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Tag: Immigration

  • Renee Good’s brothers to testify on Capitol Hill on federal agents’ use of force

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    Grants open for small businesses affect by ICE surge

    The Latino Economic Development Center says it is launching a grant for Latino-owned small businesses that are struggling amid Operation Metro Surge.

    Small businesses on St. Paul’s east side have faced reduced foot traffic and revenue loss because workers and community members are afraid to leave their homes, the development center says.

    Grant funds can be used to help with payroll, rent, loans and other operating expenses. Though it’s intended for businesses on St. Paul’s east side, the development center says it’s encouraging others to apply as well, as they’re looking for other opportunities to support businesses across the state.

     

    As Columbia Heights students return to class, superintendent calls for ICE de-escalation

    Class is back in session Tuesday for students at Columbia Heights Public Schools, one day after a racially and politically motivated bomb threat forced them to close for the day. 

    Their superintendent said their focus is squarely on returning home four other students in federal custody. 

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    Gov. Tim Walz, Attorney General Keith Ellison to address impact of federal detention on children

    Gov. Tim Walz and Attorney General Keith Ellison will join school leaders to discuss the impact of federal detention on children and families in Minnesota.

    How to watch

    • What: Walz, Ellison address impact of federal detention of children
    • Who: Walz, Ellison, Department of Education Commissioner Willie Jett, education and health leaders
    • When: 12:45 p.m. Tuesday
    • How to watch: You can watch live in the player above or on YouTube.

     

    Brothers of Renee Good to testify about federal agents’ use of force at Capitol Hill hearing

    Renee Good’s brothers will be among those who testify at a hearing in Washington, D.C., Tuesday afternoon as part of an inquiry into federal agents and their use of force.

    The hearing, which starts at 2 p.m., is organized by two Democrats: Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Rep. Robert Garcia of California. 

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    Richfield observer’s encounter with Border Patrol leads to court filing alleging “retaliation”

    As the immigration crackdown continues in Minnesota, Nicole Cleland, a resident of Richfield, Minnesota, believes federal agents identified her through facial recognition software. 

    Cleland has actively protested against the deployment of federal agents in the Twin Cities. She says she’s a trained observer, following officers of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, as well as Customs and Border Protection. Her account is detailed in a lawsuit filed alongside other observers against the Department of Homeland Security 

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    ICE claims that a man shattered his skull running into wall; Hennepin Healthcare doctors express skepticism

    Intensive care nurses immediately doubted the word of federal immigration officers when they arrived at a Minneapolis hospital with a Mexican immigrant who had broken bones in his face and skull.

    Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents initially claimed Alberto Castañeda Mondragón had tried to flee while handcuffed and “purposefully ran headfirst into a brick wall,” according to court documents filed by a lawyer seeking his release.

    But staff members at Hennepin County Medical Center determined that could not possibly account for the fractures and bleeding throughout the 31-year-old’s brain, said three nurses familiar with the case.

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    Conditions inside Whipple Federal Building are “unacceptable,” Minnesota lawmaker says after visit

    A Minnesota congresswoman got her first look inside the Whipple Federal Building, calling the conditions heartbreaking and unacceptable.

    The building is a hub for federal agents in town and is supposed to be a temporary home for people detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

    “There were people in leg shackles. There were cold cement floors, no beds, no blankets; they did have showers, but told me no one had ever taken a shower,” Democratic Rep. Kelly Morrison said. 

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  • A Theology of Immigration

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    When I was working with refugees in Lebanon and Turkey and the Iraqi crisis, Rwanda, other places—you know, when everything’s taken away from you, God is all you have left. So we need a way to speak about who God is and who we are before God, and I think theology gives us a way of doing that.

    I’ve noticed something similar in debates around homelessness and immigration: the church does enormous amounts of work on the ground, but theological questions seem to have been pushed out of the broader public discourse.

    I did my graduate work at Berkeley, so when I was in California, I can remember one day I woke up and, literally, on the other side of the bed where I slept, outside the window, was a homeless person. And for me that began a long journey of trying to understand theology from the other side of the wall—not just from the perspective of a library or a room but from the streets and from the people who are living on the edge.

    What you see in the church’s teachings called the seamless garment of life runs through homelessness, runs through immigration, runs through the elderly, runs through all other life issues. When I spend time speaking to migrants at borders around the world, I often ask them, What is it that you would want people to hear? Or if you could preach on Sunday, what would you want people to know? And often it’s about dignity. It’s about saying, We’re human beings here, and you’re treating us like we’re dogs.

    The issue is these people have become nonpersons. I mean, they’re just not even seen. And I think part of the work of the church is saying, Actually, these people belong in a human community, and they belong to be seen, and therefore they belong in the discourse as well.

    You make this core argument that all people are created in the image of God, Imago Dei. That’s something that many people would say they believe. But when you see the news right now, the horrific videos coming out, the responses to them—do you feel that idea is in crisis?

    What we’ve also included in that understanding is that in the fall, we lost the likeness, but we never lose the image. There’s a deep core within us that’s indestructible—our worth and our value before God.

    One of the things I often say is that if we can’t see in the immigrant or in the homeless or in people who are considered different from us something of ourselves, we’ve lost touch with our humanity. So I think that’s what’s at stake. We’ve deported our own soul, if we’ve really lost touch with our own humanity.

    You argue that every person should have everything necessary for living a truly human life. What does that look like in practice if it’s not simply open borders?

    The church recognizes that nations have the right to control their borders, but it’s not an absolute right. It’s subjugated to a larger sense of what’s called the universal destination of all goods. And what does the church mean by that? In practice, that everything belongs to God, and when we die, we’re gonna have to give up everything anyway. So there’s a way in which we’re, at best, stewards in this life, not owners of anything in an absolute way. And even our nationalities and our national identities have only a relative importance in light of a larger vision of what the kingdom of God is about.

    The question is, what’s the narrative that shapes our consciousness on this? If the narrative is, This is my stuff, this is my country, this is where I belong, this is what I own, and I have to defend it and protect it—that’s one way of understanding it. But if the narrative is, Everything I have is a gift, and when I die, I’m going to give everything up, that I’m a steward and not an owner, and I can be judged by how I use what I’ve been given—that’s a different way of inhabiting the world. If the narrative is about how do we move closer to communion with God, and in closer connection with each other, with a life and a faith that does justice, in terms of caring for one another, that’s a very different way of inhabiting the world.

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    Jay Caspian Kang

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  • Don Lemon says a dozen agents were sent to arrest him even though he offered to turn himself in

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    Don Lemon said about a dozen federal agents came to his Los Angeles hotel to arrest him last week, even though his attorney had told authorities he would turn himself in to face federal civil rights charges over his coverage of an anti-immigration enforcement protest that disrupted a service at a Minnesota church.

    Lemon told ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel that sending the agents was a waste of resources because law enforcement wouldn’t have had to dispatch agents to follow him if he had been allowed to surrender to authorities.

    “I was walking up to the room and I pressed the elevator button, and then all of a sudden, I feel myself being jostled and and people trying to grab me and put me in handcuffs,” the independent journalist said Monday on the show on the show “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”

    What to know about the civil rights charges Don Lemon faces for covering church protest in Minnesota

    He asked the agents who they were and said they identified themselves. Lemon asked to see a warrant and was told they didn’t have it. The agents then summoned an FBI agent to come in from outside to show Lemon the warrant on a cell phone.

    The Department of Justice and FBI didn’t immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

    Kimmel introduced Lemon, his first guest of the night, by saying he was “was arrested for committing journalism.”

    Lemon’s attorney has said Lemon plans to plead not guilty. He told reporters “I will not be silenced” after he was released in response to a judge’s orders.

    A grand jury in Minnesota indicted Lemon, another independent journalist, Georgia Fort, and others on charges of conspiracy and interfering with the First Amendment rights of worshippers during the Jan. 18 protest at the Cities Church in St. Paul, where a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official is a pastor.

    Lemon, who was fired from CNN in 2023 following a bumpy run as a morning host, has said he had no affiliation to the group that disrupted the Sunday service by entering the church.

    Lemon said he couldn’t say much about the case but he said he was not a protester.

    “I went there to be a journalist. I went there to chronicle and document and record what was happening. I was following that one group around, and so that’s what I did. I reported on them,” Lemon said.

