Trump's DHS Sued to End Lawless Stops and Arrests in Minnesota

The ACLU on Thursday filed a class action lawsuit aimed at ending "a startling pattern of abuse spearheaded by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that is fundamentally altering civic life in the Twin Cities and the state of Minnesota."

The thousands of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents sent to Minneapolis and Saint Paul by President Donald Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have been documented engaging in violent and even unlawful activities, including at least two shootings.

"Masked federal agents in the thousands are violently stopping and arresting countless Minnesotans based on nothing more than their race and perceived ethnicity irrespective of their citizenship or immigration status, or their personal circumstances," says the complaint, filed in the District of Minnesota.

The state and national ACLU along with Covington & Burling, Greene Espel, and Robins Kaplan filed the suit on behalf of three US citizens in Minnesota and similarly situated people. According to the complaint:

Plaintiffs seek injunctive relief to halt three unlawful policies and practices. First, federal agents are stopping people to question them about immigration status without reasonable suspicion of removability—and particularly targeting those they perceive to be Somali or Latino. Second, federal agents are arresting people for immigration reasons without warrants and without probable cause to believe that they are removable, outrageously including US citizens (who plainly cannot be detained for civil immigration purposes) and individuals with immigration status. And third, federal agents are making warrantless arrests without probable cause to believe the person is a flight risk.

"ICE and CBP's practices are both illegal and morally reprehensible," said Catherine Ahlin-Halverson, staff attorney with the ACLU of Minnesota, in a statement. "Federal agents' conduct—sweeping up Minnesotans through racial profiling and unlawful arrests—is a grave violation of Minnesotans' most fundamental rights, and it has spread fear among immigrant communities and neighborhoods. No one, including federal agents, is above the law."

The three people named in the complaint are Mubashir Khalif Hussen, Mahamed Eydarus, and Javier Doe. Hussen is a 20-year-old man of Somali descent whose "family came to the United States as refugees, and he grew up in this country," the document explains. He lives in Minneapolis, and "works as a manager at a mental health services provider in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood," where he encountered ICE agents while walking to lunch last month.

According to the ACLU, Hussen told the masked agents that he was a US citizen, but they refused to look at his identification. Instead, they put him in a vehicle and drove him to the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building, where he was shackled and fingerprinted. After showing a photo of his passport card, he was eventually freed.

"At no time did any officer ask me whether I was a citizen or if I had any immigration status," Hussen said in a statement. "They did not ask for any identifying information, nor did they ask about my ties to the community, how long I had lived in the Twin Cities, my family in Minnesota, or anything else about my circumstances."

The complaint stresses that "at the center of DHS' campaign are Somali and Latino people, who are being targeted for stops and arrests based on racial profiling motivated by prejudice."

Trump and others in his administration have repeatedly attacked Somali immigrants and their descendants in Minnesota—including when the president said during a racist tirade at a December Cabinet meeting that "we're going to go the wrong way if we keep taking in garbage into our country."

Kate Huddleston, senior staff attorney with the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project, emphasized that "the government can't stop and arrest people based on the color of their skin, or arrest people with no probable cause... These kinds of police-state tactics are contrary to the basic principles of liberty and equality that remain a bedrock of our legal system and our country."

As the Trump administration has flooded the Twin Cities with federal agents, Democratic Mayor Jacob Frey has told ICE to "get the fuck out" of Minneapolis; his city, Saint Paul, and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison have filed a lawsuit against the same agencies and leaders targeted by the ACLU suit; and Democrats in the House of Representatives have introduced articles of impeachment against Noem.

Democratic US Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Somali refugee whose congressional district includes Minneapolis, said Wednesday that "we will not stop fighting until we achieve real justice and accountability. That must begin with impeaching Kristi Noem and ensuring no federal agent can act as a judge, jury, and executioner on our streets."

Omar's remarks in Washington, DC came a week after ICE officer Jonathan Ross fatally shot legal observer Renee Good in Minneapolis, and hours before a federal officer shot and wounded a man in the city during a traffic stop.

"The massive presence of ICE agents as part of Operation Metro Surge has disrupted civic life in the Twin Cities. Minnesotans are at risk of being stopped by ICE while going to work or shopping for groceries," said Greene Espel attorney Kshithij Shrinath. "We will continue to stand with our community and the rule of law."

The president has responded to protests against his immigration operation in Minnesota by threatening to invoke the Insurrection Act so he can send in troops—which Hina Shamsi, director of the ACLU's National Security Project, called "unnecessary, irresponsible, and dangerous."

"The real risk to people's safety comes from ICE and other federal agents' violence against our communities, and the killing of Renee Good starkly shows what happens when ICE operates without accountability," Shamsi said. "What's needed now is not federal escalation, but deescalation. Congress must demand these mass federal law enforcement forces leave Minneapolis and refuse to fund ICE and CBP until the administration backs down."

While Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who caucuses with Democrats, said Thursday that "the American people do not want Trump's domestic army," referring to ICE, some Democratic members have signaled that they won't seek to freeze money for the agency ahead of a January 30 deadline for funding the government.