Shortly after a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed a woman in Minneapolis on Wednesday, city leaders began looking into whether the officer had violated state criminal law.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said, “We collectively are going to do everything possible to get to the bottom of this, to get justice, and to make sure that there is an investigation that is conducted in full.” Police Chief Brian O’Hara followed up by saying that the state’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension is “investigat[ing] whether any state laws within the state of Minnesota have been violated.”
If they conclude that state law has been violated, the question is: What next? Contrary to recent assertions from some federal officials, states can prosecute federal officers for violating state criminal laws, and there is precedent for that.
I watched his speech and he doesn’t actually say that he is putting them on standby to defend against ICE. Reading between the lines, he seems to be putting them on standby to be ready to quell protest so that Trump can’t use the protests as an excuse to put federal troops in the area.
What I got from the speech is the following in fairly quick sucession.
The fact that points 1 and 2 were said right next to each other says to me at least that the national guard isn’t there for the protesters.
What made me think that is that he rattles off a whole list of state agencies that were being activated to deal with the incident, and then his next words are we do not need help from the federal government.
Quell the protest was probably the wrong wording. But I think that the national guard is being used to ensure that the protests are controlled and don’t escalate or turn to violence which would give the federal government an excuse to send troops…
A lot of those same agencies are also the same agencies you’d activate if you were getting ready to boot out ice too though. I guess only time will tell exactly what is going to happen. But Walz did seem like he regretted and learned from his response to the George Floyd protests. It seems likely to me that he may swing the other way this time.
And what are ICE agents? I haven’t seen the interview, and your interpretation could well be correct, but it could as easily be, “We’ve had enough of federal agents entering our state and arresting and killing our citizens without warrants or due process.” Frankly, no state needs that kind of help. We will see.
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