Flanked by Rev. Julia Burkey, left, and U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan, right, Christine Neumann-Ortiz speaks at a press conference Thursday about plans to respond if federal immigration agents surge into Wisconsin. (Photo by Erik Gunn/Wisconsin Examiner)
A surge in Wisconsin of federal immigration enforcement will be met with an organized and peaceful resistance, the product of more than a year’s worth of planning and training, advocates vowed Thursday.
Voces de la Frontera, a statewide immigrant rights advocacy group based in Milwaukee, has established a 24-hour hotline to field calls from people concerned about the possible presence of federal agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement as well as border patrol.
At an afternoon news conference with U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Black Earth) in a Madison church, Christine Neumann-Ortiz, executive director of Voces, said the hotline is “the starting point” for people who want to respond if they encounter a possible surge of ICE or border patrol agents.
Staffed around the clock by volunteers, the hotline was established to provide a centralized source of verified reports when there’s new ICE or border patrol activity around the state and to quickly dispel false reports that only increase fear.
Advocates and their allies are bracing for the possibility of a new federal surge in Wisconsin following what has now been more than two months of escalated federal activity in Minneapolis.
“It is not likely a question of if they’ll be coming into the community in a stronger way,” Pocan said. “It is a question of when they’ll be coming into the community.”
The Minnesota surge has led to the deaths of two people — Renee Good and Alex Pretti — who were killed by federal agents. In both instances, eyewitness accounts and videos refuted Trump administration claims that the victims had acted violently in the moments before they were shot.
“It’s not just the killings and the violence, but people are being separated and they’re also being held in dangerous and deadly conditions that are harder to see,” Neumann-Ortiz said — because federal officials have been “denying much oversight.”
Pocan authored a bill to abolish ICE during Trump’s first term, but acknowledged that even he has been taken aback by the agency’s actions in the last year.
“I don’t think people realized — nor did I — that we would ever get to this point where ICE was this rogue, this out of control,” Pocan said. “We have seen them going into communities and really having devastating consequences.”
He endorsed a description of the agencies as “a modern day Gestapo” that he attributed to New York Democratic Congressman Jerry Nadler. “It’s treating the non-citizen and citizen alike with this disrespect.”
Pocan said Wisconsin can respond both forcefully and peacefully.
“Our message is that this is a community that’s going to be united,” he said. “We are going to fight back. And I do not mean physically fight back — I mean morally fight back — on what ICE is doing and how it’s treating our neighbors and our community, and what we’re seeing in Minneapolis and other places across the country.”
Rev. Julia Burkey, the senior pastor at Orchard Ridge United Church of Christ where the news conference was held, described the actions of the federal Department of Homeland Security as “terrorizing and killing innocent people, who are all beloved children of God, simply seeking to live their lives and make peace in their communities.”
She contrasted that with the response of Twin Cities residents who have turned out to support the immigrant community.
“We also are so inspired by the people of Minnesota and how they are loving their neighbors, how they’re singing songs of love and solidarity, how they’re protecting the most vulnerable people who are delivering church meals to those who are even afraid to go outside,” Burkey said. “What we’re seeing is a groundswell of neighborly love, and we have that groundswell of neighborly love here in Wisconsin, too.”
Voces and its allies have been preparing for a wave of federal anti-immigrant action since President Donald Trump was elected to his second term.
“In Wisconsin, we have been building — really since November 2024 — with other organizations, faith groups, unions, a statewide community defense network to stand in solidarity with immigrant families and to protect our collective democratic rights,” Neumann-Ortiz said. “This network exists to help people assert their constitutional rights through peaceful assembly to document ICE violations and expose the truth about what is happening in our communities.”
Neumann-Ortiz urged people not to post or share purported sightings of ICE or other federal agents that have not been verified, to avoid spreading needless fear and misinformation.
The Voces hotline has trained volunteers who can be dispatched to locations where the federal agencies are suspected of operating and document what they encounter.
Verifiers are trained to not interfere in federal options, Neumann-Ortiz said, but instead “observe, record and support impacted families, connecting them through another network of folks who can provide legal resources and mutual aid when necessary.”