    Lemon said he asked the arresting officers if they would let him make a phone call. He said he was told no and that he could talk to his attorney the next day. He tried to use Siri on his Apple Watch to call his husband and his attorney but neither picked up.

    A diamond bracelet he was wearing kept getting caught on his handcuffs, which hurt, and the agents told Lemon they would take it off. Lemon said he asked if the agent would mind taking it up to Lemon’s husband in his hotel room and they agreed to do that.

    “And that’s how my husband found out. Otherwise, no one would have known where I was,” Lemon said.

    Lemon said he was kept in a holding room at the federal courthouse from midnight until 1 p.m. the following day.

    Kimmel himself became a symbol of a fight against censorship last year, when ABC suspended “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” for remarks made following the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr had pressured broadcasters to take Kimmel off the air shortly before that.

    ABC lifted the suspension after a public outcry, and Kimmel returned to the air with much stronger ratings than he had before. In Congress, Democratic senators raised concerns that Carr’s actions trampled on the First Amendment.

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    Audrey McAvoy

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  • ‘We’re going to get this job done’: GOP Leaders see narrow path to end partial shutdown Tuesday

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    The House is expected to vote today on a funding bill aimed at ending the partial government shutdown, with President Donald Trump urging lawmakers to act swiftly despite Democratic calls for changes to immigration operations.The deal that passed the Senate last week funds the government through the rest of the fiscal year, except for the Department of Homeland Security. Lawmakers would have until Feb. 13 to negotiate Homeland Security funding and immigration enforcement provisions. On Monday, Trump told both sides in the House to send the bill to his desk without any delays, expressing his desire to see the government reopen as soon as possible. “We need to get the Government open, and I hope all Republicans and Democrats will join me in supporting this Bill, and send it to my desk WITHOUT DELAY,” the president wrote on social media.However, many Democrats want to see changes to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol operations before anything is signed.”The American people want to see the masks come off. The American people want to see body cameras turned on, and mandated. The American people want to see judicial warrants,” said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.House Speaker Mike Johnson argues that requiring immigration officers to remove masks would not have support from Republicans, as it could lead to problems if their personal images and private information are posted online by protesters. Passing this legislation could be a challenge because Johnson is working with a razor-thin majority and can only afford to lose one Republican defection, but he is confident he will pull it off.”We’re going to get this job done, get the government reopened. Democrats are going to play games and the American people can see who really cares,” Johnson said.Lawmakers from both parties are concerned the shutdown will disrupt the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which they rely on to help people after deadly snowstorms and other disasters.Keep watching for the latest from the Washington News Bureau:

    WASHINGTON —

    The House is expected to vote today on a funding bill aimed at ending the partial government shutdown, with President Donald Trump urging lawmakers to act swiftly despite Democratic calls for changes to immigration operations.

    The deal that passed the Senate last week funds the government through the rest of the fiscal year, except for the Department of Homeland Security. Lawmakers would have until Feb. 13 to negotiate Homeland Security funding and immigration enforcement provisions.

    On Monday, Trump told both sides in the House to send the bill to his desk without any delays, expressing his desire to see the government reopen as soon as possible.

    “We need to get the Government open, and I hope all Republicans and Democrats will join me in supporting this Bill, and send it to my desk WITHOUT DELAY,” the president wrote on social media.

    However, many Democrats want to see changes to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol operations before anything is signed.

    “The American people want to see the masks come off. The American people want to see body cameras turned on, and mandated. The American people want to see judicial warrants,” said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.

    House Speaker Mike Johnson argues that requiring immigration officers to remove masks would not have support from Republicans, as it could lead to problems if their personal images and private information are posted online by protesters.

    Passing this legislation could be a challenge because Johnson is working with a razor-thin majority and can only afford to lose one Republican defection, but he is confident he will pull it off.

    “We’re going to get this job done, get the government reopened. Democrats are going to play games and the American people can see who really cares,” Johnson said.

    Lawmakers from both parties are concerned the shutdown will disrupt the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which they rely on to help people after deadly snowstorms and other disasters.

    Keep watching for the latest from the Washington News Bureau:


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  • Don Lemon says he offered to turn himself in but federal agents were sent for him anyway

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    Don Lemon says about a dozen federal agents came to his Los Angeles hotel to arrest him last week even though his attorney had told authorities he would turn himself in to face federal civil rights charges over his coverage of an anti-immigration enforcement protest that disrupted a service at a Minnesota church.

    Lemon told ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel that sending the agents was a waste of resources because law enforcement wouldn’t have had to dispatch agents to follow him if he’d been allowed to surrender to authorities.

    “I was walking up to the room and I pressed the elevator button and then all of a sudden I feel myself being jostled and people (were) trying to grab me and put me in handcuffs,” the independent journalist said Monday on the show on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”

    He asked the agents who they were and said they identified themselves. Lemon asked to see a warrant and was told they didn’t have it. The agents then summoned an FBI agent to come in from outside to show Lemon the warrant on a cell phone.

    Don Lemon departs federal court on Jan. 30, 2026, in Los Angeles. 

    Mario Tama / Getty Images


    The Department of Justice and FBI didn’t immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

    Kimmel introduced Lemon, his first guest of the night, by saying he was “was arrested for committing journalism.”

    Lemon’s attorney has said Lemon plans to plead not guilty. He told reporters “I will not be silenced” after he was released in response to a judge’s orders.

    A grand jury in Minnesota indicted Lemon, another independent journalist, Georgia Fort, and others on charges of conspiracy and interfering with the First Amendment rights of worshippers during the Jan. 18 protest at the Cities Church in St. Paul, where a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official is a pastor.

    Lemon, who was fired from CNN in 2023 following a bumpy run as a morning host, has said he had no affiliation to the group that disrupted the Sunday service by entering the church.

    Lemon said he couldn’t say much about the case but he said he was not a protester.

    “I went there to be a journalist. I went there to chronicle and document and record what was happening. I was following that one group around, and so that’s what I did. I reported on them,” Lemon said.

    Abbe Lowell, Lemon’s lawyer, said after his arrest that, “This unprecedented attack on the First Amendment and transparent attempt to distract attention from the many crises facing this administration will not stand. Don will fight these charges vigorously and thoroughly in court.”

    Lemon said he asked the arresting officers if they would let him make a phone call. He said he was told no and that he could talk to his attorney the next day. He tried to use Siri on his Apple Watch to call his husband and his attorney but neither picked up.

    A diamond bracelet he was wearing kept getting caught on his handcuffs, which hurt, and the agents told Lemon they would take it off. Lemon said he asked if the agent would mind taking it up to Lemon’s husband in his hotel room and they agreed to do that.

    “And that’s how my husband found out. Otherwise, no one would have known where I was,” Lemon said.

    Lemon said he was kept in a holding room at the federal courthouse from midnight until 1 p.m. the following day.

    Kimmel himself became a symbol of a fight against censorship last year, when ABC suspended “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” for remarks made following the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr had pressured broadcasters to take Kimmel off the air shortly before that.

    ABC lifted the suspension after a public outcry, and Kimmel returned to the air with much stronger ratings than he had before. In Congress, Democratic senators raised concerns that Carr’s actions had trampled on the First Amendment.

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  • Senators want team ready to track possible federal infractions

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    BOSTON — As federal-state tensions flare in Minnesota, a majority of the Massachusetts Senate wrote to the governor and attorney general last week urging them to prepare for potential situations in which the Bay State could prosecute a federal official who is accused of abusing their authority here.

    Led by Sen. Michael Moore of Millbury, the 23 senators who signed Friday’s letter to Gov. Maura Healey and AG Andrea Campbell acknowledged that state-level prosecution of federal officials “faces a narrow legal path” but said it is “the only viable mechanism for accountability” should Massachusetts face a situation like what has unfolded in Minnesota. The senators pointed to ICE actions that they said “violate the rights to free speech, peaceful assembly, and protection against unreasonable searches and seizures under the United States Constitution.”

    “Still, with sufficient evidence and will, a state may bring a prosecution against federal officials who violate state criminal law while acting in a manner that is not necessary and proper in the performance of their official federal duties. To that end, we respectfully request that Massachusetts undertake several actions to prepare to respond to, and when appropriate prosecute, federal officials who abuse their federal authority here,” the letter reads.

    The Democratic senators are seeking the creation of a “rapid response” task force to respond to allegations of federal abuses in Massachusetts, guidance from the attorney general to law enforcement highlighting “their authority and responsibility to collect evidence of federal misconduct” and more, and the establishment of an online portal for residents to submit complaints and evidence.

