Trump's Ethnic Cleansing Campaign in Minneapolis

[Celerity]

Every part of this illegal, violent occupation is based on lies.

https://prospect.org/2026/01/15/trumps-ethnic-cleansing-campaign-minneapolis/


A family member reacts after a federal immigration officer used a battering ram to break down the door of a home before making an arrest, January 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. Credit: John Locher/AP Photo

There are reportedly about 3,000 ICE and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) goons running riot in Minneapolis, or about five times as many officers as are in the city police department. They have been captured on video beating, gassing, and pepper-spraying bystanders, including legal observers; kidnapping people, including children, off the street with no due process; and breaking into homes without a warrant. Several people have been shot, including Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, who was killed by an ICE agent shooting directly into her driver’s-side window. Another father told local news that ICE threw flash-bangs and tear gas into his minivan containing his five children, which caused his six-month-old baby to temporarily stop breathing and lose consciousness.

According to residents, the basic tactic seems to be ICE convoys driving around looking for any nonwhite person out by themselves, jumping out and dragging them into a van, and then driving off. It’s like a cross between a half-hearted military occupation and a bunch of extremely racist gangsters hopped up on PCP and drain cleaner whipping themselves into a murder frenzy. And now President Trump is, as usual, escalating the threats. He said he is considering invoking the Insurrection Act, which allows the president to deploy the military and federalize the National Guard in cases of insurrection, civil unrest, or rebellion. It would only be the capstone of an outrageous, criminal assault on an American city based entirely on lies.

Minneapolis residents have resisted, with considerable success. In just a few days, they have set up an elaborate nonviolent neighborhood defense network of people who watch for ICE patrols, send the word out when they are spotted, and surround them with whistles and phones. That is seriously impeding the ICE/CBP kidnapping efforts, which appear to be quite poorly organized. During protests over Wednesday night, ICE abandoned several vehicles full of documents and gear, including a challenge coin that looks distinctly like a Nazi Totenkopf.

There is some important background to establish, because it reveals how everything about this is pretextual. The whole thing was touched off by some 23-year-old right-wing YouTuber named Nick Shirley. In a video that went hyper-viral thanks to a coordinated conservative media effort to boost it, he accused several Somali-run day cares of being welfare scams because they didn’t have any children in them that he could see, or they wouldn’t let him in to see the kids. This sparked a classic right-wing online frenzy, and demands for persecution.

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[TygrBright]

1. Good read. n/t