Voces also coordinates a rapid response network of volunteers to peacefully protest and publicize “unlawful and abusive activity” by federal agents, she said. Tens of thousands of volunteers have been trained across the state in churches, schools, workplaces and other locations on their legal rights and on how to respond safely, nonviolently and effectively and in a spirit of “collective care,” she added.
“Everyone should know that you have the right to remain silent if you are questioned by ICE, you have the right to an attorney if you are arrested or detained, and you have the right to demand that ICE present a judicial warrant signed by a judge before giving them access to your home, workplace, or any other area that is considered a private area not open to the public,” Neumann-Ortiz said.
“Together, these efforts represent a model of community-based safety, rooted in solidarity, dignity, shared responsibility,” she said. “We believe that real security comes from people looking out for one another, not from militarized federal agencies. Our communities deserve safety without fear, justice without violence and dignity without conditions.”
White House Border Czar Tom Homan talks with reporters on the driveway outside the White House West Wing on March 17, 2025. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
President Donald Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, cited “sanctuary” policies and the Biden administration’s ineffective border enforcement as the reason for the ongoing massive presence of immigration agents in Minnesota in a press conference Thursday morning.
Homan took over operations in Minnesota Monday from Border Patrol Commander Gregory Bovino, who was demoted after his agents shot and killed Alex Pretti in Minneapolis over the weekend.
Three thousand immigration agents remain in Minnesota, Homan said, and a reduction in force depends on cooperation from elected officials.
Homan tacitly acknowledged the chaos, saying, “I’m not here because the federal government has carried out its mission perfectly.”
Despite agents’ frequent arrests of legal immigrants and those without criminal histories, Homan insisted that immigration operations in Minnesota are targeted on removing undocumented immigrants who have committed crimes.
A federal agent holds up a canister of tear gas as people gather near the scene of 26th Street West and Nicollet Avenue, where federal agents shot and killed a 37-year-old man Saturday, Jan. 24, 2026, the third shooting in as many weeks. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)
Homan, who reportedly was investigated for receiving $50,000 in cash from an undercover FBI agent in 2024 in an alleged bribery scheme, said state and local law enforcement agencies’ refusal to assist immigration agents is the reason for the prolonged federal presence in Minnesota.
“Give us access to the illegal alien public safety threat and the safety and security of a jail,” Homan said in the press conference.
Many of the “worst of the worst” immigrants convicted of crimes, whose names have been provided to media outlets, were handed over to immigration officials after finishing sentences in state prisons, according to an MPR News analysis. Eight local law enforcement agencies in Minnesota have signed agreements with ICE to allow access to jails, or assist in immigration enforcement in other ways.
Other Trump administration officials have given different explanations for the ongoing “surge” — and made other demands of elected officials. Initial reports suggested the operation would target Somali Americans. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said when the operation began in December that it was intended to “eradicate FRAUD.” Attorney General Pam Bondi sent a letter to Gov. Tim Walz last week demanding the state hand over troves of Medicaid, nutrition assistance and voter data.
Homan said he has met with Walz, Attorney General Keith Ellison, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and local law enforcement leaders, and that those meetings have been “productive,” though he urged those elected officials to tone down their rhetoric.
“I’ve begged for the last two months on TV for the rhetoric to stop. I said in March if the rhetoric doesn’t stop, there’s going to be bloodshed. And there has been,” he said.
(He did not address Trump’s rhetoric; the president has called Somali Americans “garbage” and his political enemies “vermin.”)
Through a spokesperson, Frey responded to Homan’s news conference, saying “Any drawdown of ICE agents is a step in the right direction—but my ask remains the same: Operation Metro Surge must end.”
A spokesperson for Walz said “we need a drawdown in federal forces, impartial (Bureau of Criminal Apprehension) investigations, and an end to the campaign of retribution against Minnesota.”
Ellison did not immediately return requests for comment.
Homan seemed to take a shot at his predecessor, Bovino, who made frequent appearances in Minneapolis and at the Whipple Federal Building, surrounded by camerapeople.
“I didn’t come to seek photo ops or headlines,” Homan said. “I came here to seek solutions.”
Max Nesterak contributed reporting.
This story was originally produced by Minnesota Reformer, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Wisconsin Examiner, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.
