DOJ subpoenas Walz, Frey, Her and others in probe alleging immigration obstruction

Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota and the recent Immigration and Customs Enforcement deportations have left many pets behind.

Rachel Mairose owns The Bond Between, a dog and cat rescue and care facility in the Twin Cities. She discovered a sad side effect of the recent ICE surge.

"Watching these people get ripped apart from their families is really, really hard," Mairose said. "You see a lot of people that are getting detained or deported and they have their pets that they've had their entire life."

The Bond Between's newest rescue is Chapo.

"Chapo is the friendliest boy. He is a big old Cane Corso. He's about 110-120 pounds, he's a year old, and his dad was unfortunately deported" Mairose said.

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School district officials in Columbia Heights, Minnesota, say their sense of security is shaken and their hearts shattered after four students from the district have recently been taken by officers with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The Columbia Heights Public School District says two children were taken on Tuesday, including a 17-year-old boy on his way to school. He was removed from his car and taken away.

Then in the afternoon, 5-year-old Liam Ramos was taken with his father while in their driveway after just arriving home from his preschool classroom. School officials say the child was used as bait to knock on the door and ask to be let in, letting officers see if anyone else was home.

"Why detain a 5-year-old? You can't tell me that this child is going to be classified as a violent criminal," said superintendent Zena Stenvik.

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Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Wednesday took to social media to accuse the Trump administration of "taking credit" for many immigration-related arrests he says occurred before Operation Metro Surge.  

Walz's statement comes in the wake of an MPR News report examining a Homeland Security list of residents they claim to have arrested.

"The federal government's propaganda machine is taking credit for work that happened long before thousands of untrained agents showed up to put on a show for Trump. We all want to get violent criminals off our streets, and the State of Minnesota has never wavered in doing so," Walz said. "The federal government's propaganda machine is taking credit for work that happened long before thousands of untrained agents showed up to put on a show for Trump."

The mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul held a breakfast event Wednesday at which they were were asked questions about Operation Metro Surge and the subpeonas their offices have been served by the federal government. 

Mayor Koahly Her said her legal team is taking time to look into the subpeona and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey called these subpeonas an attempt to intimidate them. 

When discussing federal agents in cities, both mayors say they are all for precise immigration operations for violent criminals. However they say this is an occupation of federal agents which they say needs to stop. 

To wrap up the discussion, the two mayors shared they are both still working to support businesses and strengthen their cities amid the chaos of increased federal operations. 

When President Trump took to the podium Tuesday to talk about accomplishments in the first year of his second term, he used part of that time to flash photos of people the administration calls "the worst of the worst."

"Ten thousand criminals and these are serious criminals," the president said.

Mr. Trump says the Department of Homeland Security has arrested 10,000 people over the past year in Minnesota.

Though data on this number is limited, after ICE stopped making detailed information about arrests publicly available about a year ago.

The latest information obtained by the Deportation Data Project runs from January 2025 through October 2025, before Operation Metro Surge.

That data shows about 600 people with criminal convictions were arrested in Minnesota during that time period, out of the more than 1,600 arrested. 

The Deportation Data Project uses the Freedom of Information Act to acquire datasets from the government. 

An activist group is calling for the resignation of a pastor at a St. Paul church that protesters went to on Sunday. 

They say it's because of Cities Church pastor David Easterwood's role as acting director of the ICE field office in St. Paul, calling it hypocritical.

Members of the Racial Justice Network, and Black Lives Matter Minnesota and Twin Cities went to the church and interrupted the Sunday service. They say they learned about Easterwood's roles with the church and with ICE on Saturday and went to the church the next day. 

They say they spoke up and asked a question during the service and that's when things intensified. They told WCCO they were never asked to leave, and that they are standing on the side of what's right and on the side of immigrant communities. 

"We are asking Cities Church to operate in truth, integrity and the true meaning of the gospel and to recognize that David Easterwood's dual role as a pastor and as a director of the ICE office is a most definite conflict of interest and it cannot stand," Nekima Levy Armstrong, with Racial Justice Network, said.

"For people who are saying, 'Oh, they shouldn't protest in the church,' what do they think Jesus did when he turned over the tables in the church? Gentle words and gentle means are for gentle people. There is nothing gentle about ICE and there is nothing gentle about an ICE field director. So we came and we did what was necessary," Monique Cullars Doty, with Black Lives Matter Minnesota, said.

Cities Church released this statement: 

"Jesus is real. When we gather on Sunday mornings to worship him, we are gladly giving ourselves to what is most central and sacred in our life together. "We worship Jesus" stretches as the main banner of our church, alongside two other pursuits that flow from it: loving one another and seeking the good of the Twin Cities.

