agents were separating citizens and immigrants believed to be in the country illegally. He said agents had walked him down corridors and by a series of other cells on the first floor. Through one-way windows on the cell doors, he said, he saw detainees, including children, who were visibly upset.

“The people can’t see me, but I’m looking at everybody while I’m walking past, and everyone’s crying, people are curled up in a ball, they’re distraught,” he said.

Mr. Garcia described what he called a chaotic operation inside the building, where detainees were offered only bread and ham and no water, repeatedly asked the same questions by different agents and sometimes had requests to use the bathroom ignored.

Immigration lawyers have said they have found it difficult to get updates on their clients who are held at Whipple, which is meant only to be a short-term detention facility. Some lawyers said they suspected that people were being quickly flown out of the state — often to Texas — with the goal of keeping lawyers in Minnesota from being able to challenge detentions in court.

Marc Prokosch, an immigration lawyer, said he had found it increasingly difficult to get information on his clients. In one instance, he said, his firm was told that a man it was representing was still being detained at Whipple, but when the firm filed a petition to challenge his detention, the government said he had actually been moved to Texas a day earlier.

Inside the building’s immigration court, longtime observers have also noticed a rise in the number of immigrants who are missing their court dates, most likely because they fear arrest as they exit their proceedings. Such arrests have become increasingly common here and elsewhere during President Trump’s second term.

Madeline Lohman, the advocacy and outreach director for the Advocates for Human Rights, whose members have long observed immigration court proceedings at Whipple, said some proceedings were wrongly closed to observers in recent weeks.

And while many detainees appear to be quickly shipped out of state, others are reporting that they are being held at the Whipple Building for more than 24 hours, something Ms. Lohman said the building was not equipped for.

“They’re willing to expose people to really horrific detention conditions,” she said of federal officials.

This past week, a man who immigrated to the U.S. in April 2023 and had filed for asylum was appearing via video feed from a detention center, where he was taken after a failed attempt at crossing the Northern border. His lawyer said that the man had held several jobs, most recently with Amazon, but had panicked during the December surge in immigration enforcement and had tried to flee to Canada rather than be sent elsewhere.

The judge hearing the case decided that the man was a significant flight risk, given his attempt to leave the country, and ordered that he continue to be detained without the opportunity for bond.

On the Outside, Protests

Outside, immigration agents mingle with one another in a large parking lot filled with unmarked S.U.V.s as protesters jeer them from across the street.

At times, the protesters have tried to block the immigration agents from leaving the building, but more often they yell at the agents, telling them that their jobs are morally wrong and questioning why they are covering their faces.

In several instances, there have been more serious clashes between federal agents and protesters, with agents deploying tear gas and tackling demonstrators.

One man, Brandon Sigüenza, 32, said he was hit with tear gas on both ends of his detention at Whipple — once when agents sprayed into his car before arresting him — and then again when he was let go from the building hours later and had to walk through tear gas that agents were firing toward protesters.

Even as temperatures have dropped into the single digits this week, a dedicated group of protesters has been at the building every day, many in snow pants and some handing out snacks, handwarmers and coffee. One man wearing a gas mask has taken to shoveling ice off the sidewalk where protesters stand, opposite the entrance to the building’s parking lot.

Amy Wolter, a special-education teacher in the region, was one of many protesters who shouted at agents as they drove out of the building on one recent day. “My students have more empathy than you,” she said as they pulled away.

“I just feel like it’s my duty to be here and raise my voice,” she said, adding that she has been telling immigration agents that “it’s never too late to be a better human” by quitting the force.

Whipple’s ‘Fair and Just’ Legacy

All of the negative attention on the building and what is taking place there has been upsetting for Liza Interlandi Stewart, the great-great-great-granddaughter of Bishop Henry Benjamin Whipple, for whom the building is named.

Ms. Stewart, 65, a landscaper who lives in Laguna Beach, Calif., said she had always been proud to be a descendant of Bishop Whipple, the first episcopal bishop of Minnesota, and had once spent time researching him further on a trip to the Twin Cities. Bishop Whipple, who was born in 1822, was known for his missionary work and advocacy for Native Americans in the 1800s, and he was said to have been called “Straight Tongue” by some for his honesty.

It is hard to know what a man who died in 1901 would have thought of today’s events, but Ms. Stewart said she believed her ancestor would be disappointed about what immigration agents were doing in the building named for him.

“His belief was to be fair and just,” she said. “Walking up to somebody just because of the color of their skin and asking for their papers would just infuriate him.”

SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — A Colombian man belonging to a protected class was detained by ICE while leaving immigration court. His case had been dismissed minutes before his detention, and he has no criminal record.

Kevin Alexander Ortiz Barros, 21, entered the United States as a minor. He was detained by Border Patrol agents upon entry before being released on his own recognizance. He then entered the immigration proceedings process.

“They gave him what is known as an alien number and told him to be prepared because he was going to have to litigate his case,” said Adam Crayk, the lawyer now representing Barros.

Barros’ first court date in more than two and a half years was on Jan. 20. While awaiting his day in immigration court, Barros applied for and was approved for Special Immigration Juvenile Status.

Crayk explained that this is a protected-class designation that must be approved by a Utah judge outside of immigration court.

It is granted to people who crossed the border as minors and can prove they were abandoned, neglected, or abused as a child and were fleeing their country for safety.

“In order to get that, you have to prove to a Utah judge, not an immigration judge, a Utah judge, that you’ve been the victim of abuse or the victim of abandonment or the victim of neglect. A Utah judge in the juvenile district court here determined that he qualified and met that standard,” said Crayk.

Once this designation was approved, Barros became eligible for a green card and was waiting for his case to move forward. Because of this, during Tuesday’s hearing, his prior immigration case was dismissed by a judge.

Crayk explained that the dismissal of an immigration case typically indicates the government is no longer seeking to remove an individual.

As Barros was leaving his hearing, ICE agents detained him while he was still inside the courthouse.

“For us it’s alarming because there have been arrests [in court] before, but typically that’s because someone has an open warrant,” said Crayk. “This young man was actively engaged in showing up to court doing the things that he was asked to do.”

Crayk explained that once the case was dismissed, it left the judicial process. Because Barros does not yet have his green card and was no longer in active immigration proceedings, ICE then had jurisdiction to detain him and place him into expedited removal proceedings, despite his Special Immigration Juvenile Status designation.

“The real strategy behind what was done was to take him from what is commonly known as removal proceedings and then they transition him into what is known as expedited removal, which then keeps him in custody,” said Crayk.

During his immigration proceeding, Barros petitioned the judge not to dismiss the case out of fear ICE would detain him in the window between dismissal and when he received his green card. Crayk explained that this process can take years due to backlogs in the immigration system.

“What people also don’t know is that prior to the current administration, we had approximately 60,000 people in immigration proceedings already facing deportation consequences,” said Crayk. “So to say that we were ramping up or we were going to do this mass deportation effort, all that does is put more people into deportation proceedings.”

Crayk said arrests like this have a chilling effect on others who are following court orders and attending their immigration appointments.

“Why would I go to court? They’re going to arrest me anyways. I don’t have the ability to show up to that building and argue my position,” questioned Crayk. “But, I’m telling you that cannot be the mentality.”

Barros’s girlfriend, Jillian Nelson, described him as “kind, gentle, the perfect person.”

She said Barros went through a lot as a child, which led to his Special Immigration Juvenile Status.

“He was abandoned in his childhood. Now, I feel like he’s been abandoned trying to make a better life for himself, trying to provide for himself, truly trying to make his community better, trying to make everyone around him better,” said Nelson. “This is what his community does for him. This is what they do for him.”

Nelson said Barros was incredibly trusting and believed that because he was following the proper legal process to remain in the United States, this would not happen to him.

“He trusted that, after hearing for months that ‘we’re going after criminals, the worst of the worst,’ he didn’t fit that,” said Nelson. “He was 100% confident. He thought he was on the path to getting his green card.”

Nelson said she was able to speak with him briefly while he was being detained. He has also spoken with his roommate and his lawyer. She said they believe he is currently in Evanston, Wyoming, though ICE was unable to confirm his location to her.

2News also contacted ICE, which said Barros was in transit and they could not disclose his destination.

Nelson said she is trying to stay focused on sharing Barros’ story and speaking out on his behalf, but said she is “heartbroken.”

“It honestly makes me embarrassed to be an American. I know that is harsh,” said Nelson. “But, this is the way they’ve treated someone who has done nothing wrong? It’s embarrassing.”

2News reached out to Immigration and Customs Enforcement via email and phone to confirm the details of Barros’s arrest, including why he was detained. 2News also asked whether ICE is conducting enforcement operations at courthouses in Utah and whether individuals with approved Special Immigration Juvenile Status are subject to arrest.

ICE did not respond to requests for comment.

Crayk said they plan to appeal the immigration judge’s motion to dismiss Barros’ case, which would place him back into deportation proceedings.

The Constitution’s protections for individual rights keep getting in the way of the Trump administration’s immigration methods.

A whistleblower’s organization representing anonymous government employees alleged this week that the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement issued a memo in May instructing officers that they can enter a person’s home without a judicial warrant. The memo contends that officers can instead rely on a document prepared by ICE — known as an administrative warrant — after a final deportation order has been signed, typically by an immigration judge in the executive branch.

The Department of Homeland Security effectively confirmed this policy on Thursday, saying those being targeted already “had full due process” and that such warrants “have been used for decades.”

Administrative warrants are issued by the executive branch itself, not by an independent judge. They can be used to arrest immigrants in public locations. But any legal novice knows that, except in extreme circumstances, forcibly entering a person’s home without a warrant issued by a judge violates the Fourth Amendment, as the Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled.

The whistleblower report alleges that ICE agents in Texas have already started to rely on administrative warrants to arrest people in their homes, though this remains unconfirmed. If true, this represents yet another example of the administration treating constitutional rights as mere suggestions when enforcing immigration laws.

The administration has, for example, sent immigrants to be imprisoned in El Salvador without due process, which the Supreme Court later ruled was required. It has detained and sought to deport foreigners in the United States on student visas explicitly because of their political views. And who can forget President Donald Trump’s executive order attempting to end birthright citizenship, which is enshrined in the 14th Amendment?

Trump won the 2024 election on promises to pursue mass deportation, and he’s within his rights to aggressively enforce the laws. But the administration sullies that mandate every time it goes too far — especially when it reaches beyond its legal authority. The public has already soured on the administration’s crackdown. How long will it take before the president notices?

Arkansas law enforcement officials said Wednesday 48 people have been held on immigration detainers due to state police’s participation in a federal immigration program since September.

Lawmakers at a legislative hearing sought more details from State Police about the cost of training officers to participate in the program, with one lawmaker saying she hoped there were no barriers preventing more departments from participating.

“We should be acting as aggressively as we possibly can to make sure everybody’s trained, everybody’s participating, everybody’s on the same page to execute the president’s agenda,” said Republican Sen. Missy Irvin, who co-chairs the legislative subcommittee overseeing State Police. Arkansas State Police entered an agreement last summer with federal immigration authorities, granting it limited immigration enforcement power through the 287(g) Task Force Model program.

The program is a “force multiplier” that allows state and local agencies to enforce limited immigration authority during routine duties, according to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement site.

Through the agreement, state police can contact ICE if it believes a person it comes into contact with during traffic stops, pursuits, investigations or other routine enforcement activity may be in the country illegally. ICE can then put an immigration detainer on that person.

Arkansas State Police entered into the agreement after a state law passed during last year’s legislative session required state police, the Department of Corrections and county sheriffs to do so.

President Donald Trump has made deporting immigrants living in the U.S. illegally one of the cornerstones of his second term. His administration has sent thousands of immigration enforcement agents into major Democrat-run cities with a stated goal of arresting and deporting immigrants with criminal convictions.

However, those without criminal histories and U.S. citizens have found themselves caught up in the crackdown as well. Most recently, the shooting death of a woman in Minneapolis by an ICE agent sparked nationwide protests.

Neighboring Tennessee is moving to do more in the immigration crackdown as well. Republican lawmakers there recently unveiled plans for bills that would require public institutions such as public schools, vehicle registration offices and city governments to track and report immigration status.

Arkansas State Police Director Col. Mike Hagar told legislators that since the 287(g) agreement was signed, all but a handful of state police troopers have completed the required 60-hour training.

Sen. Joshua Bryant, a Republican from Rogers, said that with the fiscal session approaching, he wanted to know if expenses related to the programs were being tracked for state police and the county jails that hold immigrants for Immigration and Customs Enforcement .

Hagar said he believed county jails were being reimbursed, but was unaware of how much they were being reimbursed. Troopers did the 60-hour training in between regular calls for service during their shifts, he said. ASP spokesperson Cindy Murphy said in an email that the 287(g) training was added to troopers’ regular training requirements, so they were not seeking reimbursement from the federal government for those costs.

“It’s not had an impact on our agency as far as operations are concerned,” Hagar told lawmakers.

Hagar said federal immigration resources in Arkansas were “very minimal,” and that most of those resources were taken up by picking up immigrants in local jails to take them to federal immigration detention.

Sen. Terry Rice, a Republican from Waldron, said that while he supported efforts to deport immigrants who have committed crimes, he was also concerned about the potential for state police to assist federal immigration authorities in detaining immigrants without criminal histories.

“Is there anything outside of your daily work that y’all are doing currently in coordination with federal agencies, Homeland Security, ICE, as far as going out and just seeking anything more than people with criminal charges?” he asked.

The agency was not participating in any operations like the one Rice described, Hagar said.

He said troopers have been told there is a difference between an immigrant who was brought here as a child and who doesn’t have a criminal history, and an immigrant who is arrested for a crime.

“We’ve explained to them that we expect them to use good judgment and common sense discretion that they have under the law,” Hagar said. “And you know, we trust that they’re going to take that responsibility seriously.”

The Trump Administration’s surge of ICE agents has arrived in the state of Maine, where at least 50 people have been detained. In Minnesota, the surge is now in its third week, and state and local officials are continuing to push back against the federal presence in the Twin Cities. Geoff Bennett discussed more with St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her.

Geoff Bennett:

The Trump administration is ramping up its aggressive approach to immigration as it begins its second year.

The Associated Press reported today that an internal memo shows some new federal immigration officers have been trained to forcibly enter homes without a judge’s warrant, a sharp reversal of guidance that protected constitutional limits.

That comes amid news that ICE’s latest surge has targeted the state of Maine. At least 50 people were arrested there earlier this week. Some top local officials have condemned ICE’s aggressive approach, including Portland Mayor Mark Dion during a news conference today.

Mark Dion, Mayor of Portland, Maine: While we respect the law, we challenge the need for a paramilitary approach to the enforcement of federal statutes. What we have been concerned with as a council is the enforcement tactics that ICE has undertaken in other communities, which to our mind appear to threaten and intimidate populations.

Geoff Bennett:

In Minnesota, there’s been no letup in ICE’s surge there now in its third week. Today, a federal appeals court put a hold on a lower court’s order that had restrained federal immigration agents’ use of force against peaceful protesters.

State and local officials are continuing to push back against the federal presence in the Twin Cities. And more details are coming to light about a naturalized U.S. citizen with no criminal record, according to his family, who was arrested and detained by ICE in an incident that went viral.

Chongly Scott Thao, a resident of St. Paul, Minnesota, was later released and spoke recently about the ordeal after he was pulled from his home out through the snow.

Chongly Scott Thao, Detained By ICE:

So I just said, OK, let’s open the door, see what they want. And then, suddenly, there’s guns pointed at us. I was like, whoa. Then, suddenly, they just handcuffed me. They didn’t ask for my I.D. or anything until after they handcuffed me.

Geoff Bennett:

And we are joined now by Kaohly Her, the mayor of St. Paul, Minnesota.

Thank you for being with us.

Give us the latest picture of what’s happening right now on the ground in your city with federal immigration enforcement. And is there any coordination between ICE and local law enforcement?

Kaohly Her, Mayor of St. Paul, Minnesota: So there is no coordination between ICE and local law enforcement. We are not informed when they go out on their assignments or who they’re targeting. We do not get that kind of information.

And I think that that is what is causing the environment on the ground right now. People are afraid. They are frustrated. They are angry. But, I mean, there’s also a lot of hope that we see on the ground as well with the love and the care and the kindness that people are showing each other. And so I feel hopeful about what can be the outcome, even if it feels like there’s despair all around us right now.

Geoff Bennett:

The police chief of the Minneapolis suburb Brooklyn Park said that off-duty police officers of color had been targeted by ICE, at least on one occasion with guns drawn.

Are St. Paul officers seeing that kind of activity?

Kaohly Her:

We are seeing accounts of off-duty officers being stopped by ICE. This is not an isolated incident of in the Brooklyn Park area. We have heard accounts across the state of law enforcement being stopped by ICE.

Geoff Bennett:

I also want to ask you about this incident in St. Paul where protesters disrupted a church service where one of the pastors is an ICE official.

At this moment, when tensions are already high, do you believe entering a house of worship during a service is an acceptable form of protest or does that cross a line?

Kaohly Her:

You know, there is an active investigation into that situation. I wouldn’t — police did arrive on the scene, but by the time they got there, the individuals who disrupted the service were already gone.

So I can’t expand too much on really that particular situation, but I will say that, for me personally, I am somebody who is a person of faith. I’m a Christian. I think that places of worship are sacred spaces. But I have said this before, is that, if our federal government and our friends from the other side of the aisle want us to respect sacred spaces, which I believe are churches, a place of worship is a sacred space, that means that we have to also respect other spaces, such as hospitals, places of which people are needed to get exams or needed to be treated because of the hands of ICE have been injured.

That means that schools, where children are present, should be off-limits. And so I think that it is really important that if there’s going to be call for respecting sacred spaces, then our federal government and the agents of the federal government should be respecting those sacred spaces as well. That is the only way that we’re going to bring calm and order back to our city is if everyone on both sides of the spectrum agree that they’re going to respect sacred spaces.

Geoff Bennett:

You are among a number of Democratic state and local officials to receive a Justice Department subpoena tied to an investigation into alleged disruption of ICE operations.

What’s your reaction to being subpoenaed and how will your office respond?

Kaohly Her:

Yes, I mean, I wasn’t surprised by it.

Our president has stated very clearly that he — that there’s retribution to be paid by states and municipalities that do not agree with him. And so — but we remain committed to protecting our residents, our neighbors and our communities. It doesn’t change the process or our actions moving forward.

But, yes, I wasn’t surprised by it.

Geoff Bennett:

How do you intend to respond?

Kaohly Her:

I mean, we are having our legal team look at it right now. I mean, we will — we are law-abiding citizens. We will comply with this subpoena.

But it doesn’t mean that it’s lawful what has been done and what we have been served with. But we will comply and we will work with our legal team to figure out the best steps forward.

Geoff Bennett:

What do you want people to know about what’s happening in your city right now and how the folks you represent are responding?

Kaohly Her:

I mean, I think it’s important for people to remember that they should not just believe in the rhetoric from their sides of the party, that the — what I’m hearing out there is, if people would just comply with the law, that if they would just not resist, that if they were here legally, that they have nothing to worry about, that they shouldn’t be scared.

And that is just not true. I mean, ICE has made it very clear, the federal government, HSI, has made it really clear that anybody in the path of anything that they’re — any task that they’re executing on or any mission that they’re executing on in that, they are fair game. And so we’re allowing people to target based on the way someone looks and the way that they sound.

And now we have incident after incident after incident of American citizens being detained and being injured at the hands of ICE, people with no criminal record at all. We are hearing more of those cases than actual situations where somebody had a criminal record or is a danger to our communities, that we are hearing less of those stories and more of just everyday Americans being targeted.

We should not listen to the rhetoric of just our own sides of the party and hear the real stories of individuals who have been impacted. And I want people to know that this administration can punish our city and can punish our state, but they will never break our spirit, and that we will show and continue to love each other and create networks to support each other and that we will continue to show kindness to those who are the most hurt by what this federal government is doing.

We will continue to be Minnesotans.

Geoff Bennett:

Kaohly Her, the mayor of St. Paul, Minnesota, thanks again for your time this evening.

Kaohly Her:

Thank you for having me.

Watch
U.S. President Trump holds a bilateral meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, at the World Economic Forum in Davos

The Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security is requiring about 8,800 commercial drivers’ license holders to provide in-person proof of citizenship or lawful permanent residence by April 6, department officials told lawmakers Wednesday.