Diana E. Murphy federal courthouse is shown in Minneapolis Friday, May 17, 2024. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)
Patrick J. Schiltz, chief judge of the federal district court in Minnesota and a former clerk to conservative icon Antonin Scalia, ripped the Trump administration for ignoring dozens of court orders in a ruling Wednesday.
Schiltz had previously demanded to see U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Acting Director Todd Lyons for a Friday contempt proceeding.
After ICE released a detainee identified in court documents as Juan T.R., Schiltz canceled the hearing but also blasted the government for undermining the rule of law by ignoring judicial orders.
“That does not end the court’s concerns, however,” he wrote, attaching an appendix identifying 96 court orders that ICE violated in 74 cases.
“The extent of ICE’s noncompliance is almost certainly substantially understated,” he continued. “This list should give pause to anyone — no matter his or her political beliefs — who cares about the rule of law.”
The last straw for Schiltz was the officials’ failure to follow a Jan. 14 order to grant a timely bond hearing for Juan T.R., who Schiltz said remained in custody as of Friday. The Monday order excoriated Lyons and his colleagues for causing “significant hardship” for Minnesota residents caught up in the federal dragnet, many of whom “have lawfully lived and worked in the United States for years and done absolutely nothing wrong,” he emphasized.
Schiltz described scenarios in which detainees were held longer than necessary; removed to detention facilities elsewhere in the country; or released hundreds or even thousands of miles from home with no arrangements made for their return.
This story was originally produced by Minnesota Reformer, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Wisconsin Examiner, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.
Bystanders watch as Washington, D.C., police and agents from the federal Drug Enforcement Administration make an arrest in August. Crime in major U.S. cities continued to decline in 2025, with homicides down 21% from 2024 and 44% from a peak in 2021, according to a new analysis by the Council on Criminal Justice. (Photo by Noelle Straub/Stateline)
Crime continued to decline in 2025, with homicides down 21% from 2024 and 44% from a peak in 2021, according to a new analysis of crime trends in 40 large U.S. cities released by the nonpartisan think tank Council on Criminal Justice.
If federal nationwide data, which is set to be released later this year, reflects similar trends, the national homicide rate could fall to its lowest level in more than a century.
The Council on Criminal Justice study analyzed 13 types of offenses — from homicides to drug crimes to shoplifting — in cities that have consistently published monthly data over the past eight years. Researchers found that 11 of the 13 offenses were lower in 2025 than in 2024, with nine dropping by 10% or more.
Drug offenses were the only category to rise, while sexual assaults remained unchanged.
Carjackings and shoplifting also declined sharply. Reported carjackings fell 61% from 2023, while reported shoplifting dropped 10% from 2024.
Among the 35 cities reporting homicides, nearly all recorded declines. Denver; Omaha, Nebraska; and Washington, D.C., saw homicide rates drop roughly 40%.
There were some modest increases, including in Little Rock, Arkansas; Fort Worth, Texas; and Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The homicide rate in El Paso, Texas, remained flat. Overall, 922 fewer homicides were reported across the cities in the sample.
The downward trends extend beyond homicides. In 2025, reported incidents of aggravated assaults fell 9%, gun assaults 22%, robberies 23%, residential burglaries 17%, nonresidential burglaries 18%, larcenies 11%, and domestic violence 2%.
Looking at longer-term trends, violent crime levels in most cities are at or below pre-pandemic levels, the analysis found. Homicides were 25% lower than in 2019, with Baltimore seeing the largest drop at 60%. Milwaukee had the largest increase in homicides, at 42%.
Robberies, carjackings, domestic violence incidents, gun assaults, aggravated assaults and sexual assaults also remained below 2019 levels. Only motor vehicle thefts and nonresidential burglaries remained slightly elevated.
Nonviolent crimes have shown varied trends over the past seven years. Burglaries fell 45%, larcenies 20%, drug offenses 19%, and shoplifting 4% compared with 2019 levels.
The Council on Criminal Justice also examined trends from recent peaks, finding substantial declines in all major offense categories. Homicides fell 44% from their 2021 peak, gun assaults fell 44%, aggravated assaults 19%, domestic violence 23%, robbery 39%, carjackings 61%, residential burglaries 51%, and motor vehicle thefts 43%.
