What’s Happening with ICE and How to Fight Back

What’s Happening with ICE and How to Fight Back

Type: 
Blog Post

Communities across the country, in Minnesota and beyond, are living in terror as federal immigration enforcement agents patrol, surveil, detain, arrest, disappear, injure, and kill civilians. Agents are denying people their constitutional rights by undermining due process, searching vehicles and homes without consent or the appropriate warrants, attacking and arresting people peacefully exercising their First Amendment rights to assemble, protest, and document enforcement actions, and more. 

The massive expansion and escalation of these actions pose a danger to our nation. However, as these harms occur, we are also seeing growing public resistance to government intimidation, suppression, and violence. 

Tell Congress Federal Immigration Enforcement Has Gone Too Far!

We are witnessing firsthand the incredible power of everyday people to reject this assault on our communities, our Constitution, and our democracy. To continue exercising our people-power, we must understand what is happening and what rights we hold. 

What’s Going on with Immigration Enforcement? 

Over the past year, the federal government has drastically expanded the immigration enforcement budget, scale, and authority. In July 2025, Congress passed the One Big Beautiful Bill, which granted more than $170 billion, an unprecedented amount of funding, to expand immigration and border enforcement activities. This funding went to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Department of Defense. It included $45 billion to build new detention centers, nearly $30 billion for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and deportation, and $13.5 billion to reimburse state and local enforcement to perform immigration functions. 

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Protestors holding signs that say

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This funding enabled the Administration to expand its immigration enforcement efforts and ICE’s domestic operations, as well as to increase coordination with other federal agencies. This includes: 

  • Escalating from targeting undocumented immigrants considered threats to public safety, border security, or national security to targeting all undocumented immigrants for potential deportation.
  • ICE signing agreements to deputize state and local law enforcement to perform immigration functions, which now total more than 1,300 agreements across 39 states, compared to 135 agreements in December 2024.
  • The Administration using Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which historically focused on the country’s international borders, for immigration enforcement in cities across the country.   

As of January 2026, the number of people in immigration detention in the US reached an all-time high of 73,000, an 84% increase from January 2025. According to the American Immigration Council, the Administration's changes in immigrant arrest practices have led to a 2,450% increase in the number of people with no criminal record who are held in ICE detention. In 2025, at least 32 people died in ICE custody. As of January 27, at least nine people died in ICE custody or at the hands of federal agents. 

What’s Going on in Minnesota? 

In recent months, Minnesota has been the epicenter of escalating federal immigration enforcement efforts. In December 2025, the Administration deployed thousands of ICE, CBP, and other DHS agents into the Twin Cities (Minneapolis and St. Paul). Agents have been carrying out stops, detentions, and arrests, and using physical force against civilians, including peaceful protestors, sometimes fatally. To date, agents have shot and killed two Minnesota citizens on the street. 

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In 2025, at least 32 people died in ICE custody, and as of January 27, at least nine people died in ICE custody or at the hands of federal agents.

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This violence has triggered national fear, grief, and outrage. It has driven tens of thousands of people in Minnesota and beyond to organize mass mobilizations like protests, vigils, walkouts, boycotts, and community support efforts. Yet even at largely peaceful response demonstrations, civilians have often been met with escalating federal presence and activities. The Administration has also threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act in Minnesota to deploy federal military members to the state. 

What’s happening in Minnesota is a model of what other states could experience as the Administration continues expanding its federal enforcement operations. At the same time, the growing public resistance is also a model of how people can unite and fight back. 

The League’s Response to ICE, CBP, and DHS

In December 2025, LWVUS and LWVMN condemned ICE deployments in Minnesota. In January 2026, LWVUS urged Congress to oppose additional funding for ICE and CBP, and to impose DHS immigration enforcement guardrails and accountability measures, including writing to the Senate the day before their funding vote. LWVUS also urged Congress to investigate DHS's use of force. LWVUS and LWVMN condemned the unwarranted federal presence and military escalation in Minnesota, and LWVUS spoke about the threats recent events pose to our constitutional rights.   

The League condemns the actions taken by ICE, CBP, and other federal immigration officials. As an organization, we work to empower voters and defend democracy; the actions happening around our country directly threaten our democracy by undermining the rule of law and the Constitution. The League also supports due process for all, including the right to notice and a fair hearing, right to counsel, right of appeal, and right to humane treatment. It does not support deporting immigrants who have no history of major and/or violent criminal activity. Finally, the League also opposes illegal or unconstitutional invocations of the Insurrection Act. 

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A crowd of protestors, one holding a sign that says

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What You Can Do 

League to which this content belongs: 
the US (LWVUS)