Thousands demonstrate in Minnesota and across US to protest against ICE
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Protestors march during a "nationwide shutdown" demonstration against ICE enforcement on in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Jan 30.
PHOTO: AFP
MINNEAPOLIS - Thousands of protesters took to the streets in Minneapolis,
Students and teachers abandoned classes from California to New York on a national day of protest, which came amid mixed messages from the Trump administration
Under a national immigration crackdown, US President Donald Trump has sent 3,000 federal officers to the Minneapolis area who are patrolling the streets in tactical gear, a force five times the size of the Minneapolis Police Department.
Protesting against the surge and the tactics used by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), several thousand people gathered in downtown Minneapolis in sub-zero temperatures, including families with small children, elderly couples and young community activists.
Ms Katia Kagan, wearing a “No ICE” sweatshirt and holding a sign demanding the agency leave the city, said she was the daughter of Russian Jews who immigrated to America seeking safety and a better life. “I’m out here because I’m going to fight for the American dream that my parents came here for,” she said.
Ms Kim, a 65-year-old meditation coach who asked that her last name not be used, called the surge a “full-on fascist attack of our federal government on citizens”.
In a Minneapolis neighbourhood near the sites where Mr Alex Pretti and Ms Renee Good, two US citizens, were fatally shot in January by federal immigration agents, about 50 teachers and staff members from local schools turned out to march.
Rock star Bruce Springsteen lent his voice to the protest, taking the stage at a fund raiser for Mr Good and Ms Pretti in downtown Minneapolis and playing his new song Streets Of Minneapolis, written in response to the deaths.
Protests stretched well beyond Minnesota as organisers forecast 250 demonstrations across 46 states and in major cities such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Washington under the slogan: “No work. No school. No shopping. Stop funding ICE.”
Mr Trump in turn offered a vote of confidence for Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, whose department oversees ICE.
Critics have called for her resignation but Mr Trump said on social media that Ms Noem “has done a really GREAT JOB!”, asserting that “The Border disaster that I inherited is fixed”.
Local FBI chief forced out
Meanwhile, events in Minneapolis reverberated through the federal government.
The acting head of the Minneapolis Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) field office, Mr Jarrad Smith, was removed from his post, according to two sources familiar with the move. Mr Smith was reassigned to FBI headquarters in Washington, according to one of the sources.
The Minneapolis field office has been involved in the federal surge as well as investigations into the Pretti shooting and a church protest that led to charges against former CNN anchor Don Lemon.
The FBI arrested Lemon on Jan 30, and the Justice Department charged him with violating federal law during a protest inside a St Paul, Minnesota, church earlier in January in what his lawyer called an attack on press freedom.
After pleading not guilty, Lemon told reporters: “I will not be silenced. I look forward to my day in court.”
The New York Times, citing an internal ICE memo it reviewed, reported on Jan 30 that federal agents were told this week they have broader powers to arrest people without a warrant, expanding the ability of lower-level ICE agents to carry out sweeps, rounding up suspected undocumented immigrants they encounter.
Backlash against the administration’s immigration policy also threatened to spark a partial US government shutdown as Democrats in Congress opposed funding for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE.
Public opinion shifts
Weeks of viral videos showing the aggressive tactics of heavily armed and masked agents on the streets of Minneapolis have driven public approval of Mr Trump’s immigration policy to the lowest level of his second term, a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll showed.
As uproar over the ICE operation grew, Mr Trump’s border czar, Mr Tom Homan, was dispatched to Minneapolis, saying his officers would return to more targeted operations, rather than the broad street sweeps that have led to clashes with protesters.
Echoing protesters’ sentiments, Minnesota’s Democratic Governor Tim Walz on Jan 30 questioned whether that would happen and said more drastic changes were needed. “The only way to ensure the safety of the people of Minnesota is for the federal government to draw down their forces and end this campaign of brutality,” Mr Walz said on X.
Mr Trump said earlier this week he wanted to “de-escalate a bit” but when asked by reporters on Jan 29 if he was pulling back, he said: “Not at all.”
In Aurora, Colorado, public schools closed on Jan 30 due to large anticipated teacher and student absences. The Denver suburb saw intense immigration raids in 2025 after Mr Trump claimed it was a “war zone” overrun by Venezuelan gangs.
In Tucson, Arizona, at least 20 schools cancelled classes in anticipation of mass absences of students and employees.
At DePaul University in Chicago, protest signs read “sanctuary campus” and “fascists not welcome here”.
High school students bearing anti-ICE signs staged a walkout in Long Beach, California. In Brooklyn, a long parade of high school-age protesters marched and chanted anti-ICE obscenities. REUTERS