Despite the downward trajectory, researchers caution that the reasons for the decline are uncertain. Changes in criminal justice policies, law enforcement practices, crime-fighting technology, social and economic conditions, and local violence prevention efforts could all be contributing factors, according to the analysis.
This story was originally produced by Stateline, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Wisconsin Examiner, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.
Four individuals were arrested in Ypsilanti on Tuesday, a spokesperson for ICE confirmed, after information from Ypsilanti Community Schools Superintendent Alena Zachery-Ross and Washtenaw County Sheriff Alyshia Dyer was shared Wednesday morning with community members about ICE arrests in the area.
Christine Sauvé, the Policy, Engagement, and Communications Manager for the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center, confirmed to the Michigan Advance that three parents of Ypsilanti Community Schools students “were arrested by immigration agents while waiting to pick up their children at a bus stop when coming home from school.”
A spokesperson from ICE wrote in a statement that bus stops were not targeted in the arrests made, and that the arrests were made during a targeted vehicle stop.
“ICE does not target schools for enforcement actions or bus stop locations. To be clear, no children were present during these arrests,” the ICE spokesperson wrote.
Dyer wrote in an email to the Advance, “I have now been able to confirm after talking with immigration enforcement leadership they will not and do not target bus stops or schools and while they did make arrests in Washtenaw on Tuesday, they never did any of this intentionally near any school bus stop areas nor were they targeting bus stops.”
A Wednesday statement from Dyer on her Facebook page said, “Based on the information we currently have, ICE activity did not occur on any school grounds. However, it did take place near bus stops in the Ypsilanti community, and it appears that parents connected to local schools were targeted at a bus stop in Ypsilanti during student drop-off times.”
Sauvé said that the three individuals arrested in the first vehicle stop — two women from Honduras and one from Mexico, the latter of whom had a final order of removal, according to the ICE statement — are all currently detained at the North Lake Processing Center in Baldwin, Mich., and the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center has scheduled time with each to provide free legal services to them. Michigan Advance was able to independently confirm based on ICE data that one of the individuals was listed as detained at the center in Baldwin.
“Parents should be able to take their children to school without fear, and children should not have to worry their parents will be arrested at a bus stop,” Sauvé wrote. “This kind of trauma has been shown to have negative effects on children’s health and wellbeing. Community members are terrified but we are heartened by the strong community response.”
MLive reported on Thursday that within three miles of where Tuesday’s detention occurred, school campuses include Ypsilanti Puentes Multilingual School — a Ypsilanti Community Schools K-4 school with a Spanish-language immersion program — Washtenaw International High School, Ypsilanti International Elementary School, Ypsilanti Community High School and several other elementary and middle schools within the district.
Michigan Immigrant Rights Center is not currently in contact with the fourth arrested individual, a man from Honduras, who was detained in a second vehicle stop in Ypsilanti, and that person’s detention location is not currently known.
ICE did not immediately respond to a follow-up inquiry about where each person is being detained.
This story was originally produced by Michigan Advance, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Wisconsin Examiner, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro speaks with reporters and editors in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 29, 2026. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)
WASHINGTON — Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro is preparing a response should the Trump administration surge federal immigration agents into the commonwealth, he said Thursday in Washington, D.C.
Recent deadly shootings of two Minneapolis residents by federal agents compelled the Democratic governor “to let the good people of Pennsylvania know my views on this, where I stand, and also let them know that I’m going to protect them,” he said.
Shapiro declined to provide details, saying it would “not be prudent” to share specifics on whether a response would be a law enforcement operation or confined to challenging the administration in the courtroom.
“We’re prepared on every level now. If the president of the United States seeks to impose his will, and the federal will, on our commonwealth, there may be some things that we can’t stop, but I can tell you, we’ve learned from the good example in other states,” Shapiro said, citing actions by other Democratic governors in California, Illinois, Minnesota and Maine.
D.C. stop for presidential hopefuls
Shapiro delivered the comments during an intimate brunch with the Washington press corps hosted by The Christian Science Monitor. The Monitor routinely hosts press events with elected officials and newsmakers, and has historically been a stop on the circuit for presidential hopefuls.
Shapiro brushed aside questions about a possible presidential bid in 2028, instead saying he’s running for reelection this year and believes that “no one should be looking past these midterms.”