    Federal immigration enforcement officials have previously blamed “sanctuary policies” in Massachusetts that they say make it harder for them to remove criminals from the country, sometimes necessitating large-scale sweeps like ICE carried out here last year.

    Signed onto Moore’s letter are Sens. Cindy Friedman, Paul Mark, Patricia Jehlen, Mark Montigny, Jason Lewis, Joan Lovely, John Keenan, Michael Barrett, James Eldridge, Robyn Kennedy, Michael Brady, Rebecca Rausch, Adam Gomez, John Cronin, Paul Feeney, Liz Miranda, Sal DiDomenico, Jacob Oliveira, Pavel Payano, Barry Finegold, Nick Collins, and Michael Rush.  Lovely, Barrett and Rush hold Senate leadership posts.

    “The Trump Administration’s willingness to use the power of the federal government to hurt and even kill United States citizens is shocking. Massachusetts must be prepared for the possibility that President Trump unleashes his masked agents on the people of the Commonwealth for having the audacity to stand up to him,” Moore said in a statement.

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    Colin A. Young

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  • Football, politics and protest: This year’s Super Bowl comes at a tinderbox moment in the US

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    WASHINGTON — Don’t tune into the Super Bowl hoping for a break from the tumultuous politics gripping the U.S.

    The NFL is facing pressure ahead of Sunday’s game between the Seattle Seahawks and the New England Patriots to take a more explicit stance against the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement. More than 184,000 people have signed a petition calling on the league to denounce the potential presence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement at the Super Bowl, which is being held at Levi’s Stadium in the San Francisco Bay Area. The liberal group MoveOn plans to deliver the petition to the NFL’s New York City headquarters on Tuesday.

    Meanwhile, anticipation is building around how Bad Bunny, the halftime show’s Spanish-speaking headliner, will address the moment. He has criticized President Donald Trump on everything from his hurricane response in his native Puerto Rico to his treatment of immigrants. On Sunday night, he blasted ICE while accepting an award at the Grammys. His latest tour skipped the continental U.S. because of fears that his fans could be targeted by immigration agents.

    Trump has said he doesn’t plan to attend this year’s game, unlike last year, and he has derided Bad Bunny as a “terrible choice.” A Republican senator is calling it “the woke bowl.” And a prominent conservative group plans to hold an alternative show that it hopes will steal attention from the main event.

    The Super Bowl is one of the few remaining cultural touchstones viewed by millions of people in real time and the halftime show is no stranger to controversy, perhaps most notably Janet Jackson’s 2004 performance in which her breast was briefly exposed. But there are few parallels to this year’s game, which has the potential to become an unusual mix of sports, entertainment, politics and protest. And it will unfold at a tinderbox moment for the U.S., just two weeks after Alex Pretti’s killing by federal agents in Minneapolis reignited a national debate over the Trump administration’s hard-line law enforcement tactics.

    “The Super Bowl is supposed to be an escape, right? We’re supposed to go there to not have to talk about the serious things of this country,” said Tiki Barber, a former player for the New York Giants who played in the Super Bowl in 2001 and has since attended several as a commentator. “I hope it doesn’t devolve, because if it does, then I think we’re really losing touch with what’s important in our society.”

    The 31-year-old Bad Bunny, born in Puerto Rico as Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, has elevated Latino music into the mainstream and gained global fame with songs almost entirely in Spanish — something that irks many of his conservative detractors. He has leaned into the controversy, referring to the halftime show when he hosted “Saturday Night Live” in October by joking “everybody is happy about it — even Fox News.”

    He segued into a few sentences in Spanish, expressing Latino pride in the achievement, and finished by saying in English, “If you didn’t understand what I just said, you have four months to learn!”

    Those who follow him closely doubt that he’ll back down now.

    “He has made it very clear what he stands for,” said Vanessa Díaz, a professor at Loyola Marymount University and co-author of “P FKN R: How Bad Bunny Became the Global Voice of Puerto Rican Resistance.” “So I can’t imagine that this would all go away with the Super Bowl.”

    The halftime show is a collaboration between the NFL, Roc Nation and Apple Music. Roc Nation curates the performers and Apple Music distributes the performance while the NFL ultimately controls the stage, broadcast and branding.

    The NFL, which is working to expand its appeal across the world, including into Latin America, said it never considered removing Bad Bunny from the halftime show even after criticism from Trump and some of his supporters.

    NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell on Monday described the singer as “one of the great artists in the world,” as well as someone who understands the power of the Super Bowl performance “to unite people and to be able to bring people together.”

    “I think artists in the past have done that. I think Bad Bunny understands that. And I think you’ll have a great performance,” Goodell told reporters during his annual Super Bowl press conference.

    About half of Americans approved of Bad Bunny as the halftime performer, according to an October poll from Quinnipiac University. But there were substantial gaps with about three-quarters of Democrats backing the pick compared to just 16% of Republicans. About 60% of Black and Hispanic adults approved of the selection compared to 41% of whites.

    Republicans are eager to maintain Latino support in their bid to keep control of Congress. But as the Super Bowl draws near, many in the GOP have kept up their Bad Bunny critiques.

    Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama, the former head football coach at Auburn University who is now running for governor, derided the “Woke Bowl” on Newsmax last week and said he’ll watch an alternative event hosted by Turning Point USA.

    The group founded by the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk said Monday that Kid Rock, a vocal Trump supporter, would be among the performers at its event.

    In recent days, Department of Homeland Security official Jeff Brannigan hosted a series of private calls with local officials and the NFL in which he indicated that ICE does not plan to conduct any law enforcement actions the week of the Super Bowl or at the game, according to two NFL officials with direct knowledge of the conversations.

    ICE is not expected to be among more than a dozen DHS-related agencies providing security at the game, the officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

    While that is the plan, some worry that Trump and his MAGA allies who lead DHS can change their minds ahead of Sunday’s game given their recent statements.

    DHS official Corey Lewandowski, a key adviser to DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, said in October that ICE agents would be conducting immigration enforcement at the game.

    “There is nowhere that you can provide safe haven to people who are in the country illegally, not the Super Bowl, not anywhere else,” he said at the time.

    Asked to clarify ICE’s role this week, DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin refused to say whether federal immigration agents will be present for the Super Bowl.

    “Those who are here legally and not breaking other laws have nothing to fear,” she said. “We will not disclose future operations or discuss personnel. Super Bowl security will entail a whole-of-government response conducted in line with the U.S. Constitution.”

    The progressive group MoveOn will host a Tuesday rally outside the NFL headquarters in New York to present a petition telling the league, “No ICE at the Super Bowl.”

    “This year’s Super Bowl should be remembered for big plays and Bad Bunny, not masked and armed ICE agents running around the stadium inflicting chaos, violence, and trauma on fans and stadium workers,” MoveOn spokesperson Britt Jacovich said. “The NFL can’t stay on the sidelines, the league has a responsibility to act like adults, protect Super Bowl fans and stadium workers, and keep ICE out of the game.”

    In an interview, San Francisco mayor Daniel Lurie was optimistic that the event would be a success even in a politically tense climate.

    “We are going to keep everybody safe — our residents, our visitors,” he said. “Obviously with everything going on, we’re staying on top of it, monitoring everything. But I expect everything to be safe and fun.”

    ___

    Peoples reported from New York.

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  • Judge blocks DHS from ending deportation protections for 350,000 Haitians one day before they were set to lapse

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    A federal judge on Monday blocked the Trump administration from revoking legal protections for Haitians enrolled in the Temporary Protected Status program, granting a last-minute reprieve to 350,000 immigrants who were set to lose their deportation protections on Tuesday.

    U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes indefinitely paused the planned termination of Haiti’s TPS program, explicitly barring the federal government from invalidating the legal status and work permits of active enrollees and from arresting and deporting them. 

    In an opinion accompanying her order, Reyes issued a forceful rebuke of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s decision to end the TPS policy for Haitians.

    Reyes concluded Noem’s decision was “arbitrary and capricious” and in violation of the Administrative Procedures Act, writing that it failed to fully consider “overwhelming evidence of present danger” in crisis-stricken Haiti, which remains plagued by political instability, gang violence and widespread poverty.

    Reyes also found Noem’s decision was “in part” rooted in “racial animus,” citing disparaging remarks that the secretary and President Trump have made about Haiti and immigrants.

    “Kristi Noem has a First Amendment right to call immigrants killers, leeches, entitlement junkies, and any other inapt name she wants,” Reyes wrote. “Secretary Noem, however, is constrained by both our Constitution and the APA to apply faithfully the facts to the law in implementing the TPS program. The record to-date shows she has yet to do that.”

    In a statement, Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin suggested the Trump administration would ask the Supreme Court to intervene in the case.

    “Supreme Court, here we come,” she said. “This is lawless activism that we will be vindicated on.”

    “Haiti’s TPS was granted following an earthquake that took place over 15 years ago, it was never intended to be a de facto amnesty program, yet that’s how previous administrations have used it for decades,” McLaughlin added.

    TPS was created by Congress in 1990. Since then, Democratic and Republican administrations have used the policy to provide temporary legal refuge to foreigners from countries facing armed conflict, an environmental disaster or another emergency that makes their return unsafe.

    The Trump administration has moved to dismantle most TPS programs, raising the specter of deportation for hundreds of thousands of immigrants from Afghanistan, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Honduras, Myanmar, Nepal, Nicaragua, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria and Venezuela.

    The Trump administration argues these programs attract illegal immigration and that they have been abused and extended for too long by Democratic administrations.

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  • Minneapolis schools face impact of escalating immigration crackdown

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    Protestors rallied outside of Target headquarters in Minneapolis, demanding the new CEO take a stand against the immigration crackdowns. Meanwhile, in suburban Minneapolis, schools are feeling the impact of escalating tensions. Omar Villafranca reports.

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  • U. of I. Republicans club faces backlash for post supporting ICE: ‘Only traitors help invaders’

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    The Illini Republicans club at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is facing backlash after posting an illustration on social media of a masked gunman holding a weapon to a kneeling man’s head — alongside the caption, “Only traitors help invaders.”

    The Instagram post, published Friday, also says Alex Pretti and Renée Good — who were both fatally shot by federal agents in Minneapolis last month — had “voided their liberties the moment they decided they were above the law.”

    “Our nation has come under invasion from the masses of the third world and those incompatible with Western civilization,” the post says. “Now, the current administration, as duly elected by its people to do so, has taken a stand against this invasion.”

    The illustration was later deleted from the post, as first reported by the Daily Illini. But it prompted a complaint to the university’s Title VI Office, and drew a slew of criticism from U. of I. students online, who argue that it glorified the deaths of Pretti and Good as well as the unrest engulfing Minnesota.

    “My first initial reaction was just disgust, horror and nausea,” said sophomore Rylee Graves, 19, a member of Illini Democrats. “For them to say that that post was not violent or they weren’t condoning violence is a lie, and they know exactly what they’re doing.”

    The image, set against the backdrop of the American flag, depicts a bearded man with his back turned as the gunman looms above him. Some students said that both the man and the scene resembled the Jan. 24 killing of Pretti, who was shot multiple times in the back.

    An illustration, posted by Illini Republicans on Instagram, depicts what appears to be a federal agent pointing a gun at a man’s head. The group has said it stands with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. (Illini Republicans)

    Illini Republicans wrote in an email to the Tribune that the image was removed “to prevent misinterpretation while we review concerns,” but it was “not an admission of wrongdoing.” They declined a request for an interview.

    “We take concerns raised by others seriously and are committed to engaging in good-faith dialogue while exercising our right to express political viewpoints as a registered student organization,” the club wrote.

    “The claim that the post glorifies or endorses violence is incorrect,” the club added. “At no point did it advocate harm, violence or extrajudicial action against any individual or group.”

    The post is under review by the university’s Title VI Office, which investigates civil rights complaints, according to a statement from a U. of I. spokesperson. As a registered student organization, Illini Republicans are required to follow the student code of conduct, but U. of I. “cannot discipline them for the viewpoint or content of protected speech,” the spokesperson added.

    “Hate and intolerance are not aligned with our university values,” the spokesperson said. “We strive to be a campus where every member of our community has a transformative and positive experience.”

    More than 1,600 people have commented on the post since Friday. It was posted the same day as “ICE Out” demonstrations across the U.S., including a walkout on the Urbana-Champaign campus.

    The intensified immigration enforcement in Minneapolis, dubbed Operation Metro Surge, began in December. Good was shot during an encounter with agents Jan. 7, and Pretti was shot Jan. 24. The Trump administration said the use of force was justified — but videos of both incidents contradict those claims.

    When Lillie Salas saw the Illini Republicans’ post, her emotions fluctuated from disbelief to outrage. It’s jarring knowing that some of her classmates felt comfortable using phrases such as “foreign invaders” to refer to immigrants, the 22-year-old senior said.

    Citizens who stand against Trump’s immigration aren’t “traitors” either, she added. She said that type of rhetoric is “racist” and shouldn’t be acceptable on campus.

    “I honestly felt very concerned and scared,” Salas said. “It kind of hits differently to see groups so close to you spewing hate so outspokenly. … I know a lot of immigrants who are the most dedicated, hardworking people I’ve ever met in my life.”

    It’s a feeling Salas, who is Mexican American, said she’s grown accustomed to during Trump’s immigration crackdown. She’s sensed anxiety on campus, particularly with her Hispanic friends who’ve told her about feeling “frozen in time “and “stuck.”

    Cat Lodico, a 20-year-old sophomore, likewise, said she’s seen the stress her friends who are international students have faced in recent months. They worry that if they do or say the wrong thing, their visa will get revoked, and they won’t be able to continue their studies.

    U. of I. has one of the largest international student populations in the country. The Illini Republicans post calls immigrants without legal status “enemies of the American people.”

    “Although the main focus is studying and getting good grades and the normal college life,  because of what’s going on in the country now, there is that anxiety and worriedness in the back of everyone’s mind,” Lodico said, adding that her mom also immigrated to the U.S. from China.

    Lodico said as an engineering major, she’s not the most politically involved, but she tries to stay informed. Even still, she said she was shocked and “genuinely concerned” that people her age could agree with Illini Republicans’ post.

    “Saying we stand with enforcement of the law, like is it really lawful for random (immigration agents) to be killing other people,” she said. “I just feel like it’s so backward.”

    College campuses have increasingly become flashpoints in national debates over free speech.

    In the wake of mass student protests over the war in Gaza in 2024, Republican lawmakers have criticized elite colleges and progressive campus culture. The Trump administration froze millions in federal research funding at universities, including at Northwestern University, accusing them of failing to address antisemitism.

    Meanwhile, in September, the killing of Charlie Kirk — a right-wing activist and founder of Turning Point USA — ignited a surge of conservative activism on campuses.

    Lodico said it seems hypocritical for Illini Republicans to seemingly make light of the deaths of Pretti and Good, given the outcry over Kirk’s killing.

    “When people die from ICE suddenly it doesn’t matter? Suddenly it’s valid to shoot people? The logic is not logic-ing, you know,” she said.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

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  • Every Homeland Security Officer in Minneapolis Is Now Being Issued a Body-Worn Camera, Noem Says

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — Every Homeland Security officer on the ground, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, will be immediately issued body-worn cameras, Secretary Kristi Noem said Monday.

    Noem made the announcement on the social media platform X. She said the body-worn camera program is being expanded nationwide as funding becomes available.

    “We will rapidly acquire and deploy body cameras to DHS law enforcement across the country,” Noem said in the social media post.

    The news of the body cameras comes as Minneapolis has been the site of intense scrutiny over the conduct of immigration enforcement agents. There have been increased calls by critics of Homeland Security to require all of the department’s officers who are responsible for immigration enforcement to wear body cameras.

    President Joe Biden ordered in 2022 that federal law enforcement officers wear body cameras as part of an executive order that included other policing reform measures. President Donald Trump had rescinded that directive after starting his second term.

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

    Photos You Should See – January 2026

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  • Where things stand with the government shutdown and how soon it could end

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    NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!

    House Speaker Mike Johnson gave his prediction for when the partial government shutdown will end, as he fends off Democrats who are trying to kill funding for the Department of Homeland Security.

    Johnson appeared on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” on Sunday and said he is hopeful that the shutdown will end “at least” by Tuesday. The Senate on Friday passed a funding bill that separates DHS funding and allots a two-week window for Congress to debate that topic specifically, while allowing the rest of the government to trundle on.