The requirement aligns with the directives by the Trump administration that target non-citizen commercial drivers.

In April, the president issued an executive order mandating English proficiency requirements for commercial licenses. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy in June announced a nationwide audit of states that issue commercial licenses to non-state residents. Tennessee law does not permit those who are not residents of Tennessee to obtain commercial licenses.

In August, the State Department paused work visas for non-U.S. residents seeking to fill the demand for truck drivers. Then, in September, the federal government announced it was fast-tracking a new rule that would revoke the existing licenses of immigrants with a variety of temporary legal statuses.

Russell Shoup, assistant commissioner for the Department of Safety and Homeland Security, said his agency had audited its records following Trump’s executive order, finding that 8,800 of Tennessee’s 150,000 commercial license holders did not have proof of citizenship or lawful permanent residence in their files.

State law already requires that applicants provide proof of their citizenship or immigration status. Shoup said that the 8,800 drivers likely showed proof to obtain their license, but prior to 2001 state officials did not hold onto the documentation.

“Before 2001 we were asking for that documentation but we didn’t necessarily have it in our files,” he said.

Letters went out earlier this month notifying affected drivers, he said. About 1,000 drivers have already brought in their documentation, he said.

Shoup said commercial drivers who come to state motor vehicle offices to provide documentation will be moved to the front of the line.

“We know this is an inconvenience,” he said.

After an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer shot and killed Renee Nicole Good two weeks ago, the rules and rhythms of daily life in Minneapolis definitively changed. More than 2,000 federal officers have been let loose on the city purportedly in search of undocumented immigrants. Schools, churches, and daycares have all been in the crosshairs—there is no safe haven from ICE enforcement in the Twin Cities—and in response, the city’s residents have come together to create rapid response networks to protect their neighbors.

It is not the first American city to be under siege from ICE, and it looks like it may not be the last. President Donald Trump has said he’s weighing sending US troops to Minneapolis under the 19th-century Insurrection Act after the courts blocked his earlier mobilization of the National Guard in California and Illinois. Even if that doesn’t happen, thanks to the billions of dollars pouring into ICE coffers, roving bands of masked, armed agents have been unleashed across the country.

To better understand what life in an occupied American city is like, WIRED spoke to 10 people from a variety of backgrounds about their new normal. They all have rapidly adapted to a world where the safety of our neighbors—and ourselves—is a collective responsibility

Anonymous, 37, elementary school teacher

When you wake up in the morning, you get dressed, you put on your whistle, just in case you happen to see ICE nearby so that you can alert other people. I go into work, where we try to make it as normal as we can for the kids, but there’s this level of anxiety the teachers have.

It’s most heightened when I’m out at recess and I’m having to scan: one eye on the kids, one eye on the perimeter. Today there’s a helicopter hovering above, and that’s stressing the kids out. It gives the adults a little bit of PTSD from the George Floyd murder. Back then, there was a lot of extra energy and chaos in our city. This is a different feeling, though. That was a little more anger, and this is more a feeling of fear.

If you’re outside, you blow a whistle to let everyone know to go inside. The kids know that. We had the full conversation, age appropriate of course: “There’s some unsafe stuff happening. If we’re outside and there’s something unsafe, just like if we’re outside and it starts pouring rain, we’ll blow the whistle a little bit early and we’ll go inside.”

I have to be careful to blow it slowly because they are used to hearing quick whistle blasts in their neighborhoods alerting them that ICE is there, and that’s stressful to the kids. One of them at recess said, “Make sure you’re doing it slowly so we don’t get confused.”

Brandon Sigüenza, 32, volunteer observer detained by ICE

I’d never really done any legal observation before January 11th, the date of my arrest. My friend asked if I wanted to do legal observation with her. I said, “Sure.” According to a neighborhood text group, there was pepper spray being deployed on a legal observer close to my friend’s house. So we decided to go there to make sure people were safe and to document. There were two unmarked SUVs parked in the middle of the road. There were multiple observers around them honking their horns. We approached from the east. And so when the agents did a 270-degree turn and started driving south on 16th Avenue, we were the first people able to turn with them. We decided to follow them. We followed them for about 40 seconds, less than a block. It was the first time I’d ever followed an ICE car, the first time I’d ever seen an ICE car.

“At one point, one [agent] said to my friend: ‘You need to stop. You need to stop obstructing us. That’s why that lesbian bitch is dead.’”

My heart was pounding. The car pulled over, and I just told my friend, who was driving, “Breathe, just take deep breaths.” But I was really talking to myself. My friend is super brave and she was screaming at them: “We’re not obstructing. You can move forward.” There were no cars in front of them when they pulled over. They were blocking us from going forward and there were observers’ cars behind us, so we couldn’t go back.

The ICE agents came out and some agents surrounded us. One was filming me. They didn’t tell us that they were ICE agents, but I assumed they were. I’d never seen an ICE agent before, so I was a little nervous. My friend kept yelling, “What are we doing to break the law? We’re not obstructing. Get the fuck out.” And I just said Renee Good’s name two times. I didn’t know what else to say, and she was kind of top of mind for me.

The agents were kind of on their way back to their car, an agent grabbed pepper spray out of this car, came to us, and methodically sprayed the intake vent. The two SUVs pulled forward for another 30 seconds. They stopped again. “The car is in park. You can go forward,” my friend yelled. She told me later she was thinking about Renee Good, and didn’t want there to be any doubt in their minds that the car could drive into them. We put our hands in the air. The agent replied, “Shut the fuck up.” An agent came to my side and said, “You are under arrest.” I just held my hands in the air and I waited for instruction. I didn’t know if he wanted me to come out of the car or stay in the car. At one point, one said to my friend: “You need to stop. You need to stop obstructing us. That’s why that lesbian bitch is dead.”

Then he smashed the passenger window. Another agent smashed the driver window at the same time. The doors were unlocked, but he never attempted to open the doors. He just smashed the window. I was just thinking about Renee Good and what happened to her, and all I thought was I need to stay calm and make this agent feel safe. So I put my hands in the air and I slowed my breathing as much as I could, and it was very surreal and kind of out-of-body, but the smashing itself was loud and chaotic. (Later, when I was frisked in the detention facility, they found glass in my coat pocket.)

“They were asking about things like, ‘Do you know any protest organizers? Do you know about any bombs that might get planted? Do you know if anyone would snipe an ICE officer?’”

On the ride, one of the agents warned: “What you guys are doing is really dangerous. We’re after some really bad guys.” Later, when we pulled into the garage, I saw an East African woman in detention in her twenties that reminded me of coworkers and friends of mine. I asked the ICE agent, “Is that one of the bad guys?” She did not respond.

I knew that on January 10th, Minnesota lawmakers were denied access to the building. So what was going into my mind is like, “Oh, I’m going to see it. I should try to remember as much as I can.” When I was being booked, there were 20 or 30 brown people in a line, mostly Hispanic, some East African. My friend and I were brought over to a special table that was for, I believe for US citizens. It had a little placard on it that said “Obstruction.”

An agent frisked me, took my passport, put it in a mesh bag, and had me sign something related to my possessions.

They put foot shackles on me and brought me to the USC area, which I found out meant US citizens. I was put in a 10-foot by 10-foot cell alone. The walls were painted yellow, and there were concrete benches. My friend and I were in adjacent cells, and there were two-way mirrors, and I just yelled, “I love you. It’s OK.” And that made an agent a little uncomfortable, and he moved me to an area in the hallway where I couldn’t see her.

They read me my Miranda rights before giving me one phone call. Afterwards, I was brought back to my cell and my eight-hour detention began. Later, when I was brought to the bathroom, I had to go through a bit of the facility, and that was when I saw the most people in detention. The cells were the same size as mine, which had three people, but they had 12 to 15 people. I could lay down on the concrete bench. These other people could not. There were a lot of people staring at the ground, people staring at the walls or staring at the ceiling. There wasn’t a lot of conversation in the cells. I heard screaming. I heard a lot of crying. It was the loudest I’d ever heard anyone cry. As I passed, I saw a woman using the bathroom, and there were three male government agents of some kind that were watching, and they were kind of making small talk, just chatting. Talking about where they are from and their kids.

Three different agents brought me into a room. They said, “I’m not ICE. I’m with the Department of Homeland Security Investigations. It looks like you might be in some trouble. Maybe we can help you out.” They were asking about things like, “Do you know any protest organizers? Do you know about any bombs that might get planted? Do you know if anyone would snipe an ICE officer?” And I said no. I’ve never met a protest organizer, and I didn’t know of anyone who would want to commit violence. All the people I know that are legally observing just want to prevent violence. I don’t have any undocumented family members or know anyone that’s undocumented. I refused, and that was it. I was brought back to my cell. My cellmate was offered the same thing.

Later, a woman on Facebook messaged me. She sent me a picture of a person and she said, “This is my boyfriend. I read your Facebook post. This is my boyfriend. He was detained on Sunday. I was wondering if you saw him in there.” I just broke down crying because I was like, “Jesus, fuck.” I should have looked more closely.

Adam Wish-Werven, 37, indie record label owner and parent

Even if I’m not being detained by ICE personally right now, I still feel the energy of it happening to other people. I’m witnessing a lot of emptiness. Minneapolis almost looks like a ghost town. Then there are moments and bursts of frenetic activity, people running around, when there are ICE agents present. A lot of people gathering with their phones.

Most days, I take my 2-year-old son to daycare and then work from home. A lot of the staff of the daycare are people of color, and I can definitely see that they are concerned, less happy. The owners sent out a mass text through the app that we use with the daycare letting us know their ICE protocol. They said they would be compliant with any “audits” happening. They used terminology that a lot of mainstream America would maybe want to hear, and they are small business owners. I think they are trying to avoid saying the “ICE raid.” What I believe they mean is if ICE agents showed up with a warrant, they would let them inside and, and take whoever they’re there to take.

I can’t imagine my 2-year-old having to witness violence. That’s deeply, deeply troubling to me. We just want to celebrate the joy of our child—he’s our only child—and we don’t know when the right time to have those talks is.

Aide Salgado, 41, consultant and investor for Latino businesses

I grew up in Minneapolis. My family started a business a really long time ago on Lake Street, back in ’96, ’97, back when no one wanted to be there and it was so cheap. It was one of those businesses that became very involved in the Latino community. We feel like in a way we built the neighborhood from the ground up.

Lake Street is a place where dreams were made. It’s a place where sweat and tears went into every building, every business. It’s a place where people found community and found the power of sorority. It’s a place where so many women found independence. That is why it became so iconic and why it’s becoming this battleground.

In 2020, I started consulting after the pandemic and George Floyd, when so many businesses really needed help. I keep drawing parallels to those days because no one knew when it was gonna end, no one knew how devastating it was gonna be, emotionally but also financially.

I recently decided to offer free 20- to 30-minute consultations to any business that needed to talk to someone about what’s going on. The first week of January, that’s when I started getting a ton of phone calls from people in the community—who own daycares, restaurants, barber shops—who were saying, “I really need to talk to you, can we create a contingency plan?”

Some of them are angry. Some people are more pragmatic. Some people cry.

A lot of times, I cry with them and then we hug, and I tell them, “I’m so sorry you’re going through this. This will pass, but you will still need to eat, and you will still need a roof over your head. I can’t help you with the legal aspect, and I can’t make this go away. But I can help you make sure you’re financially OK, so when this passes you can rebuild.”

A lot of them are not gonna survive. And the ones that make it through this are going to be very debilitated, financially and spiritually. But I also think resilience is our superpower.

David Brauer, 66, former journalist

Legally, I’m a US citizen, and ICE has no jurisdiction over me, none.

But I don’t leave my house anymore without a backpack that has supplies in it, pencil and paper so that I can record things. I always wear my heaviest clothes because it’s cold here right now, and I might be stuck in some cold place that I can’t get out of for quite a while. I’ve turned off the biometrics on my phone.

I rely on my passcode to open my phone, because if I’m stopped and they take my phone, they can hold it up to my face and unlock it. I carry my passport card now, just in case.

Lori Norvell, 54, school board member

It’s 14 degrees right now. But people are out walking their dogs just to get outside and patrol. When they leave the house, they have a whistle, a mask, and a bottle of water to keep themselves safe. You’re on text threads, where at any moment you might be getting notification that something’s going on relatively close to you and you need to get in the car and go.

I take alternative routes. To try to cover vulnerable spots. When I drive to the gym, I go down towards George Floyd Square, and rather than take the highway, I drive the streets to hopefully be a bystander that can help thwart some of this.

Yesterday I got out of the gym I go to, and a vehicle pulled up and it just sat there. It had really heavy-tinted windows, and I just stopped and I pulled my whistle out and I just waited. It became clear that they were meeting someone, so another car pulled up, and I could hear them talking and kind of laughing.

I was like, OK. All right. That’s cool. It’s just this hyper-vigilance of checking, and just looking out for each other, you know?

We used to never lock our door. And we lock our door all the time now. We don’t know when they’re coming to our neighborhood. It just feels like there are no rules or laws. Everything that you thought you knew before, when you could say, the government is gonna help us. The government is actually working against us right now. So it just, it, it really very much feels like we’re on our own.

Ryan Ecklund, 45, realtor who was detained after filming federal agents

I didn’t go looking for ICE. On Monday morning, the 12th, I dropped my son off at school at 9:30 am and drove back home. I realized on the way home that I needed to stop at the grocery store for yogurt and pears. There’s one less than a mile from my home, and as I entered the parking lot I saw what was clearly an ICE vehicle—blacked out windows, an out-of-state plate, and a driver wearing tactical gear and a face covering—rolling up and down the lane.

In that moment, something in my mind said, it’s your responsibility as a member of this community to hold them accountable for their actions, not to catch them doing something wrong or make a viral video, but simply let them know that we know they’re here. So I picked up my phone and just hit Record and I started following this vehicle. It was a silver Ford Explorer. They parked sideways and I parked a few spaces away. That silver Explorer then backed up directly behind my vehicle so that I couldn’t leave that spot.

“I realized that they either took the photograph and ran it through facial recognition software or ran my license plate so that they could figure out where I lived.”

One of the ICE agents in the passenger seat got out and approached my driver-side window. I was still recording and I rolled the window down and said, “Good morning, what can I do for you?” He grabbed a cell phone and took a photo of me. He didn’t say anything in response to me. He simply took my photo and then went back to his vehicle, and they slowly drove away.

I continued to follow. He turned out of the shopping center and onto a main road here and proceeded to turn into my neighborhood, and then onto the street that leads to my house, and then into the cul-de-sac that I live in. I realized that they either took the photograph and ran it through facial recognition software or ran my license plate so that they could figure out where I lived. Then, they led me right to my front door in a clear effort to show me that they know who I am, and they know where I live. It was a fear tactic, pure and simple. They’re not here to do a service. They’re not here to be focused on finding violent illegal immigrants. They’re just here to scare people, and that’s what they’re doing to me right now. They couldn’t have been clearer.

I continued to follow them out of the neighborhood. A few minutes later they stopped on a main road in the middle of traffic and both got out. There were two ICE agents at this point. I rolled down my window once again and said, “What can I do for you?” and one of the ICE agents said, “This is your one warning, you’re not allowed to follow us.” I said “I don’t need a warning, I’m a US citizen, I’m allowed to record your movements in public. I’m not impeding your investigation or your vehicle. I’m not causing a scene. I’m allowed to record you.”

They both got back into their vehicle and continued to drive.

As they continued, an additional unmarked ICE vehicle, a black Ford F150, joined the caravan in front. We drive about 200 feet off the main road and both cars box me in so I can’t drive away. Five ICE agents walk up to my driver’s side door. One says, “You were warned, you’re doing a lot of illegal things.” He opened my car door because it wasn’t locked. He didn’t instruct me to exit my car. Then another ICE agent climbed into the car to pull me out, and they pushed me to the ground and put handcuffs on me. They took my cell phone and threw it in the vehicle so my cell phone did not come with me. (Later, my wife followed my phone’s tracking to the abandoned car. There was an active real estate listing across the street, so she called another realtor who helped get Ring camera footage from the owner, which is how she confirmed I was detained).

They picked me up and escorted me over to a white unmarked passenger van, where I was put into the back seat and driven to the Whipple Federal Building near Bloomington, about a 25-minute drive, by three agents. I continued to tell them that I am a US citizen and what they’re doing is illegal, unconstitutional, they’re violating my rights. I also said to them that they’re in our communities, causing fear and alarm and making people feel anxious and paralyzed. I told them that they should feel ashamed for what they’re doing and what they’ve just done. There wasn’t a whole lot of response.

As we were going over an overpass to get onto the freeway, there was a bald eagle that flew overhead. The agent in the passenger seat said to the driver, “Hey, there’s a bald eagle, do you know what that means?” Then the driver said: “God is on our side.” (The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to WIRED’s request for comment with regards to Sigüenza and Ecklund.)

Valerie Aguirre, 24, manager at Valerie’s Carniceria in South Minneapolis

I work for my family’s business, a Mexican store and restaurant that sells authentic Mexican products, dishes, and meat. We’ve been in the community for 25 years. I manage the restaurant and deal with issues with customers or inventory, stocking, cleaning—anytime a coworker can’t come in for any reason I am there. Since I was little, I’ve always been very hard-working, so I remember the stores being like a second home, a lot of my coworkers are our family. They’ve been with us for many years. It always felt safe. It always felt secure.

We were unfortunately visited by ICE last week. They got two of our employees. It was a horrible, horrible, horrible situation. We closed for five days, and that’s when we decided to reduce the amount of hours [that we are open]. We were truly devastated. We were very scared for our coworkers. We still feel helpless. We don’t know how to help.

I’ll have coworkers, they do not go out at all, not even in the backyard or the front yard. We are scared because of the riots in 2020 for the George Floyd murder. It affected us, people came to vandalize our property. The feeling of being scared has not gone away.

A month and a half ago, everything was shifting. We had very little business. It was very, very, very slow. I knew that it was gonna get worse, and people were gonna feel less safe to go out and shop. Even my coworkers, they were feeling very, very unsafe and scared for their families. We are very short-staffed at this moment, so we have had to close a few days or reduce our hours. I decided to start up a delivery service and threw it on my Facebook page.

I literally just have paper and a phone. You can call at our phone number and we write it down. It’s not a computer system. We were slow at first, but over the last couple of weeks, once things started getting really, really bad, we got extremely flooded with phone calls. Strangers came into the store offering help. We have a lot of volunteers looking out for small businesses.

Anonymous, US Postal Service letter carrier and union steward

As letter carriers, we go to every house, every day, everywhere in the country. And we are part of these communities. I deliver to people, especially at businesses, and I see them every day. I give them Christmas cards. When you’re on a route for several years, you get to know the people of your route, you feel connected to them, you feel responsible for it.

That means if there is a dangerous situation, like there are thousands of masked men with assault rifles and body armor creating dangerous situations, I take that personally. Postal workers everywhere are personally endangered by federal agents acting with impunity in a violent way.

“It’s scary, but it also makes me a bit emotional because it’s a really beautiful thing to see people get organized and stand in solidarity with each other.”

I deliver in a predominantly immigrant working-class neighborhood, and starting weeks ago, people were a bit on edge. Businesses started locking their doors. There was less foot traffic, maybe a little more suspicion. They see a uniformed person and before they notice it’s a mail carrier, they might think, “Oh God, who is this? Oh, it’s the mailman. OK, we’re good.” Even today, a lot of my businesses were locked. They came to the door to grab the mail and to send outgoing stuff. You can tell the neighborhood’s a little bit on edge and a little scared and want this sort of what feels like an occupation to be over with.

This was compounded on my route early on, when there was an ICE raid on the building I was about to deliver to. It was rush hour and snowing pretty heavily. But the entire neighborhood came out. And it wasn’t just a bunch of outside agitators. It was people coming out of their homes and apartments to oppose what was going on. I had to continue my route as much as I could. I waited out until they were gone, but that became a whole standoff. They deployed pepper spray. I was like half a block up, and you could still taste it in the air.

Now, restaurants, clinics, daycares, they’re open, but their doors are locked. Before, there would usually be a basket either behind the front desk or on the side of the front desk that would allow me to walk in, drop the mail off, grab the outgoing mail, say hello, chat about the weather, and be on my way with the rest of my route. And that process is disrupted now, as security guards come to the door.

