“It’s going to happen again”: Residents say ICE is treating Minneapolis as a “war zone”

In the wake of the killing of Renee Nicole Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer last week, Minneapolis residents warn that the Trump administration has expanded their use of deadly tactics while threatening residents with the specter of Good’s killing.

Since ICE officer Jonathan Ross killed Good last week, ICE has escalated its violence in the Twin Cities as conservatives around the country rally behind Ross. Activists on the ground in Minneapolis say that ICE is treating the city like a “war zone.”

In the days since Good was killed, reports and videos from Minneapolis have emerged showing ICE’s increasingly violent tactics and menacing residents with threats of violence and deadly force.

In one video, an ICE officer threatens an observer, saying, “Did you not learn from what just happened?” in an apparent allusion to ICE’s killing of Good. The video shows that ICE officers had boxed in the driver before threatening him. This is not the only video circulating where ICE officers have apparently alluded to the ICE killing of Good.

Another report from Sahan Journal, a local outlet, detailed the story of a Latino resident whose car was rammed by ICE before officers asked about his immigration status. When observers gathered, the ICE officers deployed chemical irritants.

In another report from local affiliate Fox 9, a pastor described an ICE officer waving a gun in his face, asking, “Are you afraid now?” before handcuffing him and detaining him in an SUV. The officers then returned four times to ask “Are you afraid now?” before releasing him, saying, “You’re white and that wouldn’t be any fun anyway, so you can go.”

A video reviewed by Salon shows ICE officers tackling and abducting a man at an area Walmart. According to the person who recorded the video, ICE didn’t ask any questions before doing so.

Yet another video reviewed by Salon shows a black truck, allegedly driven by an ICE officer, plowing into a crowd of protesters — the exact sort of behavior that the administration accused Good of doing and labeled “domestic terrorism.” A note accompanying the video alleged that the driver stopped because they had hit a cyclist, pushing him into an intersection.

Drew Harmon, an organizer with Minnesota 50501, a state-level branch of the progressive grassroots organization, said that ICE officers are treating the city like a “war zone,” saying “it’s going to happen again,” referring to another potential killing by ICE officers.

“However, they’re coming into our city, and as you can see from the photos, they are treating it like a war zone,” Harmon said. “They are cosplayers and LARPers, essentially dressed in their bulletproof vests, dressed in their military helmets and fatigues, carrying live weapons with live ammo and more crowd control utilities than they could ever need. So they’re coming and treating it as if we’re enemy combatants. It’s no surprise that somebody got murdered, and if anything, we are surprised it took that long for it to happen.”

Harmon said that he was on the scene around half an hour after an ICE officer shot Good last Wednesday, and that the situation has only deteriorated since then as ICE escalates operations in the Twin Cities.

“We’ve been saying for some time, it’s not ‘if but when’ someone gets killed, and it finally happened. And it’s going to happen again until they leave, because ICE has only been escalating things,” Harmon said.

Harmon said that ICE’s presence, especially in south Minneapolis, has become pervasive to the point where residents are bound to encounter ICE.

“This is what fascism looks like and feels like to live under,” Harmon said. “They started going door to door, knocking on people’s doors. In some instances, they have raided homes without the people answering.”

As it stands, ICE officers outnumber local police officers about two to one, with the Minneapolis and St. Paul police departments having just shy of 1,200 sworn officers between them. The Trump administration has already deployed some 2,000 ICE officers to the area, and committed another 1,000 officers on Monday.

ICE has also expanded who the agency targets to include not just suspected noncitizens, but also anyone who opposes their agenda, according to multiple people on the ground in Minneapolis.

One shows ICE officers breaking into someone’s care before abducting at least two people and abandoning the car on the roadside. ICE officers are then seen threatening bystanders, saying, “You’re not going to like the outcome.”

Another video reviewed by Salon appears to show the aftermath of a similar incident, with the person who took the video saying that they were on a call with the driver when ICE was breaking into his car. The video shows two cars with their windows smashed and the riders gone. Per the video, six observers were taken by ICE.

Lisa Erbes, a co-leader for the grassroots organization Indivisible Twin Cities, told Salon that “they’re targeting pretty much anybody that is even trying to just help.”

Erbes recounted an incident in which ICE officers had rammed someone’s car, and the driver had been injured. When a bystander who happened to be a nurse attempted to provide aid to the driver, officers shot at her with rubber bullets and deployed a chemical irritant. The incident, Erbes said, echoed ICE’s behavior in the wake of Good’s death, when she was blocked from receiving immediate medical care.

“These agents are out of control. They’re untrained, they’re trigger-happy. They want to bash heads,” Erbes said. “I don’t know where they’re finding these guys, but they’re dangerous.”

Erbes said that ICE’s rash of violence across the city has resulted in police departments being overwhelmed by calls. Neither the Minneapolis nor St. Paul police departments immediately responded to Salon’s request for comment.

The police department’s reaction to the situation has also divided protesters. One 50501 volunteer in the area, who requested not to be named for fear of reprisal, described frustration with the police, who have had a strained relationship with the community, especially since the 2020 murder of George Floyd by police.

“Why are you protecting the people who are terrorizing our neighborhoods when it looks like they’re facing us? You know, they’re facing the protesters and not facing ICE. They’re not showing us their ass. They’re showing us their guns,” the volunteer told Salon, noting that police have appeared with riot gear less frequently as time has passed.

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ICE’s operations in Minneapolis have also stoked right-wing activists. Video from Mercado Media showed a car containing right-wing influencer Nick Sortor and others hitting multiple people with his car before driving away. Sortor, without evidence, claimed that the protesters were “attempting to kill me.” Sortor later complained that he was detained, saying “these idiots called the police on me, saying I had a gun and was ‘running innocent protestors over.’” The video shows his car plowing past multiple people before leaving. In one video, the person who recorded the video explains that the crowd had gathered around Sortor’s car after he had hit another female protester with his car. Sortor also claimed that protesters smashed his windows, though his windows are seen intact as he drives away.

More broadly, conservatives have rallied around Ross, the man who shot Good. Vice President JD Vance declared that the killer was “protected by absolute immunity.” Meanwhile, other conservatives have donated more than $630,000 to a GoFundMe campaign supporting the killer, with the creator writing that he was “1000 percent justified.” Right-wing billionaire Bill Ackman donated $10,000.

Emboldened by ICE’s presence in the city, and the ongoing right-wing attacks on the city’s Somali immigrant population, far-right Christian nationalists have planned a rally at the federal building in Minneapolis for Jan. 17, with the leader of the event, Jake Lang, a white supremacist, antisemite and GOP candidate for Senate in Florida, promising to attend. “Unless we have leadership, real men, to stand up in this country … we will see entire cities like Minneapolis fall to Islam,” Lang said at a recent event.

ICE did not respond to a request for comment from Salon.

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