    “I’m confident that we’ll do it at least by Tuesday,” Johnson said. “We have a logistical challenge of getting everyone in town and because of the conversation I had with Hakeem Jeffries, I know that we’ve got to pass a rule and probably do this mostly on our own.”

    House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries has said Democrats will not support the current version of the bill because it provides stopgap funding for the DHS through the two-week window of debate.

    TRUMP, SCHUMER REACH GOVERNMENT FUNDING DEAL, SACRIFICE DHS SPENDING BILL IN THE PROCESS

    Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., is hopeful the government shutdown will end by Tuesday. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

    “What is clear is that the Department of Homeland Security needs to be dramatically reformed,” Jeffries told ABC News on Sunday, adding that the Senate bill is a “meaningful step in the right direction.”

    Other Democrats were more obstinate, however, with Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., saying he refuses to “give more money to ICE agents as they’re violating our Constitutional rights.”

    The rebellion from House Democrats flouted the leadership of Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who negotiated the Senate deal with the White House.

    TENSIONS BOIL IN HOUSE OVER EMERGING SENATE DEAL TO AVERT GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN

    Hakeem Jeffries speaks at a press conference

    House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries split with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. (Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    Republicans first have to pass a procedural rule to bring the legislation forward. The House Rules Committee is set to consider the Senate bill on Monday.

    The bill must then survive a House-wide “rule vote,” a procedural test vote that normally falls on party lines, before voting on final passage.

    HOUSE CONSERVATIVES SKEPTICAL AS SENATE DEAL SACRIFICING DHS SPENDING REACHED: ‘NON-STARTER’

    CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

    The federal government has been in a partial shutdown since early Saturday morning after Congress failed to find a compromise on the yearly budget by the end of Jan. 30.

    Fox News’ Elizabeth Elkind contributed to this report.

    Anders Hagstrom is a reporter with Fox News Digital covering national politics and major breaking news events. Send tips to Anders.Hagstrom@Fox.com, or on X: @Hagstrom_Anders.

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  • ICE halts

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    U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement halted “all movement” at a detention center in Texas for families and quarantined some migrants there after medical staff confirmed two detainees had “active measles infections,” the Department of Homeland Security said Sunday.

    The measles cases at the Dilley Immigration Processing Center were detected Friday, Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement to CBS News. The ICE facility houses parents and children taken into federal custody over alleged violations of immigration law. It is located in south Texas, roughly an hour drive from San Antonio.

    “ICE Health Services Corps immediately took steps to quarantine and control further spread and infection, ceasing all movement within the facility and quarantining all individuals suspected of making contact with the infected,” McLaughlin said.

    McLaughlin said medical officials were monitoring detainees and taking “appropriate and active steps to prevent further infection.”

    “All detainees are being provided with proper medical care,” she added.

    Before McLaughlin’s statement on Sunday, immigration lawyers had reported concerns about a potential measles outbreak at the Dilley center.

    Neha Desai, a lawyer for the California-based National Center of Youth Law, which represents children in U.S. immigration custody, said she hopes the measles infections at Dilley are not used to “unnecessarily” prevent lawmakers and attorneys from inspecting the detention center in the near future, citing broader concerns about the facility.

    “In the meantime, we are deeply concerned for the physical and the mental health of every family detained at Dilley,” Desai said. “It is important to remember that no family needs to be detained — this is a choice that the administration is making.”

    In 2025, the United States saw the most measles cases in decades. Overall, the nation recorded more than 2,200 measles cases, including 762 people in a West Texas outbreak, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services. Two young children died and 99 people were hospitalized, according to state data.

    Dilley is the detention complex where ICE had been holding 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his father, both detained in Minnesota during an operation that garnered widespread outcry, until the family was released over the weekend due to a court ruling. Liam and his father returned to Minnesota on Sunday.

    ICE’s detention population has ballooned under the second Trump administration, which has vowed to stage a deportation crackdown of unprecedented proportions.

    ICE is currently holding more than 70,000 individuals facing deportation in detention centers across the U.S., according to government data obtained by CBS News. The vast majority are single adults accused of being in the U.S. illegally. The number is a massive jump from a year ago, when ICE was holding around 40,000 detainees. 

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  • "Who Can You Kill?" | Sunday on 60 Minutes

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    “Who can you kill?” and “When can you kill them?” Those are questions Republican Senator Rand Paul is asking after the death of two people in Minneapolis at the hands of federal immigration officers. He’s calling for an independent investigation. Scott Pelley reports, tonight.

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  • In Minneapolis, All-Encompassing Immigration Story Tests a Newsroom in Midst of Digital Transition

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    With the eyes of a nation fixed on the unrest in Minneapolis, the events haven’t left local journalists overmatched.

    Over the past month, the Minnesota Star Tribune has broken stories, including the identity of the immigration enforcement officer who shot Renee Good, and produced a variety of informative and instructive pieces. Richard Tsong-Taatarii’s photo of a prone demonstrator sprayed point-blank with a chemical irritant quickly became a defining image. The ICE actions have changed how the outlet presents the news.

    At a time when many regional newspapers have become hollowed-out shells due to the decline in journalism as a business, the Star Tribune has kept staffing relatively steady under billionaire Glen Taylor, who has owned it since 2014. It rebranded itself from the Minneapolis Star Tribune and committed itself to a digital transformation.

    It was ready for its moment.

    “If you hadn’t invested in the newsroom, you wouldn’t be able to react in that way,” said Steve Grove, publisher and chief executive.


    Minnesota’s robust journalism tradition

    The Star Tribune hasn’t operated in a vacuum. Minneapolis has a robust journalism tradition, particularly on public radio and television. Sahan Journal, a digital newsroom focusing on immigrants and diverse communities, has also distinguished itself covering President Donald Trump’s immigration efforts and the public response.

    “The whole ecosystem is pretty darn good,” said Kathleen Hennessey, senior vice president and editor of the Star Tribune, “and I think people are seeing that now.”

    While national outlets have made their presence felt, strong local teams offer advantages in such stories. The Star Tribune’s Josie Albertson-Grove was one of the first journalists on the scene after ICU nurse Alex Pretti was shot dead on Jan. 24. She lives about a block away, and her knowledge of the neighborhood and its people helped to reconstruct what happened.

    Journalists with kids in school learned about ICE efforts to target areas where children gather by hearing chatter among friends. While covering a beat like public safety can carry baggage, Star Tribune reporter Liz Sawyer developed sources that helped her, along with colleagues Andy Mannix and Sarah Nelson, report on who shot Good.

    Besides those contacts, the staff simply knows Minnesota better than outsiders, Hennessey said.

    “This is a place with a really, really long and entrenched tradition of activism, and a place with really deep social networks and neighborhood networks,” she said. “People mobilize quickly and passionately, and they’re noisy about it. That’s definitely been part of the story.”

    A Signal chat tipped Tsong-Taatarii about a demonstration growing raucous on Jan. 21. Upon arriving, he focused his lens on one protester knocked to the ground, leaving the photographer perfectly placed for his richly-detailed shot. Two officers hold the man face-down with arms on his back, while a third unleashes a chemical from a canister inches from his face. The bright yellow liquid streams onto his cheek and splatters onto the pavement.

    What some have called the sadistic cruelty involved in the episode outraged many who saw the photo. “I was just trying to document and present the evidence and let people decide for themselves,” Tsong-Taatarii said.


    ‘A badge to prove I belong’

    In one enterprising story, the Star Tribune’s Christopher Magan and Jeff Hargarten identified 240 of an estimated 3,000 immigrants rounded up in Minnesota, finding 80% had felony convictions but nearly all had been through the court system, been punished and were no longer sought by police. Hargarten and Jake Steinberg collaborated on a study of how the size of the federal force compared with that of local police.

    Columnist Laura Yuen wrote that her 80-year-old parents have begun carrying their passports when they leave their suburban townhouse, part of the “quiet, pervasive fear” in the Twin Cities. Yuen downloaded her own passport to carry on her phone. “A document that once made me proud of all the places I’ve traveled is now a badge to prove I belong,” she wrote.

    A piece by Kim Hyatt and Louis Krauss detailed the health consequences of chemical irritants used by law enforcement — or thought to be used, since questions about what specifically was deployed went unanswered.