Since then, there’s been multiple times in my route where all of a sudden you hear whistles going off, horns honking in order to alert people to those who need to get inside and those who need to observe and help defend or whatever, get outside and show up. It’s scary, but it also makes me a bit emotional because it’s a really beautiful thing to see people get organized and stand in solidarity with each other, people who don’t know each other.

Abdikadir Bashir, executive director of the Center for African Immigrants and Refugees Organization (CAIRO) in St. Cloud

We have the highest concentration of Somali per capita in Minnesota, probably in the US. There was a lot of fear, a lot of anxiety, a lot of confusion on what to do for families that are settled here through refugee programs that are now targeted through the operation. Some of them have been detained in Minnesota, including a 16-year-old kid, and some were taken away to Texas. It’s not just impacting the Somali community, it’s impacting everybody with the love of humanity in their hearts.

We created a call center where people who have questions about how this is going to impact them can call. Most of these people are working families. We are offering them guidance and support, talking to employers, sending letters to employers to provide them accommodation, connecting people with legal services.

They would like to go to a doctor’s appointment but are asking questions. Is it safe? Can I take my car? What if they follow me? Sometimes, we’re talking about a single-parent household, maybe with an older child, 15, 16 years old, so the mother would probably leave the rest of the kids with the older child. But she’s scared that things might happen to her or the kid while they are apart.

Sometimes they ask: Why are we being targeted when we were brought here by the US? Why is that same government also attacking us in the US now?

There’s no answer to that question.

PORTLAND, Maine — Federal immigration agents launched a new enforcement operation in Maine, the latest push under the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda that follows the president’s recent attacks on Somali immigrants, who have a large presence in the state.

Portland residents reported seeing masked plainclothes officers in unmarked cars conducting traffic stops and detaining drivers. In some cases, observers heckled the officers, filmed their actions, and shouted messages of support to the immigrant detainees.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials confirmed the campaign Wednesday, calling it “Operation Catch of the Day.”

The announcement followed reports of escalating immigration enforcement activity, especially in the Portland area, starting Tuesday morning. Local and state officials began warning of a potential surge last week.

Portland Mayor Mark Dion condemned the tactics immigration agents have used in other communities. He advised city residents to observe ICE activities without obstructing them.

“While we respect the law, we challenge the need for a paramilitary approach to the enforcement of federal statutes,” Dion said Wednesday.

The crackdown here comes after the Trump administration deployed thousands of immigration agents targeting Somalis in Minnesota, where they have gone door to door and engaged in violent clashes with protestors. Agents have at times used tear gas and other crowd-control attempts, making some neighborhoods look like war zones.

A recent ICE operation there ignited widespread street protests after an immigration agent shot and killed an American citizen earlier this month.

“Our communities feel anxious and fearful,” Dion said. “They see this action as unpredictable and a threat to their families.”

However, he said it appears the agents in Maine have been targeting specific individuals, rather than conducting blanket stops.

ICE officials said the operation is focused on “the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens who have terrorized communities.” They said some of the Tuesday arrests include defendants who have allegedly committed aggravated assault, false imprisonment, and endangering the welfare of a child.

But it wasn’t clear whether any of those charges were still pending; in some cases, Dion pointed out, it appears the cases have already been adjudicated. He accused the agency of fear-mongering.

Immigrants’ rights advocates across Maine have been reporting a climate of growing fear in the state’s two largest cities, Portland and Lewiston, which both have significant Somali populations. Advocates began circulating fliers to educate people on what legal rights they could assert during a potential ICE encounter.

On Monday, Maine US Attorney Andrew Benson issued a statement calling for any potential protests to remain peaceful.

“Anyone who forcibly assaults or impedes a federal law enforcement officer, willfully destroys government property, or unlawfully obstructs federal law enforcement activity commits a federal crime and will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” he said.

President Trump’s focus on Maine comes following a series of verbal attacks on immigrants from Somalia. In December, the president said he didn’t want Somalis in the United States at all, claiming “they come from hell” and “contribute nothing.” He recently revoked Temporary Protected Status for immigrants from the east African country.

Meanwhile, on Wednesday, a federal appeals court suspended a decision that prohibited federal officers from using tear gas or pepper spray against peaceful protesters in Minnesota.

The US Department of Homeland Security defended the Maine operation and attacked the state’s governor, Janet Mills, a familiar tactic used by the administration to blame Democratic leaders.

“Governor Mills and her fellow sanctuary politicians in Maine have made it abundantly clear that they would rather stand with criminal illegal aliens than protect law-abiding American citizens,” Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement.

In a statement Wednesday evening, Mills said her administration is closely monitoring ICE activity across the state.

“If the Federal government has warrants, then it should show them,” she said. “But if they are separating working mothers from young children, solely because they sought freedom here and have committed no crime, then the Federal government is only sowing intimidation and fear and fostering division and suspicion among neighbors — none of which is welcome.”

Reports of the increased ICE activity started pouring in this week, said Ruben Torres, advocacy and policy manager for the Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition, which helped set up a reporting hot line. He said the hot line has so far received about 4,000 calls this month, compared to 288 in all of December.

“Maine is one big small town. The effects of this are already being felt in communities across the state,” his group coalition said in a statement Tuesday. “The scale of Maine’s communities means that changes on the ground ripple quickly, making statewide awareness and preparedness essential.”

Videos posted on social media and circulated among group chats show plainclothes officers exiting unmarked cars in residential neighbors, downtown streets, and parking lots.

“I want to be really clear, this is a war of terror being that’s being waged on our city by the federal government,” said Portland City Councilor Wes Pelletier. “We’ve seen people of all ages getting thrown on the ground and getting thrown into trucks.”

In response, he said, residents are rallying around neighbors who are at risk of being detained:reporting the presence of ICE agents, delivering groceries, and otherwise supporting families too afraid to leave their homes.

While most of the arrests have been reported in the Portland area, Lewiston Mayor Carl Sheline on Tuesday confirmed an increased ICE presence there. Once a thriving mill town in central Maine, Lewiston has experienced an influx of immigrants in recent decades, particularly Somalis.

“ICE’s terror and intimidation tactics reflect a complete lack of humanity and concern for basic human welfare,” Sheline said in a statement Wednesday. “These masked men with no regard for the rule of law are causing long term damage to our state and to our country.”

At a small demonstration in Augusta on Tuesday afternoon, protesters called on US Senators Susan Collins and Angus King to fight harder to stop the Trump administration’s harmful policies.

They were protesting “the different ways that this regime in DC is enjoying inflicting lethal harm on citizens,” said organizer Elizabeth Leonard, a retired history professor at Colby College.

The group dressed all in black and carried coffin-shaped signs referring to deaths they attribute to the Trump administration, including the killing of Renee Good, who was shot by an ICE officer in Minneapolis. Local and state officials immediately condemned her shooting, while Trump defended the officer’s actions. The US Justice Department has said it sees no basis to open a federal civil rights investigation into her death.

Advocates in Maine said they’ve been communicating with counterparts in Minnesota as plot how to support the state’s immigrant communities.

Portland Public Schools officials said attendance has dropped this week across the district, which is just over 50 percent students of color. Superintendent Ryan Scallon said school leaders are considering remote learning options for students who might feel unsafe coming to school.

Federal immigration officials have released few details about what residents should expect from the ongoing enforcement operation, including how long it’s expected to last.

Officials in Portland reiterated Wednesday that local law enforcement is not cooperating with ICE.

A 5-year-old preschool student was taken with his father by federal immigration agents shortly after arriving home from school, Columbia Heights school leaders said Jan. 21 — the first time a Twin Cities school district has publicly confirmed a student being detained by ICE since Operation Metro Surge began.
His detention, school leaders say, marked the fourth time a student from the district has been detained by federal agents in recent weeks as escalating immigration enforcement directly affects more Twin Cities schools and students. Roughly 3,000 federal agents are in Minnesota as part of what the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has described as the largest immigration enforcement operation in history.
According to the National Immigration Law Center, ICE’s policy is that arresting officers should allow a parent to make arrangements for their child’s care. It’s unclear if they did in this situation.
In Columbia Heights, a diverse north metro suburban district, more than 50% of students are Hispanic or Latino.
Columbia Heights Superintendent Zena Stenvik said federal agents approached the 5-year-old, Liam Conejo Ramos, and his father in their driveway after they had arrived home from preschool. Another adult living at the home was outside and begged the agents to let him take care of the small child.
Instead, Stenvik said, the agent took the child out of the still-running car and detained both him and his father, who wasn’t named by school leaders. Twenty minutes later, the boy’s brother, who is in middle school, came home to a missing dad, a missing little brother and a terrified mother, she said.
School leaders believe they are in Texas detention facilities.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Marc Prokosch, the immigration attorney representing Liam’s family, said they had an active asylum case.
“I want to point out that they have done every single thing the right way and that they were supposed to in every step of their immigration process,” Prokosch said, adding that the father doesn’t have a criminal record. Liam’s detention may be legal, Prokosch said, but “legal doesn’t mean it’s moral.”
Prokosch is exploring whether to file a habeas corpus — wrongful detainment — petition in Texas, he said, while looking at the family’s larger immigration case.

In his two decades in immigration law, he said, he’s worked on cases involving detained children. But, referring to Operation Metro Surge, Prokosch said he’s “not been through anywhere near this bad of a situation,” adding that it’s challenging to communicate with families who are quickly, often within 24 hours, transported to facilities in Texas.
Liam’s teacher, Ella Sullivan, teared up when thinking about Liam. “He’s a bright young student,” she said, “and he’s so kind and loving. His classmates miss him.”
Stenvik said Liam’s detention came just hours after a 17-year-old student was detained without a parent. In the past two weeks, she said, another 17-year-old and one 10-year-old student were also detained by ICE with their parents in separate incidents. District leaders didn’t release any more details about the cases.
ICE activity near school buildings
Across the Twin Cities, several districts have reported sharp attendance declines as families keep children home amid heightened fear of enforcement activity near schools and bus stops.
Columbia Heights said that one day a third of its students were absent, mirroring similar numbers reported in Fridley schools. Columbia Heights also plans to expand online learning options, joining school districts like Minneapolis and St. Paul that are offering remote learning for students who don’t feel safe coming to class in person.
Local schools have also faced a growing number of reports — many unconfirmed — of federal agents near school buildings and bus stops. But now, more districts are confirming reports of ICE nearby.
Columbia Heights administrators said one ICE vehicle drove onto Columbia Heights High School property Tuesday and approached a loading dock before administrators told the driver to leave, district leaders said.
“The sense of safety in our community and around our schools is shaken,” Stenvik said. “The onslaught of ICE activity in our community is inducing trauma and is taking a toll on our children, our families, our staff, and our community members.”
In Roseville, Superintendent Jenny Loeck told families Jan. 20 that ICE agents used two district properties during enforcement activity.
In an email, Loeck said video footage confirmed agents used Aŋpétu Téča Education Center as a staging area beginning around 4:30 a.m. Tuesday, Jan. 20. “It is deeply disturbing that district space was used — without our consent — as a launching point for actions taken against our friends and neighbors,” Loeck wrote.
Agents were also seen in vehicles in the parking lot of Little Canada Elementary School during the school day, prompting the school to lock entrances while classes continued, she said.

Just 10 years ago, the annual budget for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, was less than $6 billion — notably smaller than other agencies within the Department of Homeland Security. But ICE’s budget has skyrocketed during President Trump’s second term, becoming the highest-funded U.S. law enforcement agency, with $85 billion now at its disposal.

The windfall is thanks to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, enacted last July. After hovering around the $10 billion mark for years, ICE’s budget suddenly benefited from a meteoric spike.

“With this new bill and other appropriations, it’s larger than the annual budget of all other federal law enforcement agencies combined,” said Lauren-Brooke Eisen, senior director of the justice program at the Brennan Center for Justice, a nonpartisan policy institute.

ICE is now the lead agency in President’s Trump immigration crackdown, sending thousands of agents into U.S. communities. As its funding and profile has grown as part of those efforts, ICE has come under increasing criticism for its officers’ actions, from masked agents randomly stopping, questioning, and detaining people and thrusting them into unmarked vehicles to the recent killing of Renee Macklin Good in Minneapolis.

A cycle of more migrants, more money and a larger ICE mission
ICE’s sudden growth spurt follows roughly two decades of relatively modest funding since 2003, when the agency was created by merging the U.S. Customs Service with the Immigration and Naturalization Service. In 2015, for instance, Congress approved a budget of around $5.96 billion, which was nearly $1 billion less than then-President Barack Obama had requested.

In 2019, during the first Trump administration, border control officer’s encounters with migrants attempting authorized entry to the U.S. spiked. Those numbers then plummeted as the COVID-19 pandemic prompted invocation of the Title 42 public health law, allowing CBP to expel migrants more quickly, with restricted pathways to asylum.

Encounters rose sharply under former President Joe Biden and soared above 3.2 million in 2023, when Biden lifted Title 42. By late 2024, fewer migrants were arriving at the border, due to U.S. asylum limits and Mexico bolstering enforcement.

When Trump returned to the White House in 2025, he sought to empower immigration authorities to quickly remove migrants and announced a crackdown led by ICE.

Under the 2025 law, ICE has a $75 billion supplement that it can take as long as four years to spend, along with its base budget of around $10 billion. If the agency spends that money at a steady pace and current funding levels continue, it would have nearly $29 billion on hand each year. That essentially triples ICE’s total budget from recent years.

To give that large number a sense of scale, consider that the Trump administration’s 2026 appropriations request for the entire Justice Department, including the FBI, stands at a little over $35 billion.

The Trump administration has set lofty goals for ICE, aiming to deport 1 million people each year. And the One Big Beautiful Bill Act also allocates $45 billion for ICE to expand its immigration detention system — Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said last June that the agency will be able to hold up to 100,000 people in custody daily. By comparison, the federal Bureau of Prisons currently holds over 153,000 inmates.

As of Nov. 30, 65,735 people were held in immigration detention, according to the data tracking project Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse.

With those metrics in mind, ICE went on a hiring spree in 2025, fueled by its bigger budget. In just one year, the agency says, it “more than doubled our officers and agents from 10,000 to 22,000.” (The Office of Personnel Management, which tracks federal workforce statistics, is only updated through Nov. 30 and does not reflect any hiring made by the DHS in the last quarter of the year.)

According to the DHS, ICE received 220,000 applications in 2025, thanks in part to a generous incentive package with perks like a signing bonus of up to $50,000, disbursed over the course of a five-year commitment, and up to $60,000 in student loan repayment.

ICE is still on that hiring spree, looking to hire deportation officers in at least 25 cities around the U.S., according to a job listing on the USA Jobs website that will remain active through the end of September. The starting salary for an ICE deportation officer in the Enforcement and Removal Operations division, or ERO, ranges from $51,632 up to $84,277.

The dramatic growth came in the same year that the Trump administration sharply reduced the number of federal workers, firing thousands of employees and inviting many more to resign.

What else will the new funds be spent on?
With base level funding for DHS and ICE due to expire at the end of January, Democrats in Congress are calling for changes to how ICE operates. It comes after a year in which deaths of people in ICE custody spiked to the highest levels in decades, with ICE reporting seven deaths in December, and three more in 2026, as of Jan. 16.

ICE’s increased budget makes sense to Ira Mehlman, spokesman for the right-wing Federation for American Immigration Reform, a group advocating for lower levels of immigration. He says the funding boost ” is directly commensurate with the size of the task the agency is addressing.”

“ICE exists to find and remove people who are in the country illegally,” Mehlman said, referring to a category that grew when the Trump administration stripped legal status from 1.6 million immigrants in 2025.

The focus of the new spending reflects President Trump’s emphasis on arrests and removals, said Margy O’Herron, a senior fellow at the Brennan Center’s liberty and national security program who worked at the DOJ in the Biden administration.

O’Herron said she agrees with the idea that, for years, a reasonable case could be made that DHS agencies such as ICE and CBP needed more money. But other parts of the immigration system aren’t getting as much help, she said.

“All of the money is going to enforcement to arrest, to detain and to deport,” she said. “It’s not going to things like immigration hearings or immigration judges, to conduct additional review of whether or not somebody should be in the country. And that is a real problem for the system.”

An internal Immigration and Customs Enforcement document in May shows that ICE told officers and agents they can forcibly enter homes of people subject to deportation without warrants signed by judges.

The memo, dated May 12, which reads that it is from ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons, was shared with Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., by two whistleblowers.

It says ICE agents are allowed to forcibly enter a person’s home using an administrative warrant if a judge has issued a “final order of removal.” Administrative warrants permit officers and agents to make arrests and are different from judicial warrants, which judges or magistrates sign allowing entry into homes.

Lyons notes in the document that detaining people “in their residences” based solely on administrative warrants is a change from past procedures.

“Although the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has not historically relied on administrative warrants alone to arrest aliens subject to final orders of removal in their place of residence, the DHS Office of General Counsel has recently determined that the U.S. Constitution, the Immigration and Nationality Act, and the immigration regulations do not prohibit relying on administrative warrants for this purpose,” the memo reads.

The memo says agents may “arrest and detain aliens” in their places of residence who are subject to final orders of removal issued by immigration judges, the Board of Immigration Appeals, or U.S. district or magistrate judges.

The memo says under general guidelines that officers and agents using a method called Form I-205 must “knock and announce” and that “in announcing, officers and agents must state their identity and purpose.”

It says that officers and agents must give the people inside time to comply with the order.

It also says that they generally should not enter a residence before 6 a.m. or after 10 p.m., and that they “should only use a necessary and reasonable amount of force” to enter a home.

The Associated Press first reported the document Wednesday.

DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that immigrants in the country illegally who are served administrative warrants or I-205s, which are removal or deportation warrants, “have had full due process and a final order of removal from an immigration judge.”

“The officers issuing these administrative warrants also have found probable cause,” McLaughlin said. “For decades, the Supreme Court and Congress have recognized the propriety of administrative warrants in cases of immigration enforcement.”

The group Whistleblower Aid, which is representing the whistleblowers who shared the memo with Congress, said, “This ‘policy’ flies in the face of longstanding federal law enforcement training material and policies, all rooted in constitutional assessments.”

“In other words: the Form I-205 does not authorize ICE agents to enter a home,” the group said in a statement. “Training new recruits, many of whom have zero prior law enforcement training or experience, to seemingly disregard the Fourth Amendment, should be of grave concern to everyone.”

Blumenthal said in a statement that the memo was “allegedly not widely distributed” despite being labeled “all-hands.” A copy of the memo shared with Congress is addressed to “All ICE Personnel.”

“Instead, the disclosure claims that the memo was rolled out in a secretive manner in which some agents were verbally briefed while others were allowed to view it but not keep a copy,” Blumenthal said. “It was reportedly clear that anyone who openly spoke out against this new directive would be fired.”

Whistleblower Aid wrote in its disclosure that the memo was addressed to “All ICE Personnel” but that in practice it was only shown to “select DHS officials.”

Those officials were then to verbally brief the plan, the group said. Supervisors showed it some employees, including the whistleblowers, and directed them to read it and return it, according to the group.

Whistleblower Aid also cites past ICE and DHS training materials that says entering a residence on solely an administrative warrant can cause violations of Fourth Amendment constitutional protections.

The memo is dated less than four months into the second term of President Donald Trump, who campaigned on mass deportations.

Immigration crackdowns by the Trump administration against several Democrat-run cities have sparked protests and unrest, most recently in Minneapolis after an ICE agent fatally shot a U.S. citizen, Renee Good, on Jan. 7.

Blumenthal said in a statement that the newly revealed ICE policy should terrify Americans.

“It is a legally and morally abhorrent policy that exemplifies the kinds of dangerous, disgraceful abuses America is seeing in real time,” he said. “In our democracy, with vanishingly rare exceptions, the government is barred from breaking into your home without a judge giving a green light.”

The ICE memo says that Form I-205 is not a search warrant and that it “should only be used to enter the residence of the subject alien to conduct an immigration arrest.”

ICE officers have arrested roughly 220,000 people in the nine months from Jan. 20, when Trump returned to office, to Oct. 15, according to data a project shared in December.

Around 75,000 of them have been people with no criminal records, according to the data.

The figures were shared by the University of California, Berkeley’s Deportation Data Project, which obtained them through a lawsuit against ICE.

On Tuesday Scripps News spoke with Todd Lyons, Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, about the agency’s objectives.

PrevNext
By: Haley Bull , Scripps News Group
Posted 9:12 PM, Jan 20, 2026 and last updated 11:54 AM, Jan 21, 2026
On Tuesday Scripps News spoke with Todd Lyons, Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, about the agency’s objectives.