“I don’t think we should be thinking about anything other than curtailing the chaos, the cruelty and the corruption of this administration, and the best way for voters to do that is by showing up in record numbers,” Shapiro said.
The Pennsylvania executive also expressed he is “deeply concerned” about the administration’s efforts to undermine the election.
“The administration demanded that I turn over all of the voter rolls for our commonwealth. We have roughly 9 million voters. … I have a legal responsibility to protect that information. I also do not trust this administration to use that for anything other than nefarious purposes, and so I refuse to share that information. They’ve sued us, and we’ll see them in court,” he said.
The Trump administration has sued more than 20 states to date for voter roll data, including personally identifying information, according to the Brennan Center for Justice. The administration has said it plans to share the data with the Department of Homeland Security to search for noncitizens.
Among the states targeted alongside Pennsylvania: Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Oregon, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin.
New book
Shapiro told reporters he attended Thursday’s event to promote his new book, titled “Where We Keep the Light: Stories from a Life of Service,” which features stories about his faith, the process of being vetted as a potential 2024 vice presidential candidate for Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, and the “dark moment” in April 2025 when a lone man set fire to the governor’s mansion in an attempt on Shapiro’s life.
“We have to acknowledge political violence has been an issue for generations. I think it is also true that over the last several years, we’ve seen a rise,” he said, citing the recent attack on U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., the killings of former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, and of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, as well as the assassination attempts of President Donald Trump on the campaign trail.
Elected leaders, he said, have a “responsibility to speak and act with moral clarity and to condemn that violence regardless of who’s targeted.”
“I must say, when the president of the United States fails to condemn acts of political violence because they’re targeting someone that he dislikes or disagrees with, that makes us all less safe,” he said.
The governor has been on a media blitz promoting his book, including an appearance on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” earlier this week.
He told the host it’s a “sad day in America that a governor of a commonwealth needs to prepare for a federal onslaught where they would send troops in to undermine the freedoms and constitutional rights of our citizens.”
In response to a request for comment, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said assaults on federal immigration agents are on the rise because of “untrue smears by elected Democrats.”
“Just the other day, an officer had his finger bitten off by a radical left-wing rioter. ICE officers act heroically to enforce the law and protect American communities and local officials should work with them, not against them. Anyone pointing the finger at law enforcement officers instead of the criminals is simply doing the bidding of criminal illegal aliens,” Jackson said in a written statement.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune speaks to reporters at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 28, 2026. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate could vote as soon as Thursday night to approve a government funding package after Democrats brokered a deal with the White House to strip out the full-year spending bill for the Department of Homeland Security.
That bill will be replaced by a two-week stopgap for programs run out of DHS, which includes the Coast Guard, the Federal Emergency Management Agency — at a time when the agency is responding to a major winter storm — and the Secret Service.
The change is intended to give Republicans and Democrats more time to reach agreement on restrictions to federal immigration enforcement after the deadly shooting of a second U.S. citizen by immigration agents in Minneapolis on Saturday.
President Donald Trump wrote in a social media post that he wanted lawmakers to send him the reworked package in time to avoid a partial government shutdown, which would likely begin this weekend after a stopgap spending law expires.
“I am working hard with Congress to ensure that we are able to fully fund the Government, without delay,” Trump wrote. “Republicans and Democrats in Congress have come together to get the vast majority of the Government funded until September, while at the same time providing an extension to the Department of Homeland Security (including the very important Coast Guard, which we are expanding and rebuilding like never before). Hopefully, both Republicans and Democrats will give a very much needed Bipartisan ‘YES’ Vote.”
Snow piled outside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 29, 2026. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)
The package, once through the Senate, will need to go back to the House for final approval, though GOP leaders in that chamber haven’t announced if they will bring lawmakers back before Monday, when members are scheduled to return to Capitol Hill from a weeklong break.
Once the House clears the package, it will head to Trump for his signature.
Senators did not change or remove the Defense, Financial Services and General Government, Labor-HHS-Education, National Security-State and Transportation-HUD appropriations bills from the package.
Congress previously approved half of the dozen annual spending bills, so once this package becomes law, the Department of Homeland Security will be the only division of the federal government without its full-year funding bill.
