U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act to deploy federal military forces in Minnesota following days of escalating protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations in Minneapolis.
Tensions in the city have surged after an ICE agent fatally shot U.S. citizen Renee Good in a vehicle eight days ago. Protests, originally centered in Minneapolis, have since spread to other cities. Trump’s latest warning came hours after federal officers shot a Venezuelan man who, authorities said, was attempting to flee after agents tried to stop his vehicle in the city.
“If the corrupt politicians of Minnesota don’t obey the law and stop the professional agitators and insurrectionists from attacking the Patriots of I.C.E., who are only trying to do their job, I will institute the INSURRECTION ACT,” Trump wrote on social media.
The president, a Republican, has repeatedly criticized the state’s Democratic leadership and targeted the local Somali community, calling them “garbage” who should be “thrown out” of the country.
Nearly 3,000 federal officers have already been deployed to the Minneapolis area. Dressed in military-style camouflage, carrying firearms, and wearing face-covering masks, the officers have patrolled the city’s icy streets. Their presence has frequently provoked loud and sometimes confrontational protests, with demonstrators blowing whistles, banging tambourines, and chanting against ICE operations.
During the enforcement actions, agents have arrested immigrants and protesters, sometimes forcibly removing people from vehicles and breaking windows. Several Black and Latino U.S. citizens have been stopped and asked for identification, prompting outrage among local residents.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) defended the officers’ actions, saying that shortly before Wednesday’s shooting, two individuals attacked the federal agent with a broomstick and snow shovel while he struggled with the Venezuelan man outside a home.
DHS said the officer fired in self-defense and that the Venezuelan man, admitted to the U.S. in 2022 under Biden-era humanitarian parole, was not seriously injured and is recovering in hospital.
Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said the FBI and Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension are gathering evidence from the scene. Mayor Jacob Frey condemned the ICE operations as “an invasion,” describing some of the agency’s conduct as “disgusting and intolerable.” He added, “We cannot be at a place right now in America where we have two governmental entities that are literally fighting one another.”
Trump’s threat to use the Insurrection Act—an 1807 law that allows the president to federalize National Guard units or deploy the military to quell rebellion—marks a significant escalation in the administration’s crackdown on immigration enforcement, and has further divided public opinion on federal interventions in state affairs.
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