Video shows traumatic moments for a teenager in Northfield, MN as ICE agents detain his father Tuesday afternoon. Witnesses claim that ICE provided no explanation during as they restrained the 41-year-old man from Mexico, and at time of publishing, ICE was not able to tell WCCO why this man is now separated from his family.
While WCCO has not been able to independently verify what happened before, the video shot by the man’s son begins with several masked ICE agents apparently trying to grab the man in the passenger seat of a car stopped on Washington Street in Northfield. It’s a quiet residential neighborhood left shaken by the incident, with witnesses saying an ICE agent shattered the car window while others drew firearms.
The teenage boy can be heard pleading with agents as they restrain his father and bring him to the ground. One of them tells the boy and other onlookers that they had waited “fifteen minutes” as the man and other unidentified occupants refused to open the window. According to a witness, the man’s family was waiting for a lawyer to arrive when agents smashed the window.
Northfield Police Chief Jeff Schroepfer put out a statement after WCCO contacted him. He confirmed that while officers responded to a 911 call related to the ICE detainment, they did not get involved in any capacity per department policy.
“We do not have the authority to interject ourselves into a federal investigation. I will not comment on the tactics or actions of ICE agents, as I do not have information regarding the background, circumstances, or history of the individual or investigation involved,” Schroepfer said in part.
While the family declined to be identified by name, loved ones said that the man is originally from Mexico. Krissa Anderson, who said she volunteers at local schools to assist with language learning, said that she worked with the man’s son in class last year. Anderson said that he is a hardworking man trying to provide for his family with two local jobs.
“Normally if somebody is arrested in our town there’s a public record of it and we can look it up and see what happened,” Anderson said, “in this situation there were unidentified men with no uniforms and no ID that came and took somebody and we didn’t know where he was going or what was happening.”
While a spokesperson for ICE confirmed they were working on WCCO’s inquiry, the agency did not provide any details about the arrest as of Wednesday evening.
In late October, Secretary of Homeland Scurity Kristi Noem came to Minneapolis to provide what they described as an update on ICE operations in the Twin Cities region. Noem claimed that federal agents had arrested more than 4,300 people in the metro area by that point in the year, claiming 3,316 had a criminal history.
In a recent 60 Minutes interview with Nora O’Donnell, President Donald Trump said he believed ICE raids “haven’t gone far enough” when asked about footage of ICE detaining legal American citizens, tear gassing a Chicago residential neighborhood and smashing a car window.
Family said that they have received conflicting reports about where the man from Northfield is now held. This is a developing story.
Conor Wight
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