List of Democratic demands
Democrats and Republicans reached consensus on some changes to the Homeland Security appropriations bill after the Jan. 7 shooting of 37-year-old Renee Good, including funding for body cameras and additional oversight of detention facilities.
The House approved that bill last week and sent it to the Senate as part of the larger package.
But Border Patrol agents’ shooting and killing of Alex Pretti led Democrats to call for the DHS spending bill to be pulled to give lawmakers time to negotiate additional guardrails on federal immigration actions.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., outlined a list of proposed changes Tuesday that included:
The end of roving patrols;
Tightening the rules governing the use of warrants;
Requiring Immigration and Customs Enforcement to coordinate with state and local law enforcement;
Implementing a uniform code of conduct that holds federal law enforcement to the same set of standards that apply to state and local agencies;
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said Thursday morning that “there’s a path to consider some of” the changes to federal immigration during bipartisan negotiations.
But he expressed doubt later in the day that a two-week stopgap bill for DHS would give lawmakers enough time to find agreement on changes to immigration enforcement, saying there’s “no way you could do it that fast.”
“At some point we want to fund the government,” Thune said. “Obviously the two-week (continuing resolution) probably means there’s going to be another two-week CR and maybe another two-week CR after that. I don’t know why they’re doing it that way.”
Senate Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee Chairwoman Katie Britt, R-Ala., also expressed doubt a two-week stopgap would provide enough time for negotiators to broker a bipartisan deal and hold votes in each chamber.
“I think, obviously, four weeks would be much better when you’re looking at what’s in front of us,” she said.
Britt said she’d decide on any counter-proposals to Democrats after the government was funded.
“We’re going to land this plane and then we’re going to figure it out,” she said.
Homan comments please Tillis
In response to immigration agents killing Pretti, the president directed his border czar, Tom Homan, to head to Minneapolis.
Homan said during a morning press conference that immigration enforcement would only end if state officials cooperate and aid the federal government in the Trump administration’s immigration campaign. States and localities are not required to enforce immigration law, as it’s a federal responsibility.
Homan did not specify how long he would remain in Minnesota, only “until the problem’s gone.”
North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis said in the afternoon that he had messaged Trump to express his appreciation for sending Homan to Minneapolis, saying it led to a “sea change.”
“I texted the president and said, ‘great job,’” Tillis said. “You know, I can’t imagine we would be in this place if he’d been there to begin with.”
Tillis said he thought Homan’s press conference had been “perfect.”
“He said at least twice he wasn’t there for a photo op and he was there to de-escalate,” Tillis said. “That’s what happens when you put a professional law enforcement officer in the role versus people who have no experience in it.”
People whistle and film as federal agents block an alley near 35th Street and Chicago Avenue while they break a car window to detain a man and his young daughter Thursday, Jan. 22, 2026. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)
Less than an hour after the Saturday morning killing of Alex Pretti by federal agents in south Minneapolis, conservative influencer Cam Higby took to social media with a sensational claim: Higby had “infiltrated” the group chats fueling local resistance to Operation Metro Surge.
On Monday, FBI director Kash Patel said he had “opened an investigation” into the chats. Many are said to be hosted on Signal, the encrypted messaging app.
“You cannot create a scenario that illegally entraps and puts law enforcement in harm’s way,” Patel said in a podcast interview with Benny Johnson, another conservative influencer. Johnson’s title for the episode’s YouTube stream, “Kash Patel Announces FBI Crack-Down of Left-Wing Minnesota Terrorist Network LIVE: ‘Tim Walz Next…’,” left little to the imagination.
In response to emailed questions about the nature of its investigation, the FBI declined to comment.
First Amendment lawyers and national security experts expressed deep skepticism that any charges stemming from it will stick, however.
“As a general proposition, reporting on things you are observing and sharing those observations is absolutely legal,” Jane Kirtley, professor of media ethics and law at the University of Minnesota Law School, said in an interview.
A guide that Higby described as “the watered down opsec version” of a “TRAINING MANUAL for domestic terrorist patrols chasing ICE agents in Minneapolis” instructs observers to draw attention to suspected ICE activity using whistles and car horns — but specifically warns against impeding officers.
