Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey accused the federal government of conducting a “siege” of his city.
“The Operation Metro Surge needs to end. This kind of conduct and siege needs to stop, not just in Minneapolis; it needs to stop nationwide,” Frey told a room of fellow elected leaders at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington, D.C., on Thursday.
The Department of Homeland Security launched Operation Metro Surge, designed to target criminal illegal aliens in the Twin Cities area, in December, but has since expanded the operation to the rest of the state. The agency has deployed about 3,000 federal immigration officials to the area in recent weeks.
“I feel the support from across the entire country,” Frey said. “And we recognize that when one great American city is experiencing an invasion, that is an invasion on our democracy, on our republic, and on each and every one of us.”
Frey warned his fellow mayors that “if we do not speak up, if we do not step out, it will be your city that is next.”
The mayor has criticized the Immigration and Customs Enforcement operation for weeks, but his rhetoric against the operation sharpened after two recent fatal shootings of protesters by immigration enforcement agents.
Frey has repeatedly asked ICE to “get out” of his city, claiming the community “is less safe when we have roving bands of agents marching down the street.”
The “battlefield” against the alleged ICE “occupation” is the “court system,” Frey said.
Following Renee Good’s death, Minnesota and the Twin Cities filed a lawsuit against the federal government aimed at ending the federal immigration crackdown in the state. The case is still under review, but the judge declined to issue the temporary restraining order that Minnesota requested.
During his remarks in D.C., Frey did not mention the phone call he had with President Donald Trump on Monday, or the meeting with border czar Tom Homan on Tuesday.
After his meeting with Homan, Frey called the conversation “productive,” but added he told the border czar that Minneapolis would “not enforce federal immigration laws.”
Homan, who Trump deployed to Minneapolis on Monday to take over the operation, said he has asked state and local officials to cooperate with federal immigration agents.
If there is “commonsense cooperation” from officials that would allow for the “drawdown of the number of people we have here,” Homan said at a press conference Thursday.
Homan also met this week with Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, who, according to the border czar, said county jails are allowed to “notify ICE of the release dates of criminal public safety risks, so ICE can take custody of them upon release from the jail.”
“President Trump promised the American people, including the residents of Minnesota, that he would work to ensure our communities are safe,” Homan said. “And with that, this administration is absolutely focused on identifying and removing aliens that pose a public safety threat and national security threats.”