    “I really think they’ve done a commendable job,” said Scott Libin, a veteran television newsman and journalism professor at the University of Minnesota. He praised the Star Tribune’s story about the criminal backgrounds of immigrants as thorough and dispassionate.

    Since Hennessey, a former Associated Press editor, began her job last May, the Star Tribune has experienced a run of big stories, including the shooting of two state lawmakers and a gunman opening fire at a Catholic school in Minneapolis. And, of course, “we have a newsroom that still has muscle memory from George Floyd ” in 2020, Grove said.

    News compelled fundamental shifts in the way the Star Tribune operates. Like some national outlets, it has rearranged staff to cover the story aggressively through a continuously updated live blog on its website, offered free to readers. There’s also a greater emphasis on video, with the Star Tribune doing forensic studies on footage from the Pretti and Good shootings, something few local newsrooms are equipped to do. Traffic to its website has gone up 50 percent, paid subscriptions have increased and the company is getting thousands of dollars in donations from across the country, Grove said.

    “People have changed the way that they consume news,” Hennessey said. “We see that readers are coming back. You know, they’re not just waking up in the morning, reading the site and then forgetting about us all day long. They’re coming back a couple of times a day to check in on what’s new.”

    Most people in the newsroom are contributing to the story, including the Star Tribune’s food and culture team, and its outdoor reporters. “There are no normal beats anymore,” Albertson-Grove said.


    A rapid transformation to a digital-first newsroom

    Under Grove, a former Google executive, the Star Tribune has attempted a digital-first transition, turning over about 20% of its staff in two years. The paper shut its Minneapolis printing plant in December, laying off 125 people, and moving print operations to Iowa.

    “We face every single headwind that every local news organization in the country does,” Grove said. “But we do feel fortunate that we’re the largest newsroom in the Midwest and it’s part of the reason we’re able to do this now.”

    As a reporter, Sawyer says the public response to the outlet’s work, sharing stories and images, has lifted her spirits. Readers see it as public service journalism. Still, she could use a break. She and her husband, Star Tribune photographer Aaron Lavinsky, have a baby daughter and make sure to stagger their coverage. They can’t both be tear-gassed or arrested at the same time; who makes the daycare pickup?

    “I think both residents and journalists in this town are running on fumes,” she said. “We’re tired of being in the international spotlight and it’s never for something positive. People are trying their best to get through this moment with grace.”

    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

    Photos You Should See – January 2026

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  • Judge orders 5-year-old detained in Minnesota and dad to be released from ICE detention in Texas

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    A federal judge in Texas on Saturday ordered 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his father to be released from immigration detention.

    Granting an emergency request filed by the family’s lawyer, U.S. District Judge Fred Biery directed government officials to release Adrian Alexander Conejo Ramos and his son, who were detained by ICE earlier this month in Minnesota, from immigration detention “as soon as practicable,” but no later than Tuesday, Feb. 3.

    Earlier in the week, Biery had blocked ICE from deporting Liam and his family or transferring them away from Texas, while the legal case unfolded.

    In an opinion accompanying his ruling, Biery said the detention of Liam and his father “has its genesis in the ill-conceived and incompetently-implemented government pursuit of daily deportation quotas, apparently even if it requires traumatizing children.”

    The judge also cited the Declaration of Independence, saying the government’s ignorance of it is “apparent.”

    Biery signed his opinion on Saturday with a photo of Liam seen wearing a blue bunny hat and his school backpack as he was being detained. The photo garnered national attention and sparked outrage.

    Liam Conejo Ramos, 5, is detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers after arriving home from preschool no Jan. 20, 2026, in a Minneapolis suburb. 

    Ali Daniels / AP


    Since their detention, Liam and his father have been held at the Dilley ICE detention center, a facility in Texas designed to house immigrant families with underage children who have been accused of violating federal immigration law.

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  • Judge says she won’t halt Minnesota immigration enforcement surge as a lawsuit proceeds

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    Judge says she won’t halt Minnesota immigration enforcement surge as a lawsuit proceeds

    The lawsuit sought a quick order to halt the enforcement action or limit its scope

    This 13 page document lays out DHS policy for use of force. Now these rules apply to Customs and Border Protection, ICE, and Secret Service and make it clear what protocols agents should follow before any use of force is applied. And while it’s easy to look back and replay video over and over after the fact, experts we talked to told us agents need to rely on these policies and training, especially in critical moments. Unfortunately, It, it’s for me as *** field office director, this all of this is very um upsetting. Darius Reeves, *** former ICE field office director, spent nearly 20 years with ICE and Homeland Security, *** time when he says their operations were not drawing public attention. No one had any idea about ICE. We were very professional, we were very clean, and this is. There are far too many US citizens being involved. What troubles Reeves now isn’t just the outcome of recent encounters, but whether ICE and Border Patrol are following their own use of force and de-escalation policies. When is use of force an option? If it’s an immediate Imminent threat. The National Investigative Unit reviewed the Department of Homeland Security’s use of force policy alongside video from the two recent killings of Alex Preddy and Renee Good and talked with experts including Reeves. DHS policy is clear officers should attempt de-escalation, issue verbal commands, reassess when resistance stops, and discontinue force once an incident is under control. Video from the encounter involving 30 seven-year-old Alex Preddy shows in the minute before the shooting, Preddy is recording from *** distance. Agents push *** woman who grabs onto Preddy. He’s then pushed. An agent pushes another woman near Preddy, who then steps in with an open hand up, then turns away from the agent as he’s sprayed with *** chemical. They continually sprayed him even when his back was to them, and then everybody piles on. Based on the video we’ve seen, in your opinion. Was deadly force used correctly on Alex Peretti? Absolutely not. The second case involving Renee Good raises *** different policy question. DHS rules place strict limits on the use of deadly force in and around vehicles. Mark Brown used to train ICE agents and explains the strict rules. The general practice was that They went away from shooting in the moving vehicles. Reeves and Brown add that incidents need to be carefully examined afterward to prevent future violations. Are we debriefing every day after, you know, to see, OK, what are we doing for our own accountability? This is *** major travesty, um. And you, you’re going to have to stick to the policy. The DHS policy states that every agent must be trained in use of force and de-escalation policies at least once *** year, and every 2 years they must conduct less than lethal force training. The policy we reviewed was last updated in 2023. Reporting in Washington, I’m national investigative correspondent John Cardinelli.

    Judge says she won’t halt Minnesota immigration enforcement surge as a lawsuit proceeds

    The lawsuit sought a quick order to halt the enforcement action or limit its scope

    Updated: 10:27 AM PST Jan 31, 2026

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    A federal judge says she won’t halt the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota and the Twin Cities as a lawsuit over it proceeds.Video above: Examining DHS use-of-force policiesA federal judge says she won’t halt the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota and the Twin Cities as a lawsuit over it proceeds.Judge Katherine M. Menendez on Saturday denied a preliminary injunction sought in a lawsuit filed this month by state Attorney General Keith Ellison and the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul.It argued that the Department of Homeland Security is violating constitutional protections. The lawsuit sought a quick order to halt the enforcement action or limit its scope. Lawyers with the U.S. Department of Justice have called the lawsuit “legally frivolous.”The ruling on the injunction focused on the argument by Minnesota officials that the federal government is violating the Constitution’s 10th Amendment, which limits the federal government’s powers to infringe on the sovereignty of states. In her ruling, the judge relied heavily on whether that argument was likely to ultimately succeed in court.The federal government argued that the surge, dubbed Operation Metro Surge, is necessary in its effort to take criminal immigrants off the streets and because federal efforts have been hindered by state and local “sanctuary laws and policies.” State and local officials argued that the surge is retaliation after the federal government’s initial attempts to withhold federal funding to try to force immigration cooperation failed.”Because there is evidence supporting both sides’ arguments as to motivation and the relative merits of each side’s competing positions are unclear, the Court is reluctant to find that the likelihood-of-success factor weighs sufficiently in favor of granting a preliminary injunction,” the judge said in the ruling.U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi took to social media Saturday to laud the ruling, calling it “another HUGE” legal win for the Justice Department on X.Federal officers have fatally shot two people on the streets of Minneapolis: Renee Good on Jan. 7 and Alex Pretti on Jan. 24.

    MINNEAPOLIS (AP) —

    A federal judge says she won’t halt the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota and the Twin Cities as a lawsuit over it proceeds.

    Video above: Examining DHS use-of-force policies

    A federal judge says she won’t halt the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota and the Twin Cities as a lawsuit over it proceeds.

    Judge Katherine M. Menendez on Saturday denied a preliminary injunction sought in a lawsuit filed this month by state Attorney General Keith Ellison and the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul.

    It argued that the Department of Homeland Security is violating constitutional protections. The lawsuit sought a quick order to halt the enforcement action or limit its scope. Lawyers with the U.S. Department of Justice have called the lawsuit “legally frivolous.”

    The ruling on the injunction focused on the argument by Minnesota officials that the federal government is violating the Constitution’s 10th Amendment, which limits the federal government’s powers to infringe on the sovereignty of states. In her ruling, the judge relied heavily on whether that argument was likely to ultimately succeed in court.

    The federal government argued that the surge, dubbed Operation Metro Surge, is necessary in its effort to take criminal immigrants off the streets and because federal efforts have been hindered by state and local “sanctuary laws and policies.” State and local officials argued that the surge is retaliation after the federal government’s initial attempts to withhold federal funding to try to force immigration cooperation failed.

    “Because there is evidence supporting both sides’ arguments as to motivation and the relative merits of each side’s competing positions are unclear, the Court is reluctant to find that the likelihood-of-success factor weighs sufficiently in favor of granting a preliminary injunction,” the judge said in the ruling.

    U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi took to social media Saturday to laud the ruling, calling it “another HUGE” legal win for the Justice Department on X.

    Federal officers have fatally shot two people on the streets of Minneapolis: Renee Good on Jan. 7 and Alex Pretti on Jan. 24.

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  • Judge says she won’t halt Minnesota immigration enforcement surge as a lawsuit proceeds

    [ad_1]

    Judge says she won’t halt Minnesota immigration enforcement surge as a lawsuit proceeds

    The lawsuit sought a quick order to halt the enforcement action or limit its scope

    This 13 page document lays out DHS policy for use of force. Now these rules apply to Customs and Border Protection, ICE, and Secret Service and make it clear what protocols agents should follow before any use of force is applied. And while it’s easy to look back and replay video over and over after the fact, experts we talked to told us agents need to rely on these policies and training, especially in critical moments. Unfortunately, It, it’s for me as *** field office director, this all of this is very um upsetting. Darius Reeves, *** former ICE field office director, spent nearly 20 years with ICE and Homeland Security, *** time when he says their operations were not drawing public attention. No one had any idea about ICE. We were very professional, we were very clean, and this is. There are far too many US citizens being involved. What troubles Reeves now isn’t just the outcome of recent encounters, but whether ICE and Border Patrol are following their own use of force and de-escalation policies. When is use of force an option? If it’s an immediate Imminent threat. The National Investigative Unit reviewed the Department of Homeland Security’s use of force policy alongside video from the two recent killings of Alex Preddy and Renee Good and talked with experts including Reeves. DHS policy is clear officers should attempt de-escalation, issue verbal commands, reassess when resistance stops, and discontinue force once an incident is under control. Video from the encounter involving 30 seven-year-old Alex Preddy shows in the minute before the shooting, Preddy is recording from *** distance. Agents push *** woman who grabs onto Preddy. He’s then pushed. An agent pushes another woman near Preddy, who then steps in with an open hand up, then turns away from the agent as he’s sprayed with *** chemical. They continually sprayed him even when his back was to them, and then everybody piles on. Based on the video we’ve seen, in your opinion. Was deadly force used correctly on Alex Peretti? Absolutely not. The second case involving Renee Good raises *** different policy question. DHS rules place strict limits on the use of deadly force in and around vehicles. Mark Brown used to train ICE agents and explains the strict rules. The general practice was that They went away from shooting in the moving vehicles. Reeves and Brown add that incidents need to be carefully examined afterward to prevent future violations. Are we debriefing every day after, you know, to see, OK, what are we doing for our own accountability? This is *** major travesty, um. And you, you’re going to have to stick to the policy. The DHS policy states that every agent must be trained in use of force and de-escalation policies at least once *** year, and every 2 years they must conduct less than lethal force training. The policy we reviewed was last updated in 2023. Reporting in Washington, I’m national investigative correspondent John Cardinelli.

    Judge says she won’t halt Minnesota immigration enforcement surge as a lawsuit proceeds

    The lawsuit sought a quick order to halt the enforcement action or limit its scope

    Updated: 1:27 PM EST Jan 31, 2026

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    A federal judge says she won’t halt the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota and the Twin Cities as a lawsuit over it proceeds.Video above: Examining DHS use-of-force policiesA federal judge says she won’t halt the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota and the Twin Cities as a lawsuit over it proceeds.Judge Katherine M. Menendez on Saturday denied a preliminary injunction sought in a lawsuit filed this month by state Attorney General Keith Ellison and the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul.It argued that the Department of Homeland Security is violating constitutional protections. The lawsuit sought a quick order to halt the enforcement action or limit its scope. Lawyers with the U.S. Department of Justice have called the lawsuit “legally frivolous.”The ruling on the injunction focused on the argument by Minnesota officials that the federal government is violating the Constitution’s 10th Amendment, which limits the federal government’s powers to infringe on the sovereignty of states. In her ruling, the judge relied heavily on whether that argument was likely to ultimately succeed in court.The federal government argued that the surge, dubbed Operation Metro Surge, is necessary in its effort to take criminal immigrants off the streets and because federal efforts have been hindered by state and local “sanctuary laws and policies.” State and local officials argued that the surge is retaliation after the federal government’s initial attempts to withhold federal funding to try to force immigration cooperation failed.”Because there is evidence supporting both sides’ arguments as to motivation and the relative merits of each side’s competing positions are unclear, the Court is reluctant to find that the likelihood-of-success factor weighs sufficiently in favor of granting a preliminary injunction,” the judge said in the ruling.U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi took to social media Saturday to laud the ruling, calling it “another HUGE” legal win for the Justice Department on X.Federal officers have fatally shot two people on the streets of Minneapolis: Renee Good on Jan. 7 and Alex Pretti on Jan. 24.

    MINNEAPOLIS (AP) —

    A federal judge says she won’t halt the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota and the Twin Cities as a lawsuit over it proceeds.

    Video above: Examining DHS use-of-force policies

    A federal judge says she won’t halt the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota and the Twin Cities as a lawsuit over it proceeds.

    Judge Katherine M. Menendez on Saturday denied a preliminary injunction sought in a lawsuit filed this month by state Attorney General Keith Ellison and the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul.

    It argued that the Department of Homeland Security is violating constitutional protections. The lawsuit sought a quick order to halt the enforcement action or limit its scope. Lawyers with the U.S. Department of Justice have called the lawsuit “legally frivolous.”

    The ruling on the injunction focused on the argument by Minnesota officials that the federal government is violating the Constitution’s 10th Amendment, which limits the federal government’s powers to infringe on the sovereignty of states. In her ruling, the judge relied heavily on whether that argument was likely to ultimately succeed in court.

    The federal government argued that the surge, dubbed Operation Metro Surge, is necessary in its effort to take criminal immigrants off the streets and because federal efforts have been hindered by state and local “sanctuary laws and policies.” State and local officials argued that the surge is retaliation after the federal government’s initial attempts to withhold federal funding to try to force immigration cooperation failed.

    “Because there is evidence supporting both sides’ arguments as to motivation and the relative merits of each side’s competing positions are unclear, the Court is reluctant to find that the likelihood-of-success factor weighs sufficiently in favor of granting a preliminary injunction,” the judge said in the ruling.

    U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi took to social media Saturday to laud the ruling, calling it “another HUGE” legal win for the Justice Department on X.

    Federal officers have fatally shot two people on the streets of Minneapolis: Renee Good on Jan. 7 and Alex Pretti on Jan. 24.

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  • Agents were pursuing an immigrant when they killed Alex Pretti. Now, he shares his story.

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    Jose Huerta Chuma is a man in hiding — and he’s also a man in distress. He’s been replaying the fatal shooting of Minneapolis resident Alex Pretti over and over again in his mind, wondering if he could have done something differently and if there’s something that “would have saved that life.”

    The 41-year-old immigrant from Ecuador, who said he has been in the U.S. for over two decades, described witnessing the shooting after hiding inside a local business. The Department of Homeland Security has described Huerta Chuma as a criminal living in the U.S. illegally who was the target of the Border Patrol operation that led to the encounter with Pretti on Saturday, Jan. 24.