On Sunday, January 18, a group of agitators jarringly disrupted our worship gathering. They accosted members of our congregation, frightened children, and created a scene marked by intimidation and threat. Such conduct is shameful, unlawful, and will not be tolerated. Invading a church service to disrupt the worship of Jesus — or any other act of worship — is protected by neither the Christian Scriptures nor the laws of this nation.

We welcome respectful dialogue about present issues, and about how the realness of Jesus, as revealed in the Bible, provides the only final answers to the world's most complex and intractable problems.

Jesus Christ, the divine Son of God, lived, died, and rose again for the rescue of all who put their faith in him. He offers a love that transcends cultures, borders, policies, and politics. As those who have been loved and rescued by him, we will not shrink from worshiping Jesus, nor will we stop "teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Messiah" (Acts 5:42). Church buildings are meant to be places of peace and solace, where worshipers can hear and live out this message. We therefore call on local, state, and national leaders to protect this fundamental right. We are evaluating next steps with our legal counsel."

On Tuesday, President Trump said "Somalia's not even a country," among other false and inflammatory statements, during a press conference during which he was intending to tout his administration's accomplishments during the first year of his second term.

Following Mr. Trump's comments, the Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations' Deputy Executive Director Suleiman Adan spoke out.

"Today's bigoted comments by President Trump reducing our communities to mugshots echo the worst kind of political fear-mongering. That language dehumanizes Somali, Muslim and immigrant families who are our neighbors, coworkers and classmates," Adan said.

Somali Americans and refugees have been at the center of the recent surge of ICE enforcement in the Twin Cities and Greater Minnesota, following renewed scrutiny over the Feeding Our Future fraud scandal.

Mr. Trump, in his Tuesday comments to the White House Press Corps, took a significant chunk of time to show photos of people he said had been arrested in ICE's crackdown in Minnesota. 

"When he places Black and Brown faces on screens like this, it does more than mislead. It gives cover and legitimacy to an Islamophobic, xenophobic and openly racist campaign targeting our state and our communities. Somali Americans still believe in what the American flag stands for and what the Constitution promises. And we will overcome."

Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has cancelled her event Friday evening at Target Center in downtown Minneapolis.

The announcement didn't note the exact reason "An Evening with Hillary Rodham Clinton" was canceled, but the event coincides with "A Day of Truth and Freedom," which calls for Minnesotans to not work, shop or go to school this Friday in opposition to Operation Metro Surge.

A Day of Truth and Freedom also includes a rally and march in downtown Minneapolis.

U.S. Border Patrol Cmdr. Greg Bovino held a new conference Tuesday afternoon in Minneapolis where he defended the work and actions of federal agents in Minnesota in Operation Metro Surge.

Bovino also accused Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, both Democrats, of "collusion and corruption" with what he calls "anarchist protestors." 

"Let me be clear from the start that public safety in Minneapolis is not negotiable," Bovino said. "Our operations are lawful, they're targeted and they're focused on individuals who pose a serious threat to this community. They're not random, and they are not political. They are about removing criminals who are actively harming Minneapolis neighborhoods."

Bovino shared photos of three men he said were arrested in the past day — respectively from Honduras, Guatemala and Laos — whom he called "repeat offenders with serious criminal histories." All three men, he said, have been charged or arrested sexual abuse-related crimes. The commander also accused the news media of underreporting on "the worst of the worst."

"It's very interesting that I haven't seen this individual or many others like him reported on very much by the local news media or the state news media. That's, that's, that's interesting," he said.

Bovino said recent actions by the Trump administration, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, have led to the arrests of 10,000 people in Minneapolis and Minnesota, and have halted illegal border crossings. (WCCO is working to verify the number of arrests.) 

"Illegal crossings have dropped to record lows. Catch and release has ended. Consequences have been restored," Bovino said. "Because the border is now secure, law enforcement can do its job more effectively. Agents are no longer tied up processing and releasing, releasing individuals into the interior, individuals that we just talked about. They can focus on who is coming into this country and just as importantly identifying and removing those who should not be here — and that shift matters."

Also on hand for Tuesday's conference was Marcos Charles, executive associate director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, who said federal officers have arrested "113 illegal aliens" in the state over the past holiday weekend. Charles also claimed Minnesota has "released nearly 500 criminal aliens" instead of "turning them over to ICE" since Mr. Trump took office exactly one year ago Tuesday.  

"ICE currently has more than 1,360 immigration detainers on illegal aliens in Minnesota jails and prisons, and we're calling on Gov. [Tim] Walz and Mayor [Jacob] Frey to turn these criminal illegal aliens directly over to ICE to keep Minnesota residents in our community safe," Charles said. "If local officials, including those in the Twin Cities, don't want to arrest, don't want ICE to arrest criminal aliens that are at large in their communities, the best solution is to turn them over to us in a safe, controlled setting like a jail or prison instead of releasing them back onto the street to victimize our neighborhoods."  