“We have almost 1.5 million people that are here in the country that have been legally ordered deported or removed by a federal judge. So that’s someone that has an outstanding deportation. Are that we’re going to go ahead and focus on that, but we’re also going to focus on the worst of the worst,” Lyons said.

“What we’ve been trying to do is really educate the public on the fact that that we do have so many of these international fugitives and folks that have really serious criminal histories that are hiding in plain sight, and unfortunately they were weren’t vetted properly and at the border previously. So now we’ll go ahead and try to, you know, get rid of these.”

Lyons said he wanted to see more cooperation from state and local officials — by doing more to arrest immigrants with criminal histories, and by toning down rhetoric against federal enforcement.

PrevNext
By: Haley Bull , Scripps News Group
Posted 9:12 PM, Jan 20, 2026 and last updated 11:54 AM, Jan 21, 2026
On Tuesday Scripps News spoke with Todd Lyons, Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, about the agency’s objectives.

“We have almost 1.5 million people that are here in the country that have been legally ordered deported or removed by a federal judge. So that’s someone that has an outstanding deportation. Are that we’re going to go ahead and focus on that, but we’re also going to focus on the worst of the worst,” Lyons said.

“What we’ve been trying to do is really educate the public on the fact that that we do have so many of these international fugitives and folks that have really serious criminal histories that are hiding in plain sight, and unfortunately they were weren’t vetted properly and at the border previously. So now we’ll go ahead and try to, you know, get rid of these.”

RELATED STORY | US citizen says ICE held him at gunpoint, led him outside in underwear

Lyons said he wanted to see more cooperation from state and local officials — by doing more to arrest immigrants with criminal histories, and by toning down rhetoric against federal enforcement.

“When we go out and make an arrest after someone gets released from local jurisdiction, you’d only need five or six officers to do that. Now, we have to go out there with those five to six officers make the arrest, but 15 to 20 just to protect them,” Lyons said. “You wouldn’t see that many officers and special agents on the street if we had that cooperation. ”

Lyons’ comments come as the Department of Homeland Security and its agencies, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement, continue an unprecedented immigration crackdown called Operation Metro Surge. The deployment involves more than 2,000 federal agents in the Twin Cities, where they have clashed with protesters and where one agent shot and killed Renee Good on January 7.

At a press conference on Tuesday, DHS officials said agencies had made more than 10,000 arrests of “illegal aliens” since President Trump took office. 113 arrests occurred over the Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend.

The recent death of a detainee at an immigrant detention camp in Texas has been officially deemed a homicide, according to an autopsy report released Wednesday by the El Paso County Office of the Medical Examiner.

“Based on the investigative and examination findings, it is my opinion that the cause of death is asphyxia due to neck and torso compression,” Adam C. Gonzalez, deputy medical examiner for El Paso County, said in the report. “The manner of death is homicide.”

The finding does not imply intent to kill, but rather that the victim’s death was caused by another person, according to Lee Ann Grossberg, an independent forensic pathologist who reviewed the autopsy at the request of The Washington Post.

Geraldo Lunas Campos, a 55-year-old Cuban man who was detained at Camp East Montana in El Paso, died during an interaction with guards after being placed into solitary confinement, according to the government. A fellow detainee who said he witnessed the incident claimed Lunas Campos had been asking for his medication.

The autopsy report indicated that Lunas Campos was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and had medication for depression in his system. Asphyxia due to neck and torso compression means Lunas Campos did not get enough oxygen because of pressure on his neck and chest, Grossberg said.

The medical examiner’s findings shed new light on the mystery of Lunas Campos’s death, an event that has in recent days become the subject of conflicting explanations. They also add to growing concerns about Camp East Montana, the largest ICE detention center in the country, where three men have died in the past two months.

Following Lunas Campos’s death on Jan. 3, the Department of Homeland Security initially said “staff observed him in distress” and gave no cause of death. Then, in a recorded conversation last week that was first reported by The Washington Post, an employee of the medical examiner’s office told one of Lunas Campos’s relatives that the office was likely to list the manner of death as homicide.

After that report in The Post, Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that Lunas Campos had tried to take his own life and guards were trying to save him. “Campos violently resisted the security staff and continued to attempt to take his life,” McLaughlin said. “During the ensuing struggle, Campos stopped breathing and lost consciousness.”

In response to questions about the autopsy report, McLaughlin repeated last week’s statement.

A fellow detainee, Santos Jesus Flores, said in a phone interview with The Post last week that he saw guards choking Lunas Campos and heard Lunas Campos repeatedly saying, “No puedo respirar” — Spanish for “I can’t breathe.” Medical staff tried to resuscitate him for an hour, after which they took his body away, Flores said.

“He said, ‘I cannot breathe, I cannot breathe.’ After that, we don’t hear his voice anymore, and that’s it,” Flores said.

The Trump administration has taken steps to deport Flores and one other detainee who provided an eyewitness account, both of whom have criminal convictions.

On Wednesday, a federal judge granted a request by lawyers representing Lunas Campos’s family to temporarily bar their deportation, a court filing shows. In his order, David Briones, a senior U.S. District Court judge for the Western District of Texas, said that deporting the men would make it harder to “obtain the testimony of these witnesses” given the difficulty of locating them abroad.

The judge set a hearing for Jan. 27 to determine whether the men can provide testimony.

Deaths in ICE detention centers have occurred with increasing frequency in recent months, as President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown floods these facilities with record numbers of detainees. At least 30 people died in detention last year — the highest in two decades — and Lunas Campos is one of six who died in the first two weeks of 2026 alone, according to ICE, which posts information about all detainee deaths on its website.

The agency reported that another man, Victor Manuel Diaz, died at Camp East Montana on Jan. 14, an incident it said was “a presumed suicide” but added that the official cause of death was under investigation. Diaz, a 36-year-old from Nicaragua, had been arrested by ICE just days earlier in Minneapolis as federal agents swept through in the city.

Camp East Montana is a colossal makeshift tent encampment that was built on the Mexican border last summer where migrants have reported substandard conditions and physical abuse. In September, ICE’s own inspectors said the facility failed to properly monitor and treat some detainees’ medical conditions, among dozens of other violations of federal detention standards, according to documents obtained by The Post.

At the time, inspectors said the facility had no approved security policy, which would include procedures for finding contraband that may pose a threat or controlling access to keys or equipment that could be used as weapons. Armed guards stationed along the facility’s perimeter were given instructions about the care and handling of their weapons, but the instructions did not explain which situations would justify the use of lethal force, inspectors noted, calling this “a serious vulnerability.”

Vice President JD Vance will visit Minneapolis on Thursday, amid heightened tensions between the Trump administration and local officials and activists due to the president’s immigration crackdown.

Vance will host “a roundtable with local leaders and community members” and deliver remarks “focused on restoring law and order in Minnesota” during his trip to the city, the vice president’s office announced on Wednesday.

He will also meet with ICE agents “to reinforce the White House’s unwavering support for federal immigration officials,” according to the White House.

The trip comes as local and state officials have called for ICE agents to leave the Minnesota after an officer fatally shot 37-year-old Renee Good in her car earlier this month. Following Good’s shooting, Democratic Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey told the agency to “get the fuck out of Minneapolis,” accusing ICE of “recklessly using power that resulted in somebody dying.”

“People are free to come to Minneapolis, including the Vice President — that’s how this country works,” Frey said in a Wednesday statement. “But if the Vice President actually wanted to help, he should be focused on stopping federal agents from targeting and harming our neighbors in ways that clearly cross constitutional lines. That’s what Minneapolis wants.”

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, has also repeatedly condemned ICE’s operation in the state, which the Department of Homeland Security has sought to tie to a widespread investigation into allegations of government program fraud involving some Somali Americans.

In the wake of the shooting, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem doubled down on the need for a heightened presence of federal law enforcement, vowing that “hundreds more” officials would be deployed to Minnesota in addition to the more than 2,000 agents already there.

The Minnesota Department of Public Safety announced Saturday that the state’s National Guard had been “mobilized and are staging to support local law enforcement and emergency management agencies” at Walz’s direction.

Walz has repeatedly sparred with President Donald Trump, with federal prosecutors subpoenaing the 2024 Democratic nominee for vice president in the latest clash between the two leaders. In a Tuesday statement, Walz called the investigation into him “a partisan distraction,” accusing the Trump administration of pursuing “baseless legal tactics aimed at intimidating public servants standing shoulder to shoulder with their community.”

Walz’s announcement that he had received a subpoena came after Trump warned Minnesota Democrats in an ominous social media post that “THE DAY OF RECKONING & RETRIBUTION IS COMING!”

The Department of State’s directive to pause the issuance of immigrant visas to applicants from 75 countries, representing an extraordinary reduction in lawful immigration to the U.S., takes effect today. Nationals from these countries, which include Somalia, Russia, Thailand, Brazil, Guatemala, and Afghanistan, among many others, received nearly half of all immigrant visas in fiscal year 2024.

Consistent with its increasingly racist, anti-immigrant rhetoric, the Trump Administration claims that nationals from the 75 targeted countries are at “high risk” of becoming a public charge, without providing any evidence to justify this assertion.
Consistent with its increasingly racist, anti-immigrant rhetoric, the Trump Administration claims that nationals from the 75 targeted countries are at “high risk” of becoming a public charge, without providing any evidence to justify this assertion. A recent analysis of census data shows that the majority of people who are immigrants do not use public benefits. U.S. federal laws have long barred most immigrant visa recipients from accessing any means tested public benefits for the first five years of residency, and the harmful Republican megabill takes away access from even more people with lawful immigration statuses.

The pause applies only to those seeking to immigrate permanently to the U.S. from the 75 countries, including immediate family members of U.S. citizens; it does not apply to nonimmigrant visas, which are issued to people seeking to temporarily enter the U.S. for purposes such as business, tourism, study, or temporary work.

The visa freeze comes amid sweeping efforts by the Trump Administration to curtail lawful immigration. These include a travel ban and indefinite hold placed on immigration applications from nationals of 39 countries, and a move to rescind the Biden-era public charge rule so that immigration officers have vast discretion to deny applications for lawful permanent resident status based on their belief that someone may receive assistance at some point in the future. Key questions like how such determinations should be made, what evidence should be reviewed, and what kinds of future benefit receipts should be considered are left entirely unaddressed in the proposed Trump rule.

Such discretion and lack of clarity around the basics of the policy would introduce significant risk of inconsistent and biased determinations, including bias based on race, ethnicity, national origin, sex or religion — and would create an immigration system that only recognizes people with significant wealth as potential contributors to the United States. This belies the incredible accomplishments of people who have come to the U.S. for hundreds of years and the accomplishments of their descendants.

These actions, alongside the Administration’s extreme and aggressive immigration enforcement dragnet — which includes widespread civil rights abuses, from the brutal invasion of Minneapolis and other U.S. cities by federal agents to the use of fatal force by ICE officers — have created enormous fear and confusion for immigrants and their families. This will undoubtedly result in people forgoing health coverage and food assistance they need and qualify for — including families who forgo help for children, many of whom are U.S. citizens.

House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) announced in a closed-door meeting on Tuesday that he would oppose the bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for the rest of the fiscal year. But the Democratic caucus is not engaged in a formal whip operation to encourage all members to vote against the bill, which is likely to get a vote on Thursday.

Two congressional sources told the Prospect that Jeffries and his leadership team were “recommending” a no vote, but that is different from a whip operation where Democratic Whip Rep. Katherine Clark and her deputies push members to support the leadership position on the bill. Several frontline Democrats in swing seats are expected to vote in favor of the appropriation.

“They’re terrified of being labeled anti–law enforcement,” said a Hill source tracking the legislation. “They want this to go away so they can talk about the cost of living more. Problem is, it’s not going away.”

More from David Dayen

The DHS appropriation falls short of imposing true accountability on ICE in the wake of the murder of Renee Good in Minneapolis. It “flat-funds” ICE at current levels for the fiscal year, although in real terms it’s an increase to the budget, because the previous year included a one-time “anomaly” of additional spending. It restricts spending on detention that could theoretically lower capacity to 41,500 beds from a proposed 50,000. And there are some limitations on what DHS can shift from other agencies into ICE. But because the bill includes no penalties or enforcing mechanisms to ensure that its funding directives are actually adhered to, these funding boundaries are not terribly meaningful.

Democratic lawmakers forced other “guardrails” into the bill, like funding for oversight of detention facilities and mandatory body cameras for ICE agents. And additional training is mandated for agents who interact with the public. But other measures, like blocking the detention and deportation of U.S. citizens or borrowing enforcement personnel from other agencies, weren’t added to the bill. And the funding, once again, is not guaranteed, given that the Trump administration has routinely withheld or shifted around funding without pushback from Congress.

For this reason, much of the House Democratic caucus, including Jeffries and Clark, can be expected to vote no. But the Democratic leadership worked it so that the DHS appropriations bill will get a separate vote from the other three bills in the package released on Tuesday. While a full four-bill package may have needed support from House Democrats, the DHS appropriation alone, with its meager accountability measures and funding for immigration enforcement, can be expected to get full support from House Republicans.

That makes it a free vote. But a large show of support against it from House Democrats could make it a heavier lift in the Senate, where Democrats would be needed for final passage to avert a filibuster.

Maximizing that opposition would typically be done through a formal whip operation, not by announcing personal opposition or merely “recommending” a no vote. In the prior two government funding showdowns in 2025, Jeffries did formally whip the caucus into opposition. But that has changed for this appropriations bill, which is specifically about immigration enforcement.

The analogous situation is when Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer pronounced himself a no on the legislation that ended the shutdown in November, while doing nothing to stop several Senate Democrats from providing the votes necessary to pass that legislation. In general, the job of a caucus leader is to unify the caucus, rather than take idiosyncratic personal votes.

The Hill source told the Prospect that in general, Democratic leadership was disinterested in fighting on the issue of ICE and immigration enforcement. “They’ll just yell at Trump as he escalates and hope people forget and don’t punish them for failing to use what little power they had when it mattered,” the source said.

It is true that ICE has a reserve of $75 billion from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, over seven times its annual budget, and that even if DHS were not funded, ICE agents would still be on the streets and paid in full through drawing from that reserve. Some might argue that this is all the more reason to vote against an inadequate package, because if the concern is to be seen as shutting down law enforcement, that won’t happen in this case.

Public polling shows plurality support for abolishing ICE entirely, including substantial support from self-described Democrats. Trump’s handling of immigration is sharply negative. Americans are clearly frustrated with the brutality from ICE that they are seeing in the media. Democrats are frustrated too, but not quite enough to do much about it.

Jeffries’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal immigration officers are asserting sweeping power to forcibly enter people’s homes without a judge’s warrant, according to an internal Immigration and Customs Enforcement memo obtained by The Associated Press, marking a sharp reversal of longstanding guidance meant to respect constitutional limits on government searches.

The memo authorizes ICE officers to use force to enter a residence based solely on a more narrow administrative warrant to arrest someone with a final order of removal, a move that advocates say collides with Fourth Amendment protections and upends years of advice given to immigrant communities.

The shift comes as the Trump administration dramatically expands immigration arrests nationwide, deploying thousands of officers under a mass deportation campaign that is already reshaping enforcement tactics in cities such as Minneapolis.

For years, immigrant advocates, legal aid groups and local governments have urged people not to open their doors to immigration agents unless they are shown a warrant signed by a judge. That guidance is rooted in Supreme Court rulings that generally prohibit law enforcement from entering a home without judicial approval. The ICE directive directly undercuts that advice at a time when arrests are accelerating under the administration’s immigration crackdown.

The memo itself has not been widely shared within the agency, according to a whistleblower complaint, but its contents have been used to train new ICE officers who are being deployed into cities and towns to implement the president’s immigration crackdown. New ICE hires and those still in training are being told to follow the memo’s guidance instead of written training materials that actually contradict the memo, according to the whistleblower disclosure.

It is unclear how broadly the directive has been applied in immigration enforcement operations. The Associated Press witnessed ICE officers ramming through the front door of the home of a Liberian man, Garrison Gibson, with a deportation order from 2023 in Minneapolis on Jan. 11, wearing heavy tactical gear and with their rifles drawn.

Documents reviewed by The AP revealed that the agents only had an administrative warrant — meaning there was no judge who authorized the raid on private property.

The change is almost certain to meet legal challenges and stiff criticism from advocacy groups and immigrant-friendly state and local governments that have spent years successfully urging people not to open their doors unless ICE shows them a warrant signed by a judge.

The Associated Press obtained the memo and whistleblower complaint from an official in Congress, who shared it on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive documents. The AP verified the authenticity of the accounts in the complaint.

The memo, signed by the acting director of ICE, Todd Lyons, and dated May 12, 2025, says: “Although the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has not historically relied on administrative warrants alone to arrest aliens subject to final orders of removal in their place of residence, the DHS Office of the General Counsel has recently determined that the U.S. Constitution, the Immigration and Nationality Act, and the immigration regulations do not prohibit relying on administrative warrants for this purpose.”

The memo does not detail how that determination was made nor what its legal repercussions might be.

Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said in an e-mailed statement to the AP that everyone the department serves with an administrative warrant has already had “full due process and a final order of removal.”

She said the officers issuing those warrants have also found probable cause for the person’s arrest. She said the Supreme Court and Congress have “recognized the propriety of administrative warrants in cases of immigration enforcement,” without elaborating. McLaughlin did not respond to questions about whether ICE officers entered a person’s home since the memo was issued, relying solely on an administrative warrant and if so, how often.

Recent arrests shine a light on tactics
Whistleblower Aid, a nonprofit legal organization that assists workers exposing wrongdoings, said in the whistleblower complaint obtained by The Associated Press that it represents two anonymous U.S. government officials “disclosing a secretive — and seemingly unconstitutional — policy directive.”

A wave of recent high-profile arrests, many unfolding at private homes and businesses and captured on video, has placed a spotlight on immigration arrest tactics, including officers’ use of proper warrants.

Most immigration arrests are carried out under administrative warrants, internal documents issued by immigration authorities that authorize the arrest of a specific individual but do not permit officers to forcibly enter private homes or other non-public spaces without consent. Only warrants signed by judges carry that authority.

All law enforcement operations — including those conducted by ICE and Customs and Border Protection — are governed by the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution, which protects all people in the country from unreasonable searches and seizures.

People can legally refuse federal immigration agents entry into private property if the agents only have an administrative warrant, with some limited exceptions.

Memo shown to ‘select’ officials
The memo says ICE officers can forcibly enter homes and arrest immigrants using just a signed administrative warrant known as an I-205 if they have a final order of removal issued by an immigration judge, the Board of Immigration Appeals or a district judge or magistrate judge.

The memo says officers must first knock on the door and share who they are and why they’re at the residence. They’re limited in the hours they can go into the home — after 6 a.m. and before 10 p.m. The people inside must be given a “reasonable chance to act lawfully.” But if that doesn’t work, the memo says, they can use force to go in.

“Should the alien refuse admittance, ICE officers and agents should use only a necessary and reasonable amount of force to enter the alien’s residence, following proper notification of the officer or agent’s authority and intent to enter,” the memo reads.

The memo is addressed to all ICE personnel. But it has been shown only to “select DHS officials” who then shared it with some employees who were told to read it and return it, Whistleblower Aid wrote in the disclosure.

One of the two whistleblowers was allowed to view the memo only in the presence of a supervisor and then had to give it back. That person was not allowed to take notes. A whistleblower was able to access the document and lawfully disclose it to Congress, Whistleblower Aid said.

Although the memo was issued in May, David Kligerman, senior vice president and special counsel at Whistleblower Aid, said it took time for its clients to find a “safe and legal path to disclose it to lawmakers and the American people.”

Memo says ICE officers are told to rely solely on administrative warrants
ICE has been rapidly hiring thousands of new deportation officers to carry out the president’s mass deportation agenda. They’re trained at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Brunswick, Georgia.

During a visit there by The Associated Press in August, ICE officials said repeatedly that new officers were being trained to follow the Fourth Amendment.

But according to the whistleblowers’ account, newly hired ICE officers are being told they can rely solely on administrative warrants to enter homes to make arrests, even though that conflicts with written Homeland Security training materials.

Lindsay Nash, a law professor at Yeshiva University’s Cardozo School of Law in New York, said the memo “flies in the face” of what the Fourth Amendment protects against and what ICE itself has historically said are its authorities.

