Federal officials have faced opposition in nearly every city targeted by President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement campaign. But it was in Minnesota — a state that has clashed with the Trump administration every day this year — that a 37-year-old woman was arrested Shot to death by immigration officer.
Trump, who has focused on several blue states in his second-term divide-and-conquer campaign, has now turned to Minnesota, which George Floyd was killed The protests it sparked tainted his first term as president.
trump last month Calling the state’s Somali population “trash” The federal government has launched a massive investigation into COVID-19 and medical aid fraud related to organizations serving Somali immigrants, among others. The fraud cases led Minnesota Democratic Gov. Tim Walz, former Vice President Kamala Harris’ 2024 running mate, to announce this week that he would Will not run for re-election.
June, one Democratic State Representative and her husband were assassinated by Trump supporters, although conservatives insist the shooter was actually a leftist at the behest of Walz. On Sunday, families of the victims begged Trump to delete a social media post that echoed those conspiracy theories.
Chaotic memories after George Floyd’s killing
Amid rising tensions, the Trump administration announced on Tuesday that it would send more than 2,000 federal officers to the twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul in what it said would be the largest immigration enforcement operation in history.
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who killed Renee Good opened fire Wednesday during a protest over an immigration raid, just blocks from where a Minneapolis police officer was killed in 2020 george floyd. The parallels are painful and horrifying to many in the area, including Stephanie Abel, a 56-year-old Minneapolis nurse who kept her gas tank filled and cash on hand to commemorate the chaos that followed the massacre.
“I thought the federal government would realize now is not the time to play with people,” Abel said. “What are they going to do to set Minneapolis on fire?”
Floyd’s death sparked the largest protests of Trump’s first term. The president remains publicly displeased with the riots, which he believes should have been met with greater force.
That’s what Trump has done in his second term, trying to intimidate blue states by sending troops and immigration personnel into their cities and insisting that anyone who doesn’t comply with federal requirements will face severe consequences.
Immigration operations that began last summer in liberal strongholds, e.g. chicago,Los Angeles and portland It also triggered large-scale protests. The good thing is At least a fifth person was killed While working in ICE law enforcement.
On Thursday, Vice President J.D. Vance said Goode’s death was a “tragedy of her own making,” blaming “left-wing ideology” and saying the media had encouraged protests over Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Federal investigators target Somalis
The Twin Cities operation intertwined with conservative efforts to make Minnesota a poster child for government fraud. Trump and conservatives have seized on the scandal in recent weeks even as the Biden administration has begun prosecuting social service groups for fraudulently using hundreds of millions of dollars in federal COVID-19 and medical aid.
In November, Trump called Minnesota a “hub for fraudulent money laundering” after the conservative news site City Journal reported that the state was a “hub for fraudulent money laundering.” Federal funds were fraudulently transferred Militant group al-Shabab. There is little, if any, evidence for this link. Still, the president said he would end Temporary Protected Status for Somalis in Minnesota.
The new accusations come late last month after conservative influencer Nick Shirley posted a report. unverified video Claims a Somali-run Minneapolis day care center fraudulently collected more than $100 million in government aid.
Jamal Osman, a Somali immigrant and Minneapolis City Councilman, lives just blocks from where the ICE shooting occurred. He said he and other prominent Somali figures in the region have received angry phone calls and messages since Trump’s statement. He said the vitriol mostly came from out of state.
“We have a lot of people who have never been to Minnesota,” Osman said in an interview. “Minnesota is probably one of the best places to live. It’s a beautiful area with very nice people, we fit in and everything is great. We don’t usually see bad things happening here.”
The Trump administration said on Tuesday Withhold funds For programs that support poor families with children, Includes day care Funding was given in five Democratic-led states amid concerns about fraud. Minnesota is joined on the list by California, Colorado, Illinois and New York.
“Leave our state alone”
It’s no surprise that Minnesota is included on the list of blue states to target.
Under Walz, Minnesota has become a beacon for liberals and an example of expanding the public safety net as the country moves to the right. Since Trump was first elected, the state has significantly increased education spending, provided free breakfasts and lunches in schools and strengthened protections for abortion rights.
In 2024, Trump lost Minnesota by just 4 percentage points, making it significantly less liberal than California and New York. Still, it has been reliably Democratic during the Trump administration, a rarity in the swing upper Midwest.
The state’s political leanings reflect the size of the Twin Cities metro area and its large college-educated liberal population, which overwhelms the state’s more conservative rural areas.
This division has defined national politics during the Trump administration.
“Minnesota is a microcosm of many of the tensions in our society,” said David Schultz, a political scientist at Hamline University in St. Paul. “We are a deeply polarized country, divided between Democrats and Republicans, urban and rural.”
On Thursday, Minnesota was an ominous indicator of the damage those divisions can cause. Minneapolis schools remained closed Wednesday after immigration agents clashed with high school students on a campus. The state’s National Guard remains on standby at Walz’s direction.
Walz implored Trump to relax, saying Minnesota residents were “exhausted” by the president’s “relentless attacks on Minnesota.”
“So please give us a break,” Walz said at a news conference Thursday. “If it were me, you’d get what you wanted, but don’t bother my people. Don’t bother our state.”
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Riccardi reported from Denver. Associated Press writers Giovanna Dell’Orto, Rebecca Santana and Tim Sullivan in Minneapolis contributed.