Bovino compared the current operation and Operation Catahoula Crunch, recently carried out in Louisiana, by the number of federal law enforcement members who said have been victims of violence by protesters. He said one attack occurred in Louisiana, while he's "lost count" of the attacks in Minnesota.

"These anarchists that are intent on creating violence for law enforcement, you know, I see a lot of this, that mirrors what happened in 2020 here, right here in this city, when they decided to try to burn the city down," Bovino said, referencing the unrest in the Twin Cities following the murder of George Floyd. "It's that same type of rhetoric, that same type of support by these elected officials, so that's very different than what I just witnessed in Louisiana."

Bovino said that "everything" federal officers do in Minnesota "every day is legal, ethical, moral, well-grounded in law."

"I would impugn upon these police chiefs and anyone else elected representatives, and you have to remember many of these police chiefs do work for the Mayor Freys of the world that, turn over those illegal aliens, those criminal illegal aliens," Bovino said.

When pressed by a journalist about "ordinary citizens … getting swept up" in Operation Metro Surge, as opposed to criminals, Bovino described those arrestees as "agitators," "rioters" and "anarchists."

"There's no need for that violence that we see against law enforcement, and again it seems that the only end of it, the only people that are really dialing down that rhetoric is the federal law enforcement entities that just want to conduct legal, ethical and lawful law enforcement missions in this city to take out those violent criminals, bad people and bad things," he said.

When asked if ICE officer Jonathan Ross — who fatally shot Renee Good earlier this month in south Minneapolis — is on administrative leave, Bovino would only say the agent is at home recovering.

Both Bovino and Charles indicated there is no end date for this operation.

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President Trump marked the first full year of his second presidency Tuesday with a White House press briefing, where the first order of business was highlighting "the murders and drug dealers ... and a lot of bad people" who are among the 3,000-some people arrested by federal agents since last month in Operation Metro Surge, a number provided by Homeland Security officials.  

Following a seven-week span were federal agents shot two people in Minnesota, one of whom fatally, Mr. Trump admitted federal law enforcement are "going to make mistakes sometimes," but said they're dealing with "rough" people.

When asked about the fatal shooting of 37-year-old Renee Good by ICE officer Jonathan Ross on Jan. 7 in south Minneapolis, the president stated, "I understand both sides of it," and echoed similar statements he made last week in a CBS News interview, namely who Good was likely a "very, solid wonderful person," but her actions were "pretty tough" in the moments before her killing.

Mr. Trump held up several wanted-style posters of whom he describes as "the worst of the worst" in Minnesota, placing blame on his predecessor's administration.

"[Former President Joe] Biden wouldn't do this because he let them all in," Trump said.

The president then said "agitators and insurrectionists" are behind Minnesota's "incredible" crime problems, and noted how the country's "Hispanic" residents comprise both a majority of the make-up of immigration officers and those arrested for immigration-related offenses.

"They talk about Hispanic, they're mostly Hispanic, right? And they're unbelievable people. And then they say, 'Oh, we discriminate against ...' I love Hispanic. They are unbelievable. Entrepreneurial, they have everything. I did great, I did the highest, nobody ever got numbers like I got from the standpoint of being a Republican," Mr. Trump told reporters.

Mr. Trump's Minnesota mission was one of several topics he discussed in Tuesday's briefing, in addition to boasting his administration's wins, including lower some pharmaceutical prices. He also lamented the perception gap between the economic strife many Americans have been experiencing in his first year back in office and the "bad public relations people" in his administration that haven't been getting the word out on the rebounding economy.

Wall Street has taken a hit on Tuesday amid Mr. Trump's comments on Europe's lack of willingness to support the U.S. acquisition of Greenland, and his threats to unleash widespread tariffs against several European Union nations.

Kaia Hubbard, Melissa Quinn, Kathryn Watson and Caitlin Yilek contributed to this report.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and others were subpoenaed in connection with a DOJ probe into an alleged conspiracy to impede federal immigration officers, three sources told CBS News.

The subpoenas represent a significant escalation between the Justice Department and Minnesota officials, who have clashed over the Trump administration's intense crackdown against immigrants living in the state illegally.

Multiple sources have told CBS News the statute being used as the basis for the probe is 18 U.S.C. § 372 — the same one that was used against some of the rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Walz, on Tuesday, invited President Trump to come to Minnesota and "see our values in action."

"I invite you to join me, and others in our community, to help restore calm and order and reaffirm that true public safety comes from shared purpose, trust, and respect," Walz posted. 

Legal observers are weighing the likelihood of outcomes connected to a lawsuit filed Jan. 12 that seeks an order to halt or limit the surge of immigration enforcement action in Minnesota.

Ilan Wurman, who teaches constitutional law at the University of Minnesota Law School, doubts the state's arguments will be successful.

"There's no question that federal law is supreme over state law, that immigration enforcement is within the power of the federal government, and the president, within statutory bounds, can allocate more federal enforcement resources to states who've been less cooperative in that enforcement space than other states have been," Wurman told The Associated Press.

Julia Decker, policy director at the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota, expressed frustration that advocates have no way of knowing whether the government's arrest numbers and descriptions of the people in custody are accurate. U.S. citizens have been dragged from their homes and vehicles during the Minnesota surge.

"These are real people we're talking about, that we potentially have no idea what is happening to them," Decker said.

Public safety leaders from across the Twin Cities on Tuesday called on some of the federal agents in the area to correct their conduct, accusing them of violating civil rights and torpedoing trust in law enforcement.

"Recently as the last two weeks, we as the law enforcement community have been receiving endless complaints about civil rights violations in our streets from U.S. citizens," Brooklyn Park Police Chief Mark Bruley said.

"I am seeing and hearing about people in Hennepin County stopped, questioned and harassed solely because of the color of their skin — 'solely' being the operative word here," Hennepin County Sheriff Dawanna Witt said. "This is not OK now and it's never been OK."

Witt said the actions of federal agents are undermining efforts to restore trust in law enforcement in an area that has been scarred by police violence.

"The trust is fragile right now, and it is an essential element to public safety," Witt said. "Today that trust is being damaged, broken by the questionable and sometimes unethical actions of some — some — federal agents, particularly in these last recent weeks."

Bruley, Witt and St. Paul Police Chief Axel Henry spoke at the morning news conference, calling for greater accountability for the federal agents here and more oversight from the people in charge.

"We demand more from our federal government," Witt said. "More professionalism, more accountability, more humanity. We demand lawful policing that respects human dignity."

Bruley claimed it is "a small group of agents within the surge in the metro area that are performing or acting this way" and said he and the other leaders are not calling for an end to immigration enforcement.

"We're calling to action that we have more supervision over the surge, that this type of civil rights violations have to stop," he said.

Bruley said he has attempted to reach out to federal leaders to discuss the issue, but has met with disorder and irresponsibility.

"When you call ICE leadership or you call Border Patrol leadership or you call Homeland Security leadership, they're unable to tell you what their people were doing that day," he said. "They're hard to find a leader to give you to, they like to give you a website to go file a complaint, but the complaint requires identity of the agents. The agents don't have nametags on, they cover their face, they don't have body cameras."

"I don't think the leaders in Washington, D.C., fully understand what some of their groups are doing here on the street and how much damage that they're causing and that is why we are here to bring this to light," Bruley added.

Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara was not at Tuesday's presser, said something similar in a "60 Minutes" interview.

"Targeted, precise, preplanned operations on violent offenders, that is a good thing," O'Hara said. "But I'm concerned that people in the administration don't actually understand the reality of what's happening on the street."  

The U.S. Department of Justice says claims made in a lawsuit seeking an immediate stop to the surge of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Minnesota are "legally frivolous."

The lawsuit, filed late last week, argues the unprecedented surge of an estimated 3,000 federal agents is endangering citizens. It accuses ICE of violating the First and Tenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.  

According to the memorandum, the DOJ argues the plaintiffs' "Tenth Amendment and related claims have not a shred of legal support" and that their "motion should therefore be denied." The federal agency made the remark in a memorandum filed with the U.S. District Court in Minnesota on Monday, which argued against a motion made by the state of Minnesota, Minneapolis and St. Paul for a temporary injunction.

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With thousands of federal agents active in the state as part of Operation Metro Surge, the University of Minnesota says it's making changes to support students, faculty and staff.

The university says students will have the option to attend some classes virtually, depending on their courses, and guidance on that will come from their deans' offices. 

Building access is also tightening. Nearly all buildings will require badge access, which means carrying a U Card is imperative.

Some public spaces, including student unions and museums, will remain open to the public. 

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The lawyer for the family of Renee Good, who was shot and killed by an ICE agent in Minneapolis, says he issued a demand to federal officials last week to preserve evidence, but is still waiting for a response.

"We will move forward with or without any government agency sharing any evidence," said Antonio Romanucci, of Chicago-based firm Romanucci and Blandin. 

The FBI is investigating the shooting, but said there is "no basis for a criminal civil rights investigation."

Amid a blare of horns and shouting from witnesses, federal agents removed an elderly Hmong-American man from his St. Paul, Minnesota, home on Sunday.

"It is heartbreaking. It is infuriating to see U.S. citizens, and this gentleman was a U.S. citizen, ripped out of his house without a shirt on, without a coat, without pants, wearing his boxers and Crocs. I don't know how anyone could watch that happen to anyone," Mark Goldberg said.

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