Homan Announces End To Minnesota Immigration Enforcement Surge

The Trump administration’s massive immigration enforcement surge throughout Minnesota is coming to a close, White House border czar Tom Homan said during a press conference on Thursday.

"I have proposed, and President Trump has concurred, that this surge operation conclude,” Homan said, citing arrests of “public safety threats” in coordination with state officials.

A “significant drawdown” in federal immigration agents is already underway, Homan said, and will continue into the next week. But Homan has directed certain officers to remain in strategic areas throughout the state to coordinate with local sheriffs on more arrests.

The White House has diminished its presence in Minneapolis amid public outcry after two federal agents shot and killed 37-year-old Alex Pretti, a local nurse, during a protest in January. The agents were placed on administrative leave. And just last week, Homan announced the White House would shrink the number of immigration officers in the state by 25 percent.

Homan characterized the White House pullback as evidence that the president had succeeded in his efforts to fight crime and remove violent undocumented people from the state.

And he praised Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, both Democrats, for their collaboration with federal authorities in recent weeks, and for using rhetoric that he said helped de-escalate the chaotic clashes between law enforcement and protesters.

Offices for both Walz and Frey did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the end of the surge.

“We’ve seen a big change here in the last couple of weeks,” Homan said. “And it’s all good changes.”

Homan’s Thursday press conference was a major departure from the administration’s longstanding approach to the violence in Minnesota. In the wake of Pretti’s slaying and law enforcement’s earlier killing of Renee Good, another protester, White House officials blamed Democrats for the escalating violence and heaped pressure on Frey and Walz to stop “spreading lies.” The Department of Justice subpoenaed Walz, Frey and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison in January amid a federal investigation into the state’s response to the heightened immigration enforcement.

“This tragedy occurred as a result of a deliberate and hostile resistance by Democrat leaders in Minnesota,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters after Pretti’s death.