Kirtley said Patel’s statements to date have been too vague to support firm conclusions about what the FBI will actually investigate or what charges, if any, the United States Department of Justice would bring as a result. The sorts of loaded terms that influencers like Higby and President Trump himself have used to describe organizers’ activities — such as “conspiracy” or “insurrection” — are formal legal concepts that require certain standards to be met, she added.
Jason Marisam, a constitutional law professor at Mitchell Hamline School of Law, said any prosecution would likely need to pass a two-part test established in a nearly 60-year-old U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Brandenburg v. Ohio.
Brandenburg prohibits speech only if it is “directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action,” such as violence against law enforcement officers, and “is likely to incite or produce such action,” according to a summary by Cornell Law School’s Legal Information Institute.
Brandenburgis “a very high bar,” Marisam said. Speech that only indirectly led to “lawless action,” such as coordinating a protest that later turned violent, would likely not meet it, he added.
“The use of encryption to keep government authorities from getting access to our private communications is literally as American as apple pie.”
– Patrick G. Eddington
Marisam said Brandenburg, incidentally,is the same standard that former special counsel Jack Smith would have needed to meet had his January 6th prosecution against President Trump gone to trial, Marisam added. That case was mooted after Trump won a second term and subsequently oversaw a campaign of professional retribution against the career prosecutors on Smith’s team.
Marisam said narrowing or overturning Brandenburghas not yet been a priority for conservatives in the judiciary, despite self-evident benefits for Trump’s efforts to quell dissent and consolidate power. But he acknowledged that the “politics of free speech” can change depending on who’s in charge in Washington.
For instance, Trump supporters castigated what they perceived to be limits on free speech during the Biden years, but have remained silent in the face of a student’s deportation for writing an op-ed.
Still, Patel’s apparent interest in Twin Cities observers’ encrypted chats is likely less the opening move of a well-thought-out legal strategy than an effort to discourage legally permissible activity, Marisam said.
“It seems to me that (Patel’s) announcement is meant to chill speech ahead of time,” he said.
In a blog post published Tuesday, Patrick Eddington, a senior fellow with the libertarian Cato Institute, said federal prosecutors would likewise struggle to make hay out of Twin Cities observers’ use of the encrypted messaging apps themselves.
Trump officials and right-wing pundits have pointed to Signal’s popularity within the observer networks as evidence that participants want to evade legal accountability for their actions. Signal uses end-to-end encryption, meaning messages sent on properly secured devices kept in their owners’ possession are effectively impossible for third parties to see. Signal itself can’t access messages or calls sent over the app, the company says, though messages on a user’s device can be read if it is hacked or stolen. (Or, if the wrong person is added to a Signal chat, as when senior national security figures in the Trump administration — including Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth — sent information about military operations to the editor of The Atlantic magazine after he’d been accidentally included.)
Eddington, who works on homeland security and civil liberties issues for Cato, said the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals’ 1999 ruling in Bernstein v. United States Department of Justice established ordinary citizens’ rights to use encrypted channels for communication they wish to keep private. Government efforts to curtail encryption could impede individuals’ rights under the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits “unreasonable search and seizure.”
Eddington cited a much earlier precedent that may well have informed the Constitution’s privacy protections, though its contemporary legal relevance is unclear. Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and other members of America’s founding generation used “codes and ciphers” to communicate before, during and after the Revolutionary War, Eddington wrote.
“The use of encryption to keep government authorities from getting access to our private communications is literally as American as apple pie,” he wrote.
This story was originally produced by Minnesota Reformer, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network which includes Wisconsin Examiner, and is supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity.
Lincoln Hills, the troubled youth detention facility, ended court-ordered monitoring Wednesday. | Photo courtesy Wisconsin Department of Corrections
On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge James Peterson ended mandated oversight of the Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake youth prisons. A court-mandated monitoring program for the juvenile detention facilities found them to be in “substantial compliance” with reforms sought in a 2018 class action settlement, marking a new chapter in their troubled history.
Teresa Abreu, the court-appointed monitor, praised the progress both facilities have made in the latest report. “This accomplishment reflects years of deliberate and meaningful reform, including the elimination of OC spray, the removal of punitive room confinement, the reduction of restraint usage and confinement in general, the use of MANDT, the implementation of a robust behavior management system and programming efforts to reduce idleