Minneapolis | It’s been over a month since the Trump administration flooded the Minneapolis metro area with ICE officers and Federal Agents as part of a surge that the Department of Homeland Security has called its largest immigration operation ever.

The Trump administration maintains that the immigration enforcement action in the Twin Cities is targeting dangerous illegal immigrants. Yet a review conducted by Reader Supported News, found that dozens of US citizens have been arrested, sometimes violently, by ICE officers across the Twin Cities metro area. Some US citizens have been held by ICE for days, others report being denied water while detained, and many report being held without access to an attorney.

The ICE operation is systematically violating the constitutional rights of American citizens, engaging in wide-scale racial profiling, and conducting warrantless searches of homes and vehicles.

Community members have reported US citizens are being violently attacked by ICE officers. In one incident, an activist reported seeing two agents “violently slamming a young Black man against the wall” even though the man was screaming in pain and telling them he was a U.S. citizen.

Some citizens have reported ICE officers ignore their attempts to show their identification or prove their identity. Others have reported that their personal belongings have been taken while detained and never returned.

Minnesota tenth grader Arnoldo Bazan recounted how ICE tackled him and his father on the way to a McDonalds. The officers placed him and his father in suffocating chokeholds as the 16-year-old screamed he was a US citizen.

“I started screaming with everything I had, because I couldn’t even breathe,” Arnoldo said. “I felt like I was going to pass out and die.”

The ICE officers took Arnoldo’s phone during the altercation and never returned it. Arnoldo was able to use the Find My Phone app later and tracked his phone down to a vending machine for used electronics near an ICE detention facility.

In another case, Susan Tincher, who has since filed a lawsuit against ICE for her treatment, reported that she was tackled while documenting ICE officers in her neighborhood. While detained, ICE removed her bra and cut off her wedding ring. Not all of her belongings were returned to her when she was released.

Community members also have documented a pattern of ICE officers intentionally ramming into the cars of US citizens.

Christian Molina, a US citizen, was driving to his job when federal agents started following him and crashed into the back of his car.

“I was going to pull over, but before I pulled over they just hit me,” Molina said.

Mr. Molina’s wife, Lorena Molina, said, “Thankfully we are citizens and no one was shot or detained. I was terrified.”

In another incident, Christina Rank, a teacher at a special education school, was pulling into her school when an ICE officer rammed her car and arrested the 25 year-old US citizen.

This ICE presence in Minnesota has spurred thousands of activists and community members to protest, organize, and document ICE officers’ actions across the city. However, ICE has responded to this community response with threats, arrests, and a pattern of misconduct.

Federal officers have surrounded activist’s cars–while pointing semi-automatic weapons at them– threatening that if they continue tracking ICE officers, their car windows will be smashed and they will be dragged from their cars and arrested.

When a member of the community reports an ICE officer making an arrest, activists will rush to the scene to blow whistles and document the incident.

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has urged Minnesotans to “peacefully film ICE agents”. He said these videos would help the state create a “a database of the atrocities against Minnesotans, not just to establish a record for posterity, but to bank evidence for future prosecution.”

As a result of this activism, over a dozen activists have been arrested. Many have been arrested while engaging in activities protected by the first amendment.

University of Pennsylvania law professor David Rudovsky stated, “I think about the civil rights movement in the South and how Southern law enforcement reacted with hoses, dogs and lynchings,” he said.

Some activists have reported ICE officers have been attempting to intimidate activists by accessing private data about the activists to address them by their name or to show up at their homes. Other activists report that while detained by ICE, officers are pressuring them with phony charges in an attempt to get them to provide information about other activists or immigrants.

While being an activist has put many American citizens in ICE’s crosshairs, for others simply being a minority in the community has been enough to draw attention.

According to Minnesota state Senator Erin Maye Quade, ICE agents aren’t looking for specific people at specific addresses. “They drive around looking for kidnappings of opportunity.”

Sen. Quade said, ICE officers wait in their idling car for minorities to walk by and then attempt to arrest them. They will also run license plates of cars and pull over drivers with foreign sounding names. ICE officers have also set up checkpoints in minority neighborhoods and are asking to see the papers of everyone who leaves or enters.

“Most of the people they’re taking are US citizens, lawful permanent residents, or people with some kind of legal status,” Sen. Quade said.

In one particularly disturbing incident, ICE broke down the door of ChongLy Scott Thao, an elderly US citizen with no criminal history. Mr. Thao who was in his home when federal officers held his family at gunpoint and arrested him without even allowing him to get dressed before dragging him into the frigid Minnesota winter cold.

According to the family, Federal agents terrified his 5 year-old grandson who was napping on the sofa and “ woke up crying in fear”.

Mr. Thoa was placed in a SUV and driven around for an hour. After ICE took his fingerprints and ran his information, he was dropped back off at home without an apology or an explanation.

Mr. Thoa is a family friend of St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her, who called the arrest “unjustifiable”.

Ms. Her stated this week that Federal Officers are openly engaging in racial profiling.

"We've received reports of federal law enforcement officers going door-to-door asking people where the Asian people live right in our very own city," Her said. "I myself have received advice to carry my passport with me because they may try to target me based on what I look like as well."

ICE officers’ conduct has received pushback from Minnesota local law enforcement who have also characterized ICE’s actions as racial profiling.

Chief Axel Henry of the St. Paul Police Department stated this week that many people in his city “are scared to death” and “afraid to go outside.”

Suburban police chief Mark Bruley recounted how one of his off-duty officers, was pulled over and asked for her immigration paperwork, which she doesn’t have because she’s a citizen. The officer was then surrounded by ICE officers with their guns drawn.

The Brooklyn Park officer took out her phone and started recording the conversation, only to have her phone knocked away by an immigration agent, Bruley said.

The officer informed ICE she was an officer and the immigration officers left the scene “without an apology”.

“If it’s happening to our officers, it pains me to think how many of our community members are falling victim to this every day,” he said. “It has to stop.”