She said there’s an “enormous potential for overreach, for mistakes and we’ve seen that those can happen with very, very serious consequences.”

The Trump administration won a legal victory on Monday that temporarily allows it to keep elected officials out of immigration detention camps, while it advanced two other court actions in support of its surge into Minnesota.

A federal judge in Washington DC ruled that the homeland security department (DHS) can continue to insist that lawmakers provide a week’s notice of their intention to inspect immigration facilities, even though she blocked an identical policy last month.

Separately, justice department lawyers urged a district court judge in Minneapolis to allow the administration’s immigration enforcement actions in Minnesota to continue, in response to a lawsuit filed by the state seeking to end what it called a “federal invasion”.And in a related development, the justice department said it was appealing an injunction issued on Friday curbing aggressive tactics by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other federal agencies in dealing with protesters.

Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, backtracked on Sunday on her insistence that federal agents had not used chemical substances including pepper spray against crowds protesting ICE actions, and claimed instead they were necessary to “establish law and order”.

The Washington DC ruling on congressional oversight of federal immigration facilities comes after three Democratic members of Congress from Minnesota, Ilhan Omar, Angie Craig and Kelly Morrison, said DHS officials illegally blocked them from performing authorized congressional oversight when they tried to inspect an ICE detention center near Minneapolis earlier this month.

The Colorado congressman Joe Neguse and colleagues filed a lawsuit arguing that it violated district court judge Jia Cobb’s December ruling blocking DHS from enforcing a seven-day notice period.

But in four-page ruling on Monday, Cobb said the fact that the DHS claimed it was now enforcing the seven-day requirement using funding from a different source, namely Trump’s so-called “big, beautiful bill”, instead of existing appropriations, meant the policy “facially differs” from the one she blocked.

“If plaintiffs wish to challenge the legality of a new agency action, plaintiffs may seek leave to amend their complaint or file a supplemental pleading,” she wrote, adding that she would consider another temporary restraining order.

Neguse did not respond to Cobb’s ruling, but in an earlier post on social media said no-notice inspections were essential.

“The law is crystal-clear: the administration can’t block members of Congress from conducting real-time oversight of immigration detention facilities,” he wroteMeanwhile, the justice department responded on Monday to the lawsuit brought by Minnesota, and the cities of Minneapolis and St Paul, seeking an end to ICE activities, claiming the state was demanding an unprecedented veto over federal law enforcement.

At a press conference last week announcing the action, Keith Ellison, the Minnesota attorney general, said the cities were being terrorized by federal actions, including the shooting death of Renee Good, an unarmed US citizen, by an ICE agent“We allege that DHS’s use of excessive and lethal force, their warrantless, racist arrests, their targeting of our courts, our churches, houses of worship and schools are a violation of the Administrative Procedures Act on arbitrary and capricious federal actions,” he said.

Justice department lawyers, however, called the lawsuit “an absurdity”, according to the New York Times. “It would render the supremacy of federal law an afterthought to local preferences,” they said, and an injunction blocking the operation “would constitute an unprecedented act of judicial overreach”, the newspaper reported.

Katherine Menendez, the Joe Biden-appointed district court judge hearing the case, made no immediate ruling but indicated she might hold another hearing before deciding on the lawsuit’s merits.

Menendez is also the judge who issued the order on Friday curtailing ICE’s tactics, including “retaliation” against protesters and “the drawing and pointing of weapons; the use of pepper spray and other non-lethal munitions; actual and threatened arrest and detainment of protesters and observers; and other intimidation tactics”.

The DHS told Menendez on Monday it had filed an appeal notice with the eighth district court of appeal, the New York Times reported, noting that the text of the document was not immediately available.

The Trump administration won a legal victory on Monday that temporarily allows it to keep elected officials out of immigration detention camps, while it advanced two other court actions in support of its surge into Minnesota.

A federal judge in Washington DC ruled that the homeland security department (DHS) can continue to insist that lawmakers provide a week’s notice of their intention to inspect immigration facilities, even though she blocked an identical policy last month.

Separately, justice department lawyers urged a district court judge in Minneapolis to allow the administration’s immigration enforcement actions in Minnesota to continue, in response to a lawsuit filed by the state seeking to end what it called a “federal invasion”.And in a related development, the justice department said it was appealing an injunction issued on Friday curbing aggressive tactics by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other federal agencies in dealing with protesters.

Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, backtracked on Sunday on her insistence that federal agents had not used chemical substances including pepper spray against crowds protesting ICE actions, and claimed instead they were necessary to “establish law and order”.

The Washington DC ruling on congressional oversight of federal immigration facilities comes after three Democratic members of Congress from Minnesota, Ilhan Omar, Angie Craig and Kelly Morrison, said DHS officials illegally blocked them from performing authorized congressional oversight when they tried to inspect an ICE detention center near Minneapolis earlier this month.

The Colorado congressman Joe Neguse and colleagues filed a lawsuit arguing that it violated district court judge Jia Cobb’s December ruling blocking DHS from enforcing a seven-day notice period.

But in four-page ruling on Monday, Cobb said the fact that the DHS claimed it was now enforcing the seven-day requirement using funding from a different source, namely Trump’s so-called “big, beautiful bill”, instead of existing appropriations, meant the policy “facially differs” from the one she blocked.

“If plaintiffs wish to challenge the legality of a new agency action, plaintiffs may seek leave to amend their complaint or file a supplemental pleading,” she wrote, adding that she would consider another temporary restraining order.

Neguse did not respond to Cobb’s ruling, but in an earlier post on social media said no-notice inspections were essential.

“The law is crystal-clear: the administration can’t block members of Congress from conducting real-time oversight of immigration detention facilities,” he wroteMeanwhile, the justice department responded on Monday to the lawsuit brought by Minnesota, and the cities of Minneapolis and St Paul, seeking an end to ICE activities, claiming the state was demanding an unprecedented veto over federal law enforcement.

At a press conference last week announcing the action, Keith Ellison, the Minnesota attorney general, said the cities were being terrorized by federal actions, including the shooting death of Renee Good, an unarmed US citizen, by an ICE agent“We allege that DHS’s use of excessive and lethal force, their warrantless, racist arrests, their targeting of our courts, our churches, houses of worship and schools are a violation of the Administrative Procedures Act on arbitrary and capricious federal actions,” he said.

Justice department lawyers, however, called the lawsuit “an absurdity”, according to the New York Times. “It would render the supremacy of federal law an afterthought to local preferences,” they said, and an injunction blocking the operation “would constitute an unprecedented act of judicial overreach”, the newspaper reported.

Katherine Menendez, the Joe Biden-appointed district court judge hearing the case, made no immediate ruling but indicated she might hold another hearing before deciding on the lawsuit’s merits.

Menendez is also the judge who issued the order on Friday curtailing ICE’s tactics, including “retaliation” against protesters and “the drawing and pointing of weapons; the use of pepper spray and other non-lethal munitions; actual and threatened arrest and detainment of protesters and observers; and other intimidation tactics”.

The DHS told Menendez on Monday it had filed an appeal notice with the eighth district court of appeal, the New York Times reported, noting that the text of the document was not immediately available.

Just 10 years ago, the annual budget for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, was less than $6 billion — notably smaller than other agencies within the Department of Homeland Security. But ICE’s budget has skyrocketed during President Trump’s second term, becoming the highest-funded U.S. law enforcement agency, with $85 billion now at its disposal.

The windfall is thanks to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, enacted last July. After hovering around the $10 billion mark for years, ICE’s budget suddenly benefited from a meteoric spike.

“With this new bill and other appropriations, it’s larger than the annual budget of all other federal law enforcement agencies combined,” said Lauren-Brooke Eisen, senior director of the justice program at the Brennan Center for Justice, a nonpartisan policy instituteICE is now the lead agency in President’s Trump immigration crackdown, sending thousands of agents into U.S. communities. As its funding and profile has grown as part of those efforts, ICE has come under increasing criticism for its officers’ actions, from masked agents randomly stopping, questioning, and detaining people and thrusting them into unmarked vehicles to the recent killing of Renee Macklin Good in MinneapolisA cycle of more migrants, more money and a larger ICE mission
ICE’s sudden growth spurt follows roughly two decades of relatively modest funding since 2003, when the agency was created by merging the U.S. Customs Service with the Immigration and Naturalization Service. In 2015, for instance, Congress approved a budget of around $5.96 billion, which was nearly $1 billion less than then-President Barack Obama had requestedLimiting migration led to 1.6 million losing legal status in 2025
In 2019, during the first Trump administration, border control officer’s encounters with migrants attempting authorized entry to the U.S. spiked. Those numbers then plummeted as the COVID-19 pandemic prompted invocation of the Title 42 public health law, allowing CBP to expel migrants more quickly, with restricted pathways to asylum.

Encounters rose sharply under former President Joe Biden and soared above 3.2 million in 2023, when Biden lifted Title 42. By late 2024, fewer migrants were arriving at the border, due to U.S. asylum limits and Mexico bolstering enforcement.

When Trump returned to the White House in 2025, he sought to empower immigration authorities to quickly remove migrants and announced a crackdown led by ICEUnder the 2025 law, ICE has a $75 billion supplement that it can take as long as four years to spend, along with its base budget of around $10 billion. If the agency spends that money at a steady pace and current funding levels continue, it would have nearly $29 billion on hand each year. That essentially triples ICE’s total budget from recent years.

To give that large number a sense of scale, consider that the Trump administration’s 2026 appropriations request for the entire Justice Department, including the FBI, stands at a little over $35 billionThe Trump administration has set lofty goals for ICE, aiming to deport 1 million people each year. And the One Big Beautiful Bill Act also allocates $45 billion for ICE to expand its immigration detention system — Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said last June that the agency will be able to hold up to 100,000 people in custody daily. By comparison, the federal Bureau of Prisons currently holds over 153,000 inmates.

As of Nov. 30, 65,735 people were held in immigration detention, according to the data tracking project Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse.

With those metrics in mind, ICE went on a hiring spree in 2025, fueled by its bigger budget. In just one year, the agency says, it “more than doubled our officers and agents from 10,000 to 22,000.” (The Office of Personnel Management, which tracks federal workforce statistics, is only updated through Nov. 30 and does not reflect any hiring made by the DHS in the last quarter of the year.According to the DHS, ICE received 220,000 applications in 2025, thanks in part to a generous incentive package with perks like a signing bonus of up to $50,000, disbursed over the course of a five-year commitment, and up to $60,000 in student loan repayment.

ICE is still on that hiring spree, looking to hire deportation officers in at least 25 cities around the U.S., according to a job listing on the USA Jobs website that will remain active through the end of September. The starting salary for an ICE deportation officer in the Enforcement and Removal Operations division, or ERO, ranges from $51,632 up to $84,277The dramatic growth came in the same year that the Trump administration sharply reduced the number of federal workers, firing thousands of employees and inviting many more to resign.

What else will the new funds be spent on?
With base level funding for DHS and ICE due to expire at the end of January, Democrats in Congress are calling for changes to how ICE operates. It comes after a year in which deaths of people in ICE custody spiked to the highest levels in decades, with ICE reporting seven deaths in December, and three more in 2026, as of Jan. 16.

ICE’s increased budget makes sense to Ira Mehlman, spokesman for the right-wing Federation for American Immigration Reform, a group advocating for lower levels of immigration. He says the funding boost ” is directly commensurate with the size of the task the agency is addressing.”ICE exists to find and remove people who are in the country illegally,” Mehlman said, referring to a category that grew when the Trump administration stripped legal status from 1.6 million immigrants in 2025.

The focus of the new spending reflects President Trump’s emphasis on arrests and removals, said Margy O’Herron, a senior fellow at the Brennan Center’s liberty and national security program who worked at the DOJ in the Biden administration.

O’Herron said she agrees with the idea that, for years, a reasonable case could be made that DHS agencies such as ICE and CBP needed more money. But other parts of the immigration system aren’t getting as much help, she said.

“All of the money is going to enforcement to arrest, to detain and to deport,” she said. “It’s not going to things like immigration hearings or immigration judges, to conduct additional review of whether or not somebody should be in the country. And that is a real problem for the system.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — A ballooning Immigration and Customs Enforcement budget. Hiring bonuses of $50,000. Swelling ranks of ICE officers, to 22,000, in an expanding national force bigger than most police departments in America.

President Donald Trump promised the largest mass deportation operation in U.S. history, but achieving his goal wouldn’t have been possible without funding from the big tax and spending cuts bill passed by Republicans in Congress, and it’s fueling unprecedented immigration enforcement actions in cities like Minneapolis and beyond.

The GOP’s big bill is “supercharging ICE,” one budget expert said, in ways that Americans may not fully realize — and that have only just begun.

“I just don’t think people have a sense of the scale,” said Bobby Kogan, senior director of federal budget policy at the Center for American Progress and a former adviser to the Biden administration’s Office of Management and Budget.

“We’re looking at ICE in a way we’ve never seen before,” he said.

Trump’s big bill creates massive law enforcement force
As the Republican president marks the first year of his second term, the immigration enforcement and removal operation that has been a cornerstone of his domestic and foreign policy agenda is rapidly transforming into something else — a national law enforcement presence with billions upon billions of dollars in new spending from U.S. taxpayers.

The shooting death of Renee Good in Minneapolis showed the alarming reach of the new federalized force, sparking unrelenting protests against the military-styled officers seen going door to door to find and detain immigrants. Amid the outpouring of opposition, Trump revived threats to invoke the Insurrection Act to quell the demonstrations and the U.S. Army has 1,500 soldiers ready to deploy.

But Trump’s own public approval rating on immigration, one of his signature issues, has slipped since he took office, according to an AP-NORC poll.

“Public sentiment is everything,” said Rep. Nydia M. Velázquez, D-N.Y., at a press conference at the Capitol with lawmakers supporting legislation to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.

Americans, she said, are upset at what they are seeing. “They didn’t sign on for this,” she said.

Border crossings down, but Americans confront new ICE enforcements
To be sure, illegal crossings into the U.S. at the Mexico border have fallen to historic lows under Trump, a remarkable shift from just a few years ago when President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration allowed millions of people to temporarily enter the U.S. as they adjudicated their claims to stay.

Yet as enforcement moves away from the border, the newly hired army of immigration officers swarming city streets with aggressive tactics — in Los Angeles, Chicago and elsewhere — is something not normally seen in the U.S.

Armed and masked law enforcement officers are being witnessed smashing car windows, yanking people from vehicles and chasing and wrestling others to the ground and hauling them away — images playing out in endless loops on TVs and other screens.

And it’s not just ICE. A long list of supporting agencies, including federal, state and local police and sheriff’s offices, are entering into contract partnerships with Homeland Security to conduct immigration enforcement operations in communities around the nation.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has warned Democrats that this is “no time to be playing games” by stirring up the opposition to immigration enforcement officers in Minneapolis and other places.

WATCH: Minnesota protests enter 3rd week as immigration raids continue

“They need to get out of the way and allow federal law enforcement to do its duty,” Johnson said at the Capitol.

Noem has said the immigration enforcement officers are acting lawfully. The department insists it’s targeting criminals in the actions, what officials call the worst of the worst immigrants.

However, reports show that non-criminals and U.S. citizens are also being forcibly detained by immigration officers. The Supreme Court last year lifted a ban on using race alone in the immigration stops.

Trump last month called Somali immigrants “garbage,” comments that echoed his past objections to immigrants from certain countries.

The Trump administration has set a goal of 100,000 detentions a day, about three times what’s typical, with 1 million deportations a year.

Money from the big bill flows with few restraints
With Republican control of Congress, the impeachment of Noem or any other Trump official is not a viable political option for Democrats, who would not appear to have the vote tally even among their own ranks.

In fact, even if Congress wanted to curtail Trump’s immigration operations — by threatening to shut down the government, for example — it would be difficult to stop the spend.

What Trump called the “big, beautiful bill” is essentially on autopilot through 2029, the year he’s scheduled to finish his term and leave office.

The legislation essentially doubled annual Homeland Security funding, adding $170 billion to be used over four years. Of that, ICE, which typically receives about $10 billion a year, was provided $30 billion for operations and $45 billion for detention facilities.

“The first thing that comes to mind is spending on this level is typically done on the military,” said Kathleen Bush-Joseph, a policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute. “Trump is militarizing immigration enforcement.”

Ahead, Congress will consider a routine annual funding package for Homeland Security unveiled Tuesday, or risk a partial shutdown Jan. 30. A growing group of Democratic senators and the Congressional Progressive Caucus have had enough. They say they won’t support additional funds without significant changes.

Lawmakers are considering various restrictions on ICE operations, including limiting arrests around hospitals, courthouses, churches and other sensitive locations and ensuring that officers display proper identification and refrain from wearing face masks.

“I think ICE needs to be totally torn down,” said Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., on CNN over the weekend.

“People want immigration enforcement that goes after criminals,” he said. And not what he called this “goon squad.”

Big spending underway, but Trump falls short of goals
Meanwhile, Homeland Security has begun tapping the new money at its disposal. The department informed Congress it has obligated roughly $58 billion — most of that, some $37 billion, for border wall construction, according to a person familiar with the private assessment but unauthorized to discuss it.

The Department of Homeland Security said its massive recruitment campaign blew past its 10,000-person target to bring in 12,000 new hires, more than doubling the force to 22,000 officers, in a matter of months.

“The good news is that thanks to the Big Beautiful Bill that President Trump signed, we have an additional 12,000 ICE officers and agents on the ground across the country,” Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a December statement.

The department also announced it had arrested and deported about 600,000 people. It also said 1.9 million other people had “voluntarily self-deported” since January 2025, when Trump took office.

An ICE agent’s killing of Renee Good in Minneapolis has pushed the fight over immigration enforcement to the center of the midterm campaign trail — opening new fault lines in some of Democrats’ most competitive congressional primaries.

Across the country, Democratic candidates are expressing horror at Immigration and Custom Enforcement’s tactics and ratcheting up calls to restrict the agency’s reach in the wake of Good’s killing and other dramatic ICE escalations. But even as public outcry has Democrats shifting out of the defensive crouch on immigration they took following President Donald Trump’s 2024 victory, old intraparty fissures about whether to rein in, defund or abolish ICE have roared back to the fore in key Democratic primaries.Nowhere is that more true than in Minnesota, the epicenter of ICE’s current operations and the widespread protests against them.

Both of the Democrats vying to be the state’s next senator have sharp words for ICE, the Trump administration — and for each other: Progressive Minnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan is attacking moderate Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) for pulling a “politically expedient” about-face after taking “pro-Trump” immigration votes last year but now pushing to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. Craig was one of 46 House Democrats who crossed party lines two days after Trump’s inauguration to pass the Laken Riley Act, which allows for the detention of undocumented immigrants accused of certain crimes. She later voted for a resolution that expressed “gratitude” for ICE along with a condemnation of antisemitism after an attack on a pro-Israel demonstration in Colorado.

“There’s a through-line from that first vote to where we are today,” Flanagan said in an interview Friday. “And this Senate race is a fundamental question about whether we’re going to have a United States senator who sticks to their values and truths, or someone who votes with Republicans and Donald Trump when it’s politically expedient.”

Craig fired back, accusing Flanagan of “turning her Senate campaign into the focus right now, when she should be joining me to fight the Trump administration and the lawlessness of Kristi Noem,” while noting the Laken Riley Act is “ironically … being used to release people now.”

Those tensions are emerging as public support for Trump’s immigration crackdown dips precipitously.Just 38 percent of adults supported Trump’s handling of immigration in an Associated Press/NORC poll conducted after Good’s death, down from 49 percent last March. A survey from Democratic-aligned firm Navigator Research, also conducted after the shooting, showed 89 percent of Democrats, 62 percent of independents and a quarter of Republicans viewed ICE negatively. Most Democrats, 86 percent, and 60 percent of independents also felt ICE has been too aggressive, as did 31 percent of Republicans.

Congressional Democrats — including some more moderate members from swing districts — are now threatening to withhold necessary budget votes as they push for tougher rules for ICE agents and are signing onto progressives’ doomed Noem impeachment effort. They’re sensing they can put Republicans on defense as public opinion swings against Trump’s aggressive tactics, and as the president ratchets up tensions by threatening to invoke the Insurrection Act to send the military into Minnesota.