    “I think, maybe if I hadn’t gone to that place, or I don’t know, a little later or a little earlier, I mean, that never would have happened,” Huerta Chuma told CBS News during a phone interview conducted in Spanish.

    Asked if he feels some sense of guilt, he said, while crying, his voice fraught with emotion: “I do feel guilty, I do feel bad. I saw stories about the man and I saw a very good person.”

    DHS officials have described Huerta Chuma as a “violent criminal illegal alien” on the loose. Documents reviewed by CBS News indicate Huerta Chuma’s record includes traffic violations, and that he pleaded guilty to a disorderly conduct misdemeanor offense in 2018. The New York Times reported, citing Minnesota court documents, that the plea was linked to a domestic violence arrest, and that the offense was later expunged.

    Huerta Chuma said the domestic violence case stemmed from an argument with his partner at the time. The Minnesota Department of Corrections said in a statement that Huerta Chuma has never been in the state’s prison system and that it did not find felony convictions in his case. 

    CBS News reached out to representatives for DHS seeking comment about Huerta Chuma’s record and whether officials are still pursuing him.

    A shooting witnessed from a hiding spot

    In his first public comments, Huerta Chuma told CBS News he immigrated from Ecuador in the early 2000s, in his twenties. Before Pretti’s shooting upended his life, he was raising his American-born children while working as a rideshare driver. 

    “I’m not a criminal. I just was working that day,” he said. “I was going to pick up the delivery.”

    Huerta Chuma said he was on his way to pick up a delivery order around 8:18 a.m. on Jan. 24 in south Minneapolis. (He showed CBS News screenshots of the route from that morning indicating he was in the area where the shooting happened.) It was a routine delivery, similar to the almost 20,000 rides he had done over nearly six years.

    As he was driving down Nicollet Avenue, Huerta Chuma said he passed a car driving in the opposite direction.

    “One agent was staring at me, but I just blinked my eyes and said, ‘God, they’re immigration,’” Huerta Chuma recalled.

    “So, when I looked in the mirror, they turned around immediately.” 

    Huerta Chuma said the agents, who were in a red car without license plates, started to follow him.

    “I didn’t run or anything, I left very calm,” he said. “I saw they were with ICE. I knew in my head they were ICE because they turned around so quickly when they [saw] my face.” 

    Huerta Chuma said he parked his car, got out, and left the vehicle running. He said federal agents started to follow him, and a man at a local business let him inside, locking the door behind him. Huerta Chuma said he hid there for about 4 hours.

    Huerta Chuma said he saw Pretti show up and start filming, and he saw a Border Patrol agent push a woman nearby. He said he saw the agents tackle Pretti to the ground and take his gun. 

    “It all happened so fast,” he said, noting he did not see Pretti trying to hurt the agents or reach for his firearm. 

    Then he described the rapid-fire shots: “Tac, tac, tac, tac, tac, tac.” 

    Huerta Chuma said he watched the ambulance arrive, but knew it was too late. He said he saw federal agents write down his license plate. Then he left. 

    “It felt horrible. To be watching and not being able to do anything,” Huerta Chuma said. “I don’t know how long I will be like this.”

    Initial public statements at odds with evidence, official report 

    Immediately after the shooting Huerta Chuma witnessed, DHS officials made sweeping statements about Pretti and his actions, some of which have since been directly contradicted by videos, witness accounts and a preliminary government report. 

    DHS initially said one Border Patrol agent fired “defensive shots” after Pretti “approached” agents with his firearm. The department suggested, without citing concrete evidence, that Pretti intended to “massacre” federal agents.

    A report to Congress obtained by CBS News earlier this week found that two U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents fired their weapons during the Jan. 24 shooting. The report, based on a “preliminary review” by CBP’s Office of Professional Responsibility, also did not mention Pretti reaching for his firearm.

    Video analyzed by CBS News shows an agent had removed the gun from Pretti’s waistband one second before another agent fired the first shot.

    Border Patrol official Gregory Bovino, who has since been reassigned following the bipartisan backlash triggered by Pretti’s killing, described Huerta Chuma as an “illegal alien” during a press conference hours after the deadly shooting. Pointing to a booking photo, Bovino said Huerta Chuma’s record included “domestic assault,” “disorderly conduct” and “driving without a license.”

    In a statement two days later, DHS branded Huerta Chuma a “violent criminal illegal alien” who remained “at large,” asking the public to call a government hotline with any tips regarding his whereabouts. 

    Huerta Chuma said the government was displaying an older picture from after he was arrested in 2018 during an altercation with his wife. 

    Out of work and on the run

    Huerta Chuma did not reveal his whereabouts to CBS News. He said he was worried about his safety, his work and what would happen to his three children born in the U.S. Huerta Chuma said he has two children, ages 11 and 15, who live with him, and another child, a 3-year-old, who lives with the mother. CBS News attempted to reach the children’s mother but did not receive a response. 

    Information accessed through the Justice Department’s immigration court system says Huerta Chuma’s deportation case was administratively closed in May 2022. The immigration court records do not list a deportation order. Huerta Chuma said he has since applied for a “U visa,” designed to protect immigrants who are victims of crimes and who have assisted law enforcement investigations.

    It’s unclear exactly when and how Huerta Chuma first entered the U.S. Huerta Chuma said he has another child living in Ecuador. Court records indicate that Huerta Chuma does not have a criminal record in his native country. 

    Huerta Chuma said he started working as a rideshare driver so he could have a flexible schedule and be available for his children. But since the shooting, he said, he hasn’t worked, and is rarely eating or sleeping. He said he is continuing to hide.

    Though he’s scared about getting arrested, Huerta Chuma said the main source of his consternation is Pretti’s death. 

    “I’m very devastated, spiritually. Why did they kill the man? He didn’t do anything,” he said. “I was there. I was there. I saw everything.”

    José Diaz contributed to this report.

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  • TurnSignl app helps provide on-demand legal help to people stopped by ICE

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    Amid ongoing immigration operations in Minnesota, a local company is filling a desperate need for on-demand legal help.

    TurnSignl was started in 2020 by attorney and former mayoral candidate Jazz Hampton. He developed it after George Floyd was murdered, to connect drivers to an attorney when they’ve been pulled over. But now they’re filling another huge void: on-demand legal help for people stopped by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

    “They’re doing the review of cases in Texas and then they’re finding out, oh this person does have legal status we have to send them back,” said Hampton. “The level of disorganization is, to me, startling.”

    He recently waited inside the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building for 90 minutes, only to find out his client, who was returned from Texas, was in a rural Minnesota jail. 

    “Finally an agent just took down the person I was looking for – their name and went and called throughout the cells to try to find that person,” said Hampton.

    He says his client is someone who never should have been picked up by ICE in the first place.

    “This is a situation where it was someone who was actively seeking asylum and having a pending case. They had work papers and were actively working, contributing to our society and paying taxes. They were picked up, taken to another state, returned back to this state, and then the family was just trying to figure out where they were,” said Hampton.

    WCCO asked if he felt federal immigration agents are following the law.

    WCCO


    “Absolutely not,” he said. “I believe ICE is acting unconstitutionally in our streets continuously,” said Hampton.

    But he’s also making sure more people have access to attorneys like him.

    “It’s all hands on deck in this moment,” said Hampton. “There’s a leveling of knowledge and playing field that happens when an attorney’s present and that driver can say, ‘I’m talking to an immigration attorney right now,’ and they said, ‘These papers are sufficient. I’m going to hand them to you,’” said Hampton.

    Here’s how it works: Say you’re pulled over by an ICE agent. You would just open the app and it will connect you with a live attorney. The app even has translation services.

    “This is being saved directly to the cloud so even if your phone is lost, damaged, stolen or anything in between, it’s going to save that video for you and you’ll always have access to it,” said Hampton.

    The app also gives the attorney location information on where you are as a user. Translated captions are available in 50 languages, removing the language barrier.

    There are sponsors for people who can’t afford the service, so all who need it have access to a legal lifeline in the face of an immigration crackdown.

    “We just try to give courage that we will go there and fight as much as we can,” said Hampton, adding that we are in uncharted territory.

    Hampton says several large employers are providing this service for employees. If you’d like to do the same or donate memberships to others you can do that too. A subscription is $99 a year for unlimited access.

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    Erin Hassanzadeh

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