“Democrats have to take control of the House or the Senate and ensure that DHS doesn’t get any more than they’ve gotten, that they have actual guardrails, that there’s real reform,” said Rep. Greg Landsman (D-Ohio), who’s running inone of the most competitive seats in the country. “Like this broken economy and the high cost of living, they’re going to own this public safety disaster.”

But Democrats face a series of primaries that will test how far to the left their base — and some of their most progressive candidates — will push them on immigration after the nation’s rightward shift on enforcement fueled the party’s electoral wipeout in 2024.

From Michigan to Illinois to New Jersey, progressive candidates are renewing calls to “abolish ICE,” defying centrists who are warning Democrats to stay away from a phrase they believe was politically poisonous in 2024 and could be again in 2026. And they’re joining Flanagan in attacking their more moderate rivals who crossed party lines last year to back the Laken Riley Act and the resolution thanking ICE for “protecting the homeland.”

Their first test comes next month in the special primary election for New Jersey’s blue-leaning 11th District, where progressive Analilia Mejia has emerged as the most outspoken candidate in the crowded field in calling to abolish ICE. Mejia, who worked on Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-Vt.) 2020 presidential campaign, said her stance was influenced by “watching the escalation and unchecked violence that was just around the corner” last year when federal agents arrested one Democrat and charged another over a high-profile altercation at a detention center in Newark.

“You cannot bear witness to this overreach and this recklessness and not come away thinking all this has to stop,” Mejia said, adding that progressives are the “canary in the coal mine.”

In Illinois, the three Democrats running to succeed retiring Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) are in a race to show who can be the most vocal in confronting ICE. Rep. Robin Kelly (D-Ill.) introduced legislation last week calling for Noem’s impeachment, accusing her agency of abuses tied to ICE’s recent operations. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) quickly backed the bill and has separately called for increased congressional oversight of ICE and the Department of Homeland Security. “We must abolish Trump’s ICE. I will not support one more dollar for ICE as long as this agency—operating without oversight and accountability—continues to kill and injure our neighbors,” he told POLITICO in a statement. Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton called for ICE’s elimination. “New leadership or a smaller budget can’t change the fact ICE exists to terrorize communities,” she said in a statement to POLITICO. She’s also criticized Krishnamoorthi for backing the same resolution that praised ICE and that Flanagan has criticized Craig for in Minnesota. Like Craig, Krishnamoorthi has emphasized the resolution was mostly about condemning antisemitism.

ICE had already become a defining issue in the crowded Democratic primary for retiring Rep. Jan Schakowsky’s Chicago and north suburban seat, an earlier focus of immigration crackdowns.

Many of those candidates flocked to ICE’s Broadview detention center earlier this year to protest ICE detentions. Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss was tear gassed along with other protesters at the facility; social media influencer Kat Abughazaleh, one of his primary rivals, was thrown to the ground by an ICE agent and currently faces federal charges for conspiracy to impede or injure a federal officer and assaulting or impeding an officer. Biss has long called to abolish ICE, and has featured the issue prominently in campaign ads — including footage of him confronting Border Patrol Commander Greg Bovino.

At a Thursday candidate forum, Biss told a crowd of more than 200 that short of abolishing ICE, Congress should also consider “rolling back ICE funding,” while Abughazaleh declared that “abolishing ice is at the top of my priority list.” State Sen. Laura Fine, who has introduced legislation in Springfield aimed at preventing ICE agents hired under the Trump administration from serving as police officers in Illinois, praised Kelly’s impeachment effort while posting on social media that it’s time “to get rid of ICE completely.”

In battleground Michigan, where Democrats are engaged in a bruising primary for retiring Sen. Gary Peters’ seat, progressive candidate Abdul El-Sayed is renewing his longtime calls to abolish the agency he claims is “corrupted at its soul.” And he’s accusing his rivals, Rep. Haley Stevens and state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, of being mealy-mouthed on the issue, while knocking Stevens for backing the same resolution lauding ICE that has become a flashpoint in the Minnesota and Illinois Senate primaries. El-Sayed said in an interview that calling to abolish ICE is “not saying there is not a responsibility to secure our border and even to undergo certain kinds of immigration enforcement — but this ain’t it.”

Stevens hit back in a brief interview Thursday, saying Trump’s immigration tactics are “clearly an abuse of power. ICE is out of control, and we need to get answers and rein it in.” But as for abolishing the agency, she said, “I don’t believe that.” McMorrow, meanwhile, told POLITICO that Congress should use its budgetary powers to “reform the agency.”

These primary schisms reflect broader ideological fights playing out within the party over immigration. Progressive groups are calling on Congress to “defund ICE” over the Minnesota shooting. Centrists scarred by words like “abolish” and “defund” after Republicans successfully weaponized “defund the police” and ran hard on cracking down on illegal immigration in 2024 are warning the term will be equally “politically lethal” if applied elsewhere. Polls show Americans are split: An Economist/YouGov survey conducted after Good’s death found 46 percent support abolishing ICE while 43 percent oppose it.Republicans see opportunity in the infighting.

“The radical ‘Abolish ICE’ crusade from far-left Democrats seemed like a relic of the past, but it’s the brand new litmus test for Democrats who are barely hanging on and begging on their knees to get approval from their socialist base,” National Republican Congressional Committee spokesperson Mike Marinella said in a statement to POLITICO. “The full embrace of their deeply unpopular, lunatic policies exposes the brain rot that has taken over the Democrat Party.”

In some of the most competitive races this year, candidates are keeping their distance from the rallying cry. Brian Varela, who is running in the crowded Democratic primary to take on Rep. Tom Kean Jr. (R-N.J.), has frequently joined protests against a potential immigration detention facility in the district. But he won’t go as far as advocating for abolishing ICE, saying that “it’s not what people want.”“That is the very last thing that the Democratic Party needs to do right now,” Varela said. “The truth is we need to reduce ICE, we need to train ICE, we need to roll back all ICE investment. If Democrats start messaging to abolish ICE, we’re going to have a very tough time in November.”

an 20 (Reuters) – Thousands of U.S. workers and students marched through cities and university campuses on Tuesday in opposition to the immigration policies of President Donald Trump.
On the first anniversary of Trump’s second term, protests sprang up across the country against his aggressive immigration crackdown that prompted outrage after federal agents dragged a U.S. citizen from her car and shot dead 37-year-old mother Renee Good in Minneapolis in past weeks. Hundreds of protesters gathered in Washington and smaller cities like Asheville, North Carolina, where demonstrators marched through the downtown shouting “No ICE, no KKK, no fascist USA,” according to online videos.The Trump administration says it has a mandate from voters to deport millions of immigrants in the country illegally. Recent polls show most Americans disapprove of the use of force by officers with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies.University students demonstrated in Cleveland, Ohio, chanting “No hate, no fear, refugees are welcome here” while high schoolers in Santa Fe, New Mexico, left class to attend a “Stop ICE Terror” rally at the state capitol, according to protest organizers and school officials.
The actions were organized by left-leaning groups such as Indivisible and 50501, as well as labor unions and grassroots organizations opposed to immigrant detention camps, like one in El Paso, Texas, where three detainees have died in the last six weeks, according to federal authorities.The demonstrations were set to roll west to cities such as San Francisco and Seattle, where afternoon and evening protests were planned.

Federal prosecutors issued subpoenas on Tuesday to at least five Democratic officials in Minnesota, ramping up the Justice Department’s investigation into their response to the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown in the state, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The subpoenas sought documents from Gov. Tim Walz, Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis and Mayor Kaohly Her of St. Paul related to their policies on immigration enforcement efforts in the state. Two Minnesota prosecutors, Keith Ellison, the state attorney general, and Mary Moriarty, the Hennepin County attorney, were also sent similar subpoenas.

The subpoenas, all of which were formally served on the officials’ offices, represent a significant expansion of the inquiry into Minnesota leaders that was disclosed late Friday. The investigation was initially said to have focused on Mr. Frey and Mr. Walz, who have both criticized the crackdown. But it now appears that prosecutors will also scrutinize other public officials, including Mr. Ellison and Ms. Moriarty, who could open their own inquiries into the fatal shooting in Minneapolis this month of a 37-year-old woman, Renee Good, by a federal immigration agent.While the subpoenas did not cite a specific criminal statute, the inquiry as a whole was said to center on whether elected officials in Minnesota had conspired to impede the thousands of federal agents who have been in the state since last month looking for undocumented immigrants. But the investigation is likely to run up against stiff pushback for examining political speech and conduct that is traditionally protected by the First Amendment.
The shooting of Ms. Good, an unarmed mother of three, has led to sustained protests against federal agents in Minneapolis. In the immediate aftermath of Ms. Good’s death, Mr. Frey used an expletive to demand that agents leave the city. Mr. Walz has also sharply criticized the agents’ conduct, asking residents to monitor their efforts.

Justice Department leaders, in turn, have vowed to arrest anyone impeding the agents’ mission. Todd Blanche, the deputy attorney general, recently accused Mr. Frey and Mr. Walz of “encouraging violence against law enforcement” and referred to their actions as “terrorism.” But there is no evidence that either man has incited violence — let alone engaged in acts of terrorism.

The investigation into the elected Democrats comes as the Justice Department has all but announced that it will not bring charges against Jonathan Ross, the agent who killed Ms. Good. Instead, the department has signaled that it intends to scrutinize possible connections between Ms. Good and her partner, Becca Good, and left-wing protesters in Minnesota.

That decision led to the resignation last week of six prosecutors in the U.S. attorney’s office in Minneapolis. Among those who quit was Joseph H. Thompson, the office’s second in command, who oversaw a sprawling fraud investigation that President Trump and his allies have repeatedly used to criticize Democratic leaders in the state.
Federal investigators have refused to cooperate with state and local officials like Mr. Ellison and Ms. Moriarty, who have the power to open their own inquiries into Ms. Good’s killing. But the subpoenas they received could further complicate their efforts.

In recent days, the Trump administration has started enlisting prosecutors and agents from other states to travel to Minnesota to assist in pursuing criminal cases against protesters they claim have impeded the activities of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. Over the weekend, Attorney General Pam Bondi pressed U.S. attorneys in Midwestern states to provide personnel.

Ten federal prosecutors from Michigan have been assigned to work in Minnesota for the time being, according to people familiar with the matter. Additional prosecutors are expected to arrive in the coming weeks. Administration officials have repeatedly said that ICE agents have been under sustained assault from protesters. But prosecutors have only filed a handful of criminal cases related to the protests since Ms. Good was killed.

The Justice Department needs additional personnel in part because so many senior prosecutors left the Minneapolis office rather than follow orders from the department’s leaders to conduct a criminal investigation into Ms. Good. The office already faced a significant staff shortage because many prosecutors had left last year as the Trump administration offered buyouts and encouraged prosecutors to quit.

To try to address the shortage, Justice Department leaders plan to draw staff from six states: Michigan, South Dakota, North Dakota, Iowa, Nebraska and Wisconsin, according to people familiar with the matter and internal department communications.

The Trump administration has also vowed to thoroughly investigate social services fraud in Minneapolis after a yearslong series of prosecutions that have recently caught the attention of Republicans.

Senior Justice Department officials have pushed for federal prosecutors and agents to investigate whether any of the people engaged in such fraud made suspicious campaign donations to Minnesota politicians.

To assist in those efforts, Justice Department officials have also been working on plans to send auditors from the Defense Department to Minnesota, according to a person familiar with the discussions.

Minnesota doctors say immigration crackdown is forcing patients to hide, endangering lives

Diabetics rationing insulin. Jaundiced babies missing appointments. Appendicitis festering untreated for days. Expectant mothers laboring in hiding.

These were just some of the anecdotes shared by five Minnesota physicians Tuesday at a hastily scheduled Capitol press conference on the health care impacts of the federal law enforcement surge across the state.

They were flanked by Democratic-Farmer-Labor Sens. Alice Mann and Matt Klein, both physicians. The group evoked a climate of fear keeping patients and their loved ones out of Minnesota clinics and hospitals.

“The only other time in history I can remember having a group of physicians standing in front of you (like this) was during COVID…this is a moment of crisis in our state,” Mann said to an audience of several dozen press, legislative staff and medical workers.

The gathering came after the U.S. Department of Homeland Security recently subpoenaed Hennepin Healthcare for the I-9 forms it uses to confirm its workers’ identities and employment eligibility. Those forms include workers’ home addresses, Social Security numbers and other sensitive personal information.

Hennepin Healthcare operates Hennepin County Medical Center, a major safety net hospital in downtown Minneapolis that serves a relatively high proportion of uninsured and underinsured patients. Earlier this month, elected officials and HCMC staff called on hospital administrators to do more to protect patients after reports emerged that federal agents stood watch by a shackled detainee’s bedside and prevented family members from visiting him for more than a day over the New Year holiday.

Another detainee, Alberto Castaneda Mondragon, reportedly remains hospitalized at HCMC under U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement supervision after sustaining a “catastrophic” and “life-threatening” head injury in the hours after his Jan. 8 arrest, according to a lawsuit reviewed by Sahan Journal. It’s unclear exactly how the injury occurred, but the lawsuit alleges Castaneda Mondragon told hospital staff that he was roughed up by federal agents.

In a statement about the New Year detention, HCMC said “any federal agents arriving with a patient presented appropriate identification, adhered to our established processes, and left after (hospital security) asked for documentation to support their continued presence.”

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not respond to an email seeking comment.

The doctors assembled at the Capitol on Tuesday made clear that those assurances don’t go far enough.

Klein, a former Hennepin Healthcare physician running for U.S. Congress in Minnesota’s 2nd District, said he’d cared for “numerous patients” at HCMC in the midst of “formal interactions with the law…but I’ve never heard a concern over 35 years of practice that patients’ rights were violated.”

Klein tied what he said were federal agents’ disregard for patient privacy and well-being with the killing earlier this month of Renee Nicole Good, a U.S. citizen and mother of three. According to media and witness reports, agents rebuffed a physician who arrived at the scene shortly after ICE agent Jonathan Ross shot Good at least three times.

Klein said Good still had a pulse “eight minutes” after the shooting.

“I can’t say how much that stirs the blood of those behind me…and I believe it stirs the blood of every patriotic Minnesotan,” he said.

One by one, working physicians stepped up to the mic to describe the toll of a federal immigration and “anti-fraud” operation that has mushroomed into something more. Gov. Tim Walz last week described the roughly 3,000-agent force as an “occupation.”

Erin Stevens, chair of the legislative committee for the Minnesota chapter of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, said ICE agents have waited in vehicles outside hospitals, routinely entered medical buildings and even followed patients into emergency rooms.

Fewer patients are presenting at metro-area labor and delivery triage units amid a spike in requests for home births among patients who had previously intended to deliver in hospital and for whom home birth “is not a safe option,” Stevens added.

Janna Gewirtz O’Brien, a member of the executive board of the Minnesota chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said trauma stemming from “violence and the threat of family separation” could affect her young patients for many years to come.

In the here and now, new mothers are laying low and deferring checkups for their babies as they weigh the benefits of health care against the risk of indefinite detention, Gewirtz O’Brien said.

Families that feel safe enough to venture outdoors face health risks through no fault of their own, Gewirtz O’Brien added, noting the apparently incidental tear-gassing of a family vehicle in north Minneapolis during a chaotic ICE operation last week. A six-month-old riding in the vehicle was admitted to a nearby hospital with breathing problems.

“Chemical weapons have no place in our neighborhoods or schools. They can have life-threatening effects on children,” she said. “It’s only a matter of time before a child dies.”

Three top Minnesota police officials on Tuesday criticized the tactics that federal agents have used during their immigration crackdown and described a region where residents, including those with legal status, were scared to venture outside.

Two of the officials said they knew of United States citizens, including a police officer and city workers, who had been stopped and questioned by immigration agents. And they expressed concern that the Trump administration’s surge of some 3,000 federal agents to Minnesota was undermining residents’ trust in law enforcement and disrupting daily life.

“Can we find a way to make sure that we can do these things without scaring the hell out of our community members and freaking everyone out?” Chief Axel Henry of the St. Paul Police Department asked at a news conference on Tuesday. He added that many people in his city “are scared to death” and “afraid to go outside.”

Federal officials responded by criticizing state and local politicians and defending agents’ actions.
“Our operations are lawful. They’re targeted and they’re focused on individuals who pose a serious threat to this community,” Gregory Bovino, a senior Border Patrol official, said in a separate news conference in the Minneapolis area.

The local officials’ news conference, which also included Sheriff Dawanna S. Witt of Hennepin County and Chief Mark Bruley of the Brooklyn Park police, revealed the escalating tensions between federal officials and Minnesota law enforcement leaders.

The Department of Homeland Security has repeatedly criticized state and local policies that limit coordination with immigration agents. On Tuesday, the Justice Department issued subpoenas to the offices of at least five Democratic officials in Minnesota — including Gov. Tim Walz, Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis and Mayor Kaohly Her of St. Paul — related to their policies on immigration enforcement efforts in the state, according to two people familiar with the matter. Mr. Walz dismissed the investigation in a statement as a “partisan distraction.”

“Minnesotans are more concerned with safety and peace than baseless legal tactics aimed at intimidating public servants standing shoulder to shoulder with their community,” the governor said in a statement.
Elected leaders in Minnesota have repeatedly called on Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to leave the state, and a lawsuit filed by the state and the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul claims that the surge is unconstitutional.

The Trump administration has defended its work in Minnesota as necessary to crack down on illegal immigration and root out fraud in state social service programs. In a court filing on Monday, the administration said that more than 3,000 people who were in the country illegally had been arrested during the campaign. Many of those people, federal officials said, had been convicted of serious crimes.

Mr. Bovino described a highly organized opposition to federal agents in Minnesota, beyond what he had seen in other places, that had made it challenging to carry out their work. Responding to local officials’ criticism of federal tactics, Mr. Bovino said that “those tactics are born of necessity” and that “what we do is legal, ethical and moral.”

But in their news conference, the local police officials criticized what they described as a heavy-handed federal approach.
“We demand more from our federal government — more professionalism, more accountability, more humanity,” said Sheriff Witt, who said she was especially concerned about claims of racial profiling by federal agents. “We demand lawful policing that respects human dignity.”
The dueling news conferences in Minnesota came on the first anniversary of President Trump’s second term. As the administration celebrated the changes that year has brought to the country, protesters gathered in several cities — including Houston, New York City, Oklahoma City and Washington — to voice their opposition to Mr. Trump’s agenda.

MINNEAPOLIS — As confrontations with federal officers over their massive immigration enforcement operation in Minnesota showed no signs of stopping Wednesday, legal battles over the surge and the local response were also intensifying.

Federal prosecutors served grand jury subpoenas Tuesday to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz’s office and five other officials in the state as part of an investigation into whether they obstructed or impeded law enforcement during a sweeping immigration operation in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, a person familiar with the matter said.

The subpoenas, which seek records, were also sent to the offices of Attorney General Keith Ellison, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her and officials in Ramsey and Hennepin counties, the person said.

The person was not authorized to publicly discuss an ongoing investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

The subpoenas came a day after the government urged a judge to reject efforts to stop the immigration enforcement surge that has roiled Minneapolis and St. Paul for weeks.
The Justice Department called the state’s lawsuit, filed soon after the fatal shooting of Renee Good by an immigration officer, “legally frivolous.” Ellison has said the government is violating free speech and other constitutional rights.

Vice President JD Vance, meanwhile, is expected to travel to Minneapolis on Thursday for a roundtable with local leaders and community members, according to sources familiar with his plans who spoke on condition on anonymity because the trip had not yet been officially announced.

The subpoenas are related to an investigation into whether Minnesota officials obstructed federal immigration enforcement through public statements they made, two people familiar with the matter said Friday. They said then that it was focused on the potential violation of a conspiracy statute.

In a subpoena released by Frey’s office, the long list of documents required include “any records tending to show a refusal to come to the aid of immigration officials.”
Frey said: “We shouldn’t have to live in a country where people fear that federal law enforcement will be used to play politics or crack down on local voices they disagree with.”
The governor’s office referred reporters to a statement earlier Tuesday in which Walz said the Trump administration was not seeking justice, only creating distractions.
Greg Bovino of U.S. Border Patrol, who has commanded the Trump administration’s big-city immigration crackdown, said more than 10,000 people in the U.S. illegally have been arrested in Minnesota in the past year, including 3,000 “of some of the most dangerous offenders” in the last six weeks during Operation Metro Surge.

Julia Decker, policy director at the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota, expressed frustration that advocates have no way of knowing whether the government’s arrest numbers and descriptions of the people in custody are accurate.

Good, 37, was killed on Jan. 7 as she was moving her vehicle, which had been blocking a Minneapolis street where ICE officers were operating. Trump administration officials say the officer, Jonathan Ross, shot her in self-defense, although videos of the encounter show the Honda Pilot slowly turning away from him.

Since then, the public has repeatedly confronted officers, blowing whistles and yelling insults at ICE and Border Patrol. They, in turn, have used tear gas and chemical irritants against protesters. Bystanders have recorded video of officers using a battering ram to get into a house as well as smashing vehicle windows and dragging people out of cars.
Bovino defended his “troops” and said their actions are “legal, ethical and moral.”

A Minnesota church targeted by an anti-ICE protest Sunday decried it as unlawful, while one of the protest leaders called for the resignation of a church leader who works at a local ICE office. About three dozen people entered Cities Church in St. Paul, some walking right up to the pulpit.

“Invading a church service to disrupt the worship of Jesus — or any other act of worship — is protected by neither the Christian Scriptures nor the laws of this nation,” Cities Church in St. Paul said Tuesday in a statement shared by its pastor, Jonathan Parnell.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem described the protesters as “agitators” in a post on X and said, “arrests coming.”

Nekima Levy Armstrong, a lawyer and local activist, called for another pastor who works at ICE to resign from the church, saying his dual role poses a “fundamental moral conflict.” ___

Mayor Brett P. Smiley today signed Executive Order 2026-1, Prohibiting the Use of City Property for Civil Immigration Enforcement Activities, prohibiting the use of City-owned property for civil immigration enforcement activities, including as a staging area, processing location or operations base. The order reaffirms Providence’s commitment to being a safe and welcoming city for all neighbors of all immigration status, prioritizing the safety of all neighbors, providing essential city services and protecting the well-being of Providence communities.

“The federal actions we are seeing across the nation are threatening immigrant communities and causing fear and uncertainty for all of our neighbors,” said Mayor Brett Smiley. “My administration remains committed to ensuring Providence is safe and welcoming for every neighbor, regardless of immigration status. With this executive order, we are making clear that City property will be used to serve our community, not to carry out civil immigration enforcement. Providence’s strength comes from our diverse immigrant communities, and we will continue to do everything we can to protect families and maintain trust across our neighborhoods.”

The executive order affirms that the Providence Police Department will not, and should not, act as immigration officers and does not ask individuals about their immigration status, and that City departments will not proactively collaborate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
The executive order directs City departments to identify relevant City properties, install clear signage prohibiting civil immigration enforcement activities, and makes signage templates available for private landowners and leaseholders to identify non-public areas of their property where civil immigration enforcement activities are prohibited.

This order does not restrict or interfere with the enforcement of criminal law or lawful federal activity unrelated to staging, debriefing, processing or operations for federal civil immigration enforcement on City-owned property.

Stewart Verdery, a former assistant secretary of policy and planning at the Department of Homeland Security, is executive director of the Global Recreation, Events and Tourism USA Coalition.

The United States is on the cusp of a once-in-a-generation opportunity, hosting the world’s most beloved and watched sporting events: this year’s World Cup, the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles and the 2034 Winter Games in Salt Lake City. For nearly a decade, the global spotlight will be on America and will attract millions of spectators to U.S. soil.
That moment will succeed only if the United States is seen not just as a great place to compete, but as a safe, welcoming place to visit. Unfortunately, a newly proposed Department of Homeland Security rule risks undermining that goal and could deter millions of qualified visitors without meaningfully improving security.
The rule would dramatically expand the personal and social media information required of travelers from America’s closest security partners. The policy risks chilling travel, generating negative headlines abroad and leaving stadium seats empty.
Travelers from 42 countries currently visit the U.S. visa-free for up to 90 days under the visa waiver program. These countries, which include such close allies as Britain, Japan and Australia, already meet stringent security standards, including sharing information with U.S. law enforcement, issuing passports secured with electronic chips, allowing air marshals on certain international flights and providing access to travelers’ criminal records. Roughly 19 million visitors use the program annually, with an almost flawless compliance record.

Under the new proposal, visa waiver travelers would have to submit additional information “when feasible” such as phone numbers and addresses for themselves and family members. More concerning, they would be required to provide a history of their “social media from the last 5 years.”
Press accounts in the U.S. and overseas have warned this program would enable DHS to screen individuals’ social media posts, perhaps with artificial intelligence tools, for content deemed anti-American or suggestive of “bad intentions.” This is a task even the largest technology companies have not mastered. Meta and TikTok have spent billions trying to distinguish harmful content from benign speech, satire or news engagement, often with inconsistent results. A “like” on a news story about U.S. military engagement in Venezuela could indicate support for or opposition to the action itself, or merely bookmarking. Satire and humor are even harder to parse. And genuine bad actors can easily create fake or scrubbed accounts.
It’s true that all visa applicants already submit considerable information to the State Department. But those applications are reviewed over weeks or months by trained consular officers, with escalation to law enforcement when needed. Immigrants coming from countries not considered close security partners and seeking longer visits, employment or even permanent residence understandably receive even deeper scrutiny.

The visa waiver program is different by design. It requires travelers to submit a form via the Electronic System for Travel Authorization in order to conduct a rapid pretravel check of watch lists. That system is not designed to perform a political litmus test.
If DHS plans to review applicants’ social media use, much more detail must be provided as to how decisions on the content would be made, reviewed or appealed, how a trained workforce would be capable of conducting meaningful analysis on the scale of millions of visitors expected for the World Cup and subsequent events, and what specific national security risk justifies such a drastic measure. Just as Americans would bristle at foreign governments policing their online criticism, do we really want to tell a soccer fan they’re unwelcome because they criticized President Donald Trump, or any future president, online?

There’s also a reciprocal risk. As Europe and other regions continue updating their own entry systems, U.S. travelers could soon face similar scrutiny abroad.
It may be that the new requirements would be less about reviewing social media content and more about having applicants’ account names on file so law enforcement has additional information at its disposal. If DHS contemplates this more limited approach, the agency should clarify its intent before the Feb. 9 deadline for public comment.
At a White House task force meeting last May, Trump called the 2026 World Cup “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to showcase the beauty and greatness of America,” adding, “We can’t wait to welcome soccer fans from all over the globe.”

An alliance of travel, business and sports leaders has created the Global Recreation, Events and Tourism USA Coalition to support U.S. plans for the World Cup and Olympic competitions, and we welcome the president’s enthusiasm. But implementation of the proposed DHS rule would have a negative effect on his efforts.
Counterterrorism is about finding needles in the haystack, not shrinking the haystack. With millions of fans preparing to visit global events and contribute to record spending in the U.S., we want that haystack to be as large as possible. We urge the administration to work with travel, technology and other industries to ensure any new requirements deliver real security benefits while maximizing lawful visitation.

This year and into the future, our stadiums should be both safe — and full.

Protesters who want to speak out about the fatal shooting of Renee Good face a barrage of conflicting directives from authorities.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz has encouraged protesters to record federal immigration authorities: “Help us establish a record of exactly what’s happening in our communities,” Walz said in a televised appeal to Minnesotans.

But the Trump administration has framed groups that monitor and track ICE as improperly keeping the agency from completing immigration removals.

Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin has said posting photos and videos of ICE agents online is “doxxing” and threatened to “prosecute those who illegally harass ICE agents to the fullest extent of the law.”

“Gov. Walz is encouraging obstruction to federal law enforcement, which is a federal crime and felony,” McLaughlin told USA TODAY. “He is putting his own constituents in potentially dangerous and criminal situations.”

And Republican Minnesota state Rep. Harry Niska slammed Walz, saying the governor “has fueled fear and anger by falsely claiming Minnesota is ‘at war’ with the federal government, ‘under attack’ by ICE, and by smearing federal agents as the ‘modern-day Gestapo.’”

Officers have deployed gas and rubber bullets in tense clashes that have left demonstrators in “a very difficult position,” Vanessa Cárdenas, executive director of America’s Voice, an immigration reform group, told USA TODAY.

“Americans from all walks of life are kind of walking, navigating this moment, trying to just really express their rejection to what we’re seeing play out in our communities and also trying to be safe,” Cárdenas said. “But point being is like, no one’s safe, right?”

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Walz have called for calm, with Walz appealing directly to Trump and asking to “turn the temperature down.”

“We can − we must − speak out loudly, urgently, but also peacefully,” he said in a statement to Minnesotans. “We cannot fan the flames of chaos. That’s what he wants.”

Do protesters have a right to film federal agents?
Americans have a First Amendment right to observe and record law enforcement, including ICE, while they are doing their jobs publicly, according to several First Amendment organizations.

But there are also clear legal limits.

“You can’t stop federal officers from doing their lawful duties, and it’s truly not up to individual neighbors to decide whether what ICE is doing is lawful,” said Josh Blackman, a constitutional law professor at the South Texas College of Law in Houston. “In other words, unless there’s a court order saying ‘ICE get out of Minnesota’ or ‘get out of Minneapolis,’ they’re allowed to be there. They’re allowed to enforce federal law.”

Filming law enforcement officers has become more commonplace with the rise of smartphones and after a bystander recorded the murder of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis in 2020.

Minneapolis City Council President Elliott Payne, who himself was shoved by an officer while monitoring ICE operations, has also urged people to join Defend the 612, which helps connect people in the Minneapolis area code with the hundreds of small neighborhood groups involved in rapid response, school protection patrols and community aid planning.

‘No one can guarantee’ protests will be peaceful
Cárdenas, of America’s Voice, said local organizers and leaders have repeatedly stressed that protests need to be peaceful and demonstrators should not intervene, but violence is not entirely preventable.

“It’s also a reality that sometimes that happens because you have different circumstances and you might have some bad actors that are embedded into this protest,” she said. “No one can guarantee that violence is not going to happen.”

That’s in part because there is no centralized group running the protests that can appeal to protesters to stay nonviolent, said Sidney Tarrow, an emeritus professor of political science at Cornell University who studies social movements.

The mass protests across the country in 2025 were organized by a coalition of large national left-leaning groups, such as Indivisible, but were implemented and held by local activists. Those protests, which were held in thousands of cities and involved millions of people, remained nearly violence-free.

No such group is playing a role in these protests. ICE Watch, which the Trump administration has repeatedly blamed as the mastermind, is a training program that teaches best practices of how to protest ICE without interfering in the arrests. Not everyone protesting has had the training.

In Minneapolis, protests have started from loosely organized Facebook groups and Signal chats sharing where ICE agents are and what vehicles they are driving. But like in other major cities across the country, there isn’t a cadre of people in charge directing the actions.

Tarrow said it’s remarkable that the demonstrations have remained as peaceful as they have for so long.

“Normally one would expect there to be sporadic, scattered outbreaks of violence from people who see themselves as part of the movement and are so outraged by the behavior of the government that they cannot hold themselves back from engaging in violence,” he said. “There’s also the very strong possibility that the violent behavior of some of the ICE agents will trigger violence or will be interpreted as violence on the part of the protesters. So far, we haven’t seen that.”

MINNEAPOLIS — Donald Trump won the presidency in 2024 in part by promising to end border crossings and deport criminals. A year into his second term, as immigration agents and protesters skirmish in the streets of the Twin Cities, public sentiment on immigration enforcement appears to be shifting sharply, according to recent polls.

Majorities of voters believe an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent was not justified in shooting a Minneapolis woman, disapprove of ICE’s work and think the agency is making cities less safe, polls show. Trump has been undeterred — his administration flooded Minneapolis with more agents after the shooting, and the president threatened last week to invoke the Insurrection Act.

The clash over ICE comes as Trump and other Republicans fret that their party could lose their narrow control of the House this fall. ICE’s aggressive operations have turned off much of the public and could create a new political liability for the GOP.

Aidan Perzana, 31, opposed the surge of ICE agents into his city last month. He bristled, he said, at the militarized styling of the agents, who drive unmarked vehicles, carry firearms and dress in fatigues, tactical vests and masks. Earlier this month, Perzana watched in horror out his window as an ICE agent shot and killed Renée Good in her vehicle just outside his house.

“I wasn’t expecting it to happen right in front of me, but I’m not surprised it happened,” he said.

The shooting cemented his opposition to ICE, said Perzana, a data engineer for the state who described himself as being on the left. “It doesn’t seem to me like they’re operating sort of within the legal framework that we have set up,” he said.

A poll by CNN found 56 percent of adults did not consider the shooting an appropriate use of force, including 51 percent who said it reflected broader problems with ICE’s operations.

Similarly, a Quinnipiac University poll found 53 percent of registered voters believed the shooting was unjustified and 35 percent believed it was justified. Fifty-seven percent disapproved of the way ICE was enforcing immigration laws.

In an Economist/YouGov survey, 50 percent of U.S. citizens said the shooting was unjustified and 30 percent said it was justified. Far more respondents, 47 percent, said ICE made Americans less safe than the 34 percent who said the agency made Americans safer.

And a CBS News poll found that 61 percent of Americans believe ICE’s operations are too tough when stopping and detaining people. The same poll also found that a growing number of Americans — 56 percent — are more likely to say that the Trump administration is not prioritizing the detention and deportation of dangerous criminals but instead is trying to deport more people than they thought it would, regardless of those people’s criminal backgrounds.

Even before the shooting, the public had a negative impression of ICE and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem.

“We’ve seen a slow dripping downward of confidence in ICE [and] the person running it, and then Minneapolis happens,” said Tim Malloy, a polling analyst with Quinnipiac.

Trump has stuck to his strategy. The administration in December launched Operation Metro Surge, sending ICE agents to the Twin Cities in response to investigations into fraud in public benefit programs in the state. Noem sent more agents to the state after Good’s shooting, and Trump on Thursday said if state officials don’t quash protests, he will invoke the Insurrection Act to “quickly put an end to the travesty that is taking place” in Minnesota.

On Sunday, Noem told CBS News’s “Face the Nation” that the operation in Minneapolis has no end date.

“We won’t stop until we are sure that all the dangerous people are picked up, brought to justice and then deported back to their home countries,” she said.

Also on Sunday, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey (D) told CNN’s “State of the Union” that his city is “invaded, under siege.” A lot of people, he said, are “afraid to go outside” as 3,000 ICE and Border Patrol agents outnumber the 600 local police officers.

“We will not counter Donald Trump’s chaos with our own brand of chaos,” Frey said of his messaging asking residents to continue peacefully protesting amid Pentagon plans to possibly deploy 1,500 active-duty troops to the city. “I never thought in a million years that we would be invaded by our own federal government.”

Minneapolis has been rocked by protests since Good was killed, including a Saturday march against immigrants, promoted by Jake Lang, who was charged with assaulting officers at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Trump pardoned Lang last year along with others accused of participating in the pro-Trump riot.

White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson in a statement said ICE officers are facing more assaults “because of dangerous, untrue smears from elected Democrats.”

“The President campaigned on and won an election based on his promise to carry out the largest mass deportation operation in history — he’s keeping his promise and the American people are appreciative,” she said.

ICE acting director Todd M. Lyons told Fox News’s “Sunday Morning Futures” that “it’s horrible the fact that people say ICE is targeting U.S. citizens.”

“That’s not the case,” Lyons said. “We have to send more officers and agents just to protect the men and women trying to do their regular, lawful law enforcement mission.”

Videos of Good’s shooting went viral, and large majorities of voters — 82 percent in the Quinnipiac survey — told pollsters they had seen it.

“While you had this initial kind of debate between Republicans and Democrats over framing the issue, people saw it for themselves and made their judgments,” said Carroll Doherty, the former director of political research at the nonpartisan Pew Research Center. “By 20 to 30 points, they either said it was not appropriate or unjustified, and so it was pretty one-sided.”

The public has supported strong border security and deporting criminals, according to polls, but immigration has become less of a concern for voters as the Trump administration has sharply limited border crossings. At the same time, Doherty said, there has been a “slow-building backlash against some of the tactics of the immigration crackdown.”

Views on ICE are deeply polarized, with large majorities of Republicans supporting the agency and large majorities of Democrats opposing it. A similar discrepancy shows up over whether the shooting was justified.

Independent voters have sided with Democrats, tipping the overall numbers that show majorities opposing ICE and believing the use of force against Good was inappropriate.

“We’re really, really polarized on this,” said Charles Franklin, the polling director for Marquette University Law School. “That means that ICE’s approval, in one sense, won’t sink much further.”

Unclear is whether Democrats can capitalize on the public’s disapproval of ICE in the midterm elections. The economy, not immigration, is the most important issue, according to polls of voters.

Immigration and ICE create political conundrums for both sides, pollsters said. Republicans support ICE and the president but are less concerned about the issue now that border crossings are down.

While Democrats can leverage opposition to ICE, they run the risk of getting pulled into debates over President Joe Biden’s unpopular handling of the border and “abolish ICE” debates that have divided the party and turned off some centrist voters.

The Economist/YouGov poll found Americans closely divided on abolishing ICE, with 46 percent in favor and 43 percent opposed.

The recent polling has emboldened a growing number of Democrats to more directly condemn ICE, point to the billions of dollars given to the agency under Trump’s sweeping tax and budget bill passed last year and call for a curb on the agency’s power. Until the shooting in Minneapolis, leading Democrats had been hesitant to talk about immigration, even as Trump’s crackdown intensified.

Democrats in 2020 called for a more compassionate approach toward immigration in response to Trump’s first term, but many felt Democrats lost in 2024 in large part because of Biden’s failure to stem a surge of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border. The party has since failed to coalesce around an alternate immigration plan, hindering its ability to push back on Trump.

Democratic leaders have largely wanted to focus on health care and the cost of living in their effort to win back the House and have urged their candidates and officeholders to avoid being distracted by other issues. But party leaders have recently urged members to lean in to what they view as ICE’s overreach, noting the recent shift in public sentiment.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D) has become more forceful in his condemnations of ICE over the past two weeks and called for changes, including barring agents from wearing masks, requiring them to wear body cameras and ensuring they do not have absolute legal immunity.

“Every single one of these people who we see brutalizing the American people, they’re going to be held accountable, one way or the other, in accordance with the law,” Jeffries said last week.

Republican political strategists are happy to see a renewed debate over abolishing ICE. Republicans are focusing on border security while Democrats “embrace radical policies that are electoral poison,” said a statement from Mike Marinella, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.

“The radical ‘Abolish ICE’ crusade from far-left Democrats seemed like a relic of the past, but it’s the brand new litmus test for desperate Democrats to get approval from their radical base,” he said.

But some Republicans have acknowledged that images of ICE violently arresting people in Minneapolis may not play well with the public.

“The optics are — let’s be honest — not good,” said Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), when asked by ABC News about video of officers dragging a disabled woman out of her car and slamming her to the ground during an arrest.

In November 2002, President George W. Bush signed a bill creating a federal agency devoted to protecting the United States. The country was still reeling from the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington, and the threat of international terrorism permeated public life.

Among the agencies that would be included in the Department of Homeland Security, as it would be called, would be Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection — the parts of the government most responsible for enforcing federal immigration laws.

“The new department will analyze threats, will guard our borders and airports, protect our critical infrastructure, and coordinate the response of our nation for future emergencies,” Mr. Bush said at the time, adding that the department would “focus the full resources of the American government on the safety of the American people.”

But more than two decades later, as thousands of ICE and Border Patrol officers flood Minneapolis, some Democratic leaders say the department’s role appears to have strayed far from its original purpose, turning its tools of enforcement away from external threats and toward President Trump’s domestic critics.

They say enforcement has looked more like an occupation, as officers in helmets and tactical gear have faced off against hostile residents and left-wing protesters in Los Angeles, Portland, Chicago and Washington. The interactions, broadcast to the world through social media videos filmed by protesters and federal agents alike, have given the impression of a government at war with the country’s own cities.

The Department of Homeland Security “was designed to protect Americans from threats, and what we’ve essentially done is, in some cases, we’ve turned that agency on Americans,” said Mayor Keith Wilson of Portland, Ore., a Democrat. “It’s deeply unsettling.”

Mr. Wilson said he was concerned that federal immigration enforcement activities could lead to a shooting like the one in Minneapolis that took the life of Renee Good, a 37-year-old protester fatally shot by an ICE officer. Hours after his comments, Border Patrol agents shot two Venezuelan nationals who had rammed their vehicle, the department said. The Venezuelans survived their injuries, and one was charged in connection with the incident.

More than two decades after its formation, the Department of Homeland Security is the government’s largest law enforcement agency, with around 250,000 employees. It includes many functions that are not directly part of the turmoil on the ground, such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the agency that oversees airport security.

Yet even those agencies have come under pressure to meet Mr. Trump’s political objectives, with the airport security agency providing information to immigration agents and Mr. Trump trying to redirect disaster funding away from states not cooperating with his deportation goals.

ICE’s budget increased dramatically because of the sweeping domestic policy bill the president signed into law last July, making it the highest funded law enforcement agency in the federal government.

Under Mr. Trump, the department also redirected thousands of agents from their normal duties to focus on arresting undocumented immigrants, a New York Times investigation found last year.

The Trump administration and officials in some of the targeted cities have used militaristic language to describe the conflict unfolding on the ground.

A lawsuit filed this week by Minnesota described the recent deployment of thousands of immigration agents and officers as “a federal invasion of the Twin Cities.”

“I see it as a personal militarized police force for the president to do his bidding against people who don’t see the world through the lens of the ultra rich,” said Mayor Brandon Johnson of Chicago, a Democrat.

Mr. Trump has recently raised the possibility of invoking the Insurrection Act, which would allow him to deploy the military to suppress rebellions and enforce federal laws. On Tuesday, he said on social media that Minnesotans should expect more action in their state, and that the “DAY OF RECKONING & RETRIBUTION IS COMING.”

Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, has called Chicago a “war zone,” and said the agency had made parts of the city “much more free.” In recent weeks, the department has described Minnesota as a place where there was “rampant fraud and criminality happening.”

“We would love to have the cooperation of these politicians to remove the worst of the worst from their cities,” Tricia McLaughlin, a Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman, said in a statement. “Instead, they refuse to protect their own citizens and let these criminals roam free on their streets.”

It is a starkly different environment than the one in which the department was created.

In the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, there was a bipartisan consensus that the United States needed to do more to fend off terrorist threats and protect its citizens. The Department of Homeland Security was created the following year, when Mr. Bush signed the Homeland Security Act of 2002.

Mr. Bush at the time said that the United States would be better equipped to “reduce our vulnerability and, most important, prevent the terrorists from taking innocent American lives.”

Building the agency was a big task, with all or portions of 22 federal agencies, including the Coast Guard and what was then the Immigration and Naturalization Service, to be folded into a single department. Some politicians in Washington initially resisted the creation of a new cabinet-level agency, including Mr. Bush.

Supporters of the department’s stepped-up role on immigration enforcement this year say the surge of officers in cities has made the country safer by rounding up violent criminals. They say voters endorsed decisive action on immigration when they elected Mr. Trump, who has repeatedly criticized “sanctuary cities” that limit cooperation with federal immigration authorities. He has pledged to be more aggressive.

“What these mayors are asking D.H.S. to do is not really an option,” said Chad Wolf, an acting homeland security secretary during the first Trump administration. “The majority of American people said, ‘We don’t want that America. We actually want criminal illegal aliens arrested and removed, as well as others.’”

Some law enforcement officials who have had productive relationships with federal authorities in the past have watched the new D.H.S. approach with concern.

“The biggest question that I’ve been receiving is: How will we intercede if there’s a conflict between community members and D.H.S.?” Shon Barnes, Seattle’s chief of police, said in an interview last fall. “Who will we side with? What will we do?”

The answer, Chief Barnes said, was that the department would “keep the peace.”

Jim McDonnell, the chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, said the city had long had close ties to D.H.S., in particular the agencies focused on criminal matters. But that cooperation became harder last summer, he said, when the agency launched a regionwide immigration operation that ensnared thousands of immigrants.

“This has been something very different — unprecedented — that we’ve seen here,” he said last year.

In many ways, Los Angeles was on the front line of the agency’s incursion into large, Democratic-led cities. Last June, following protests of an ICE operation in downtown Los Angeles, the agency empowered Border Patrol agents to lead immigration enforcement in the area.

Soon, agents were seen raiding carwashes, Home Depot parking lots and other locations. At one point, border agents traveled through a city park as a show of force. It was also the first time the National Guard had showed up to protect the Department of Homeland Security in its immigration work.

“The federal government invaded, intervened and created a problem, and then patted themselves on the back for so-called saving the city, when the city was never at risk of anything,” said Karen Bass, the city’s Democratic mayor.

The recent conflicts with local officials have alarmed some former leaders of the Department of Homeland Security.

When it was created, the agency was not just supposed to connect different parts of the federal government, but also expand its outreach to local and state entities.

“We must open lines of communication and support like never before, between agencies and departments, between federal and state and local entities, and between the public and private sectors,” Tom Ridge, who led the White House Office of Homeland Security, a precursor of the Department of Homeland Security, said when he was sworn in.

Janet Napolitano, who served as homeland security secretary in the Obama administration, has watched recent events with concern.

“Federal law enforcement in general, and D.H.S. in particular, work best and most effectively when they’re in coordination with local and state authorities,” she said, noting that local police know their communities better than anyone. “And when you have a federal force come in, like the recent ICE deployment in Minneapolis, and then just kind of overlay, without coordination, you have all kinds of problems.”

Ms. Napolitano added that “this kind of a disruption and kind of a dissing of the role of state and local law enforcement — it doesn’t help anyone, and it makes overall for a more dangerous situation.”

arlier this week, Dan Bilzerian, the bearded hedonism influencer and gun-loving poker chud—no one’s idea of a progressive—launched an unexpected verbal attack on ICE following the deadly shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis. “I don’t believe the ICE agent’s life was in danger,” Bilzerian posted on X. “I think he went into the interaction angry & it was a bad shoot. I don’t care if she was a blue hair liberal, this isn’t about the right & the left. This is about government tyranny & overreach. I don’t trust the government.” The last sentence is an understatement: Bilzerian routinely posts conspiracy theories, antisemitic memes, and rants from Candace Owens. Like most occupants of the manosphere, Bilzerian would be hard to pin down on any kind of conventional left-right spectrum. But he said Good didn’t deserve to die. “If you’re more afraid of liberals than your government, then you aren’t paying attention,” he added.

The shooting also caught the attention of Tim Dillon, the right-leaning comedian who advocated for Donald Trump in 2024. “I don’t believe the cop was justified in shooting her three times in the face,” Dillon said on his podcast last week. “These are not well-trained law enforcement people in ICE. They’re not the cream of the crop.” Calling the proliferating raids “performative” and “psychotic,” he also declared ICE agents buffoons who “answered an ad on Craigslist” and wouldn’t be qualified to work security at the mall.

These comments don’t signal any kind of widespread anti-Trump mutiny over ICE on the right, and no prominent Republican has crossed the president on the issue. Still, the observations of these loudmouth podcasters reflect something real in the public mind: The eyewitness video of the Minneapolis tragedy has broken through to normies, who don’t like what they see. This week, a poll from The Economist and YouGov found that a mind-boggling 69 percent of Americans had seen the clip. If extrapolated, that would imply a total viewership larger than last year’s Super Bowl—for a video of a masked federal agent shooting a woman three times.

Of those who saw the clip, a majority (50 percent) said the shooting was not justified. Most say that the ICE officer, Jonathan Ross, should face criminal charges. Only 30 percent of Americans said the killing was justified, putting the Trump administration decisively on the wrong side of public opinion. Importantly, the poll found that 47 percent of Americans believe ICE is making the country less safe, compared to just 34 percent who say it’s making the country safer.

Of course, social media has a habit of perverting and distorting how we understand the world, especially for the journalists, partisans, and political junkies who squabble about current events on X. There, members of the Trump administration—J.D. Vance most prominently—have joined a chorus of right-wing voices to defend Ross, arguing that the shooting was justified and that the “radical left” is out of touch and out of control. Sometimes the MAGA crowd can post so much, and so stridently, that it almost seems like they have a point—except that social media is an epistemological hell, creating the illusion of a consensus that doesn’t exist. In all the confusion, it might take an aberrant scoundrel like Bilzerian to speak up and cut through the noise with some moral clarity. But if the muscle man isn’t for you—well… we’ve got polls. And polls don’t lie.

ICE Underwater
To say explicitly what is now obvious: Americans do not like ICE. Period. In just a single year, ICE’s reputation has collapsed so dramatically, and so quickly, that it would be a punchline if not for ICE agents’ tragic, real-world behavior. After Trump’s inauguration, ICE had a +16 net favorability rating with Americans, according to YouGov. Now, the agency is underwater with a –14 point favorability rating. That’s a 30-point swing since last January, an unheard-of political collapse.

These overwhelmingly bad poll numbers are an embarrassment for the Trump administration, which has long made immigration its calling card and has allocated tens of billions of dollars to ICE via the One Big Beautiful Bill. Americans continue to trust Republicans more than Democrats on matters of immigration, but ICE’s conduct—captured in thousands of viral videos—has been so egregious that Americans now view it as something separate and more sinister than just federal immigration enforcement. Indeed, the agency is so loathed that 46 percent of Americans now support “abolishing ICE,” YouGov found. That’s right: “Abolish ICE”—the radically toxic left-wing slogan that was once popular only in Bushwick bars—has gained steam in recent weeks. Even 14 percent of Republicans support disbanding the agency. (That said, few Democratic politicians are willing to go there. Even the liberal Minnesota Democrats at the center of the shooting, Mayor Jacob Frey and Attorney General Keith Ellison, are condemning ICE overreach without saying the agency should be eliminated.)

The data—and there’s a lot of it—speaks for itself: ICE is the second-least-popular federal agency, barely beating out the Internal Revenue Service, according to Pew. Meanwhile, a healthy majority of independents in most polls—around 60 percent—disapprove of ICE’s conduct, and last summer, majorities of Americans believed that ICE’s tactics had “gone too far,” according to Marist. My story in Puck last week, digging into how young men are souring on the Trump administration, included polling on Kristi Noem, the Department of Homeland Security secretary, who runs ICE. Her favorable rating among young men was at a lowly 17 percent—the same poll number as “incels” in the data set.

Last October, thanks to our polling partners at Echelon Insights, I reported that more voters agreed with the statement “ICE is targeting people who are peaceful and not a threat to public safety” (47 percent) than the statement “ICE is targeting criminals and people who are a threat to public safety” (42 percent). The gap has surely widened since then. And half of likely voters say that ICE should not wear masks or face coverings while conducting arrests in public places—including a majority of independents (52 percent).

That’s something Joe Rogan apparently agrees with, too. In a conversation with Sen. Rand Paul on his podcast today, Rogan equivocated on the details of the Minnesota shooting, but said it was a “problem” that ICE agents wear masks. “Because if you get arrested by a cop, you’re allowed to ask the cop, ‘What is your name and badge number?’ And you could film that cop. If you get arrested by an ICE agent, you have no such right. They’re wearing a mask. They don’t have to tell you shit.”

Communal Shaming
At this point, it seems rather obvious that viral videos are inflicting enormous damage on ICE’s standing with the public. Americans are bearing witness—almost in real time—to their behavior and the human anguish on the other end. Most political stories don’t come with visceral, real-world images that bring them to life for Americans who don’t closely follow the news; meanwhile, ICE’s enforcement actions are constantly playing and replaying on the small screen in everyone’s pocket.

But it’s not just Minnesotans documenting this. Everyday citizens all over the country are racking up hundreds of millions of views with on-the-ground videos, and seem increasingly willing to film ICE agents on job sites, at traffic stops, and even on their doorsteps—even while being threatened at gunpoint. It’s a scrappy, diffuse content campaign against the Trump media machine, which likes to turn ICE arrests into highly produced hype videos that look as if they were produced by an SEC football program.

Indeed, in light of the polling, it seems possible the White House might even be hurting their cause by endlessly promoting ICE. After all, the data suggests that the more Americans see, the less they like. Progressive content creators I spoke to this week reported a surge in views on their posts, and at Crooked Media, home to Pod Save America, YouTube content on ICE overperformed their typical engagement after the Minnesota shooting, staffers told me. At MeidasTouch, the progressive media outfit, co-founder Ben Meiselas also said that views on ICE-related content are surging, thanks in part to a partnership they launched with Status Coup, an independent reporting outlet that’s been livestreaming protests on the ground in Minneapolis.

Magnitude Media, a Democratic media-tracking firm, also found that social media posts on left-leaning pages that mentioned the Minnesota shooting overperformed their usual engagement by 72 percent, dramatically outpacing content on right-leaning pages, which jumped by only 5 percent relative to usual performance. The right caught up in views over the weekend after Ross’s cellphone footage of the encounter—which, in the eyes of ICE supporters, validated his decision to shoot—was leaked to a reporter. But overall, the initial footage of Good’s death had a larger impact, with an estimated 230 million views compared to 170 million for the second angle, according to Magnitude.

In any case, that’s the sort of content—focused on everyday interactions with ICE—that seems to be shaping public opinion. Even a cursory glance at TikTok surfaces videos with millions of views, created by regular people whose accounts you’ve never visited. Here are just a few I found on Tuesday: a federal agent drawing his gun on a protester in Minnesota (14 million views); a California man laughing at out-of-shape ICE agents failing to chase down a construction worker (7.5 million views); a poorly trained ICE agent aiming his firearm sideways like a wannabe gangster (2.6 million views); a construction worker in West Virginia perched on a roof while ICE agents impotently try to reach him from a fire engine ladder (1 million views).

Humor also seems to be resonating. In Portland, an activist filmed an ICE agent who was wearing Vans sneakers with his uniform: “Oh my god, is it your first day, did you forget your boots?” (“He was playing Call of Duty three weeks ago,” one commenter chimed in.) In Minneapolis, a corpulent ICE officer was filmed running at demonstrators, then slipping on a sheet of ice and falling on his backside. An anonymous TikTokker remixed it with the Curb Your Enthusiasm theme and hit publish. That video now has more than 5 million views.

Mocking law enforcement is risky business for the left, which inflicted enormous political damage on itself during the heady days of Defund the Police. But Suzanne Lambert, a progressive content creator who has styled herself as a “mean girl” lib in the second Trump term, said ICE is a different beast and deserves a special kind of scorn. Democrats have traditionally called out bad actors by claiming a moral high ground, she told me, abiding by standards the MAGAverse simply doesn’t care about. “Our messaging instead has to portray their behavior as embarrassing or cringe, because being laughed at is their greatest fear,” Lambert told me. “So instead of calling them bad or bigoted or bullies, call them what they really are: Huge pussies.”

Of course, mockery isn’t going to stop ICE agents from doing their work, and it might even embolden them. But the communal shaming of the agency, waged with smartphones, has clearly blossomed into something more than just a dopamine hit for social media users documenting the drama. It’s actually changing public opinion—a small reminder of a time, only a decade or so ago, when social media had the promise of bringing strangers and citizens together instead of tearing them apart.

When the Trump administration ordered a surge of armed federal immigration enforcement personnel on to the streets of Minneapolis, the Department of Homeland Security declared it the largest operation in its history and the liberal midwestern city became Donald Trump’s latest chosen hotspot.

Such escalations mark the US president’s agenda of mass arrests and deportations from the US interior. The highest-profile efforts involve officers from multiple agencies rushing to prominent Democratic-led US cities, against local leaders’ wishes. But coast to coast, federal officers have been raiding homes, businesses, commercial parking lots – even schools, hospitals and courthouses. The efforts have delighted the president’s hardcore Make America Great Again voter base, but are also tearing families apart and spreading fear and even death on the streets and in detention.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement is the biggest cog in the machine and ICE has become an internationally recognized acronym, a growing force and Trump’s most visible anti-immigration operator. This despite officers often wearing masks and refusing to identify themselves. Border patrol is increasingly involved in the crackdown and a variety of other federal agencies have also been drafted into the efforts. The bewildering array of labels, tactical gear and clothing accessories begs scrutiny, even though it is sometimes not possible to identify which agency an individual works for.

Who’s who on the frontline of enforcement

Department of Homeland Security (DHS)

ICE and border patrol are agencies under the umbrella of the Department of Homeland Security, which is headed by DHS secretary Kristi Noem. DHS is the third-largest federal agency, after the Pentagon and Veterans Affairs. It has many functions unrelated to immigration enforcement, including the Secret Service and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema), among others. But Noem has become the face of the anti-immigration push.

She makes frequent media appearances, joining ICE on raids while wearing various items of gear and insignia, with cameras in tow. She notably posed for pictures while cheerleading the removal, without due process, of 200-plus Venezuelans from the US to a notorious prison in El Salvador last year.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
The Homeland Security Act of 2002 transformed modern immigration enforcement, conflating it with national security after the 11 September 2001 attacks. That legislation created DHS and ICE. ICE is divided into two major enforcement branches: enforcement and removal operations (ERO) and homeland security investigations (HSI). And then administrative functions such as the office of the principal legal advisor, which houses the lawyers who argue the government’s legal cases.

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed last year nearly tripled ICE’s budget for 2025-2026 to $28.7bn. ICE officers and agents more than doubled in total from roughly 10,000 to 22,000 in 2025, according to DHS, and the department is recruiting swiftly and aggressively. Overall, Congress awarded DHS a monster $175bn.

Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO)

When most people think of ICE, they’re thinking of the deportation officers in ERO. Historically, much of their work on the ground had consisted of hand-offs in jails from local police who had arrested unauthorized immigrants for other reasons. That often landed people with longstanding ties to the US and only minor criminal charges, such as marijuana infractions or driving without a license, in deportation proceedings.

The Obama administration took steps to limit such consequences and local Democratic-led jurisdictions increasingly restricted cooperation with ICE, limiting ERO’s easy arrests in many large cities.

But under this Trump administration, ERO has ramped up arrests of people in public places and at job sites to an unprecedented degree, which is why deportation officers have become so visible. The White House demanded a ratcheting up of arrests and deportations, putting those already living within the US in the crosshairs instead of people who recently crossed the US-Mexico border without documentation – as those numbers have plummeted.

Homeland Security Investigations (HSI)
HSI is the investigative branch of ICE. Its agents hold the same federal classification as FBI agents and the job typically demands much higher qualifications for entry and more extensive and expert training than ERO officers. HSI agents traditionally focus on complex criminal cases, especially international crimes involving sex traffickers, child abuse rings and drug cartels.

But since Trump’s return to the White House, HSI agents have been increasingly re-assigned to support the deportation operations handled by ERO and are seen at raids and out on the streets.

Customs and Border Protection (CBP)
CBP officers traditionally staff the legal ports of entry to the United States. The agency has not traditionally played a significant role in interior immigration enforcement, though under this Trump administration, some CBP officers have begun to play support roles at ERO field offices away from the border. CBP is the parent agency of the US border patrol.

Border patrol
Border patrol officers have become heavily involved in anti-immigration operations in US cities. The agency is acquiring a new notoriety for aggressive tactics while conducting urban immigration enforcement or confronting protesters, which has not been its traditional role. Officers have less specialist enforcement authority if further than 100 miles (160km) from a border, coastline or maritime boundary.

Border patrol has previously been best known for apprehending immigrants crossing the US-Mexico border without authorization, either those illegally trying to evade law enforcement or those turning themselves in to ask for asylum or assistance. Trump shut down many legal avenues of entry early in his second administration as he took action to choke off asylum processes, drawing ongoing legal challenges. Border patrol officers have since played a prominent role in unprecedented apprehensions at immigration court, and patrol commander Greg Bovino has kept a high profile on the streets of Minneapolis and before that New Orleans, Charlotte, Chicago and Los Angeles.

Other federal agencies

The Trump administration has drafted law enforcement agencies into his mass deportation agenda that typically have little to do with frontline immigration enforcement. This includes personnel from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), the Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agency, the US Marshals Service and the Diplomatic Security Service.

Local police
Local police departments and sheriffs’ offices have been drawn in to the issue – whether they like it or not. Some jurisdictions, especially in Republican-led states and cities, choose to work closely with federal immigration authorities, assisting removal efforts under ICE supervision. Official partnerships between local and federal agencies are called 287(g) agreements and have been on the rise.

But in many places, especially where Democrats dominate, local law enforcement limits cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. This is especially true in places that have elected to label themselves “sanctuary cities” or jurisdictions, explicitly curbing such cooperation and attempting to obstruct removals by declining to cooperate with ICE requests to hold and transfer to the feds people arrested locally on charges unrelated to immigration who may be violating immigration laws.

CLICK ON LINK TO WATCH VIDEO:

A Chicago childcare provider reflects on a year of President Donald Trump’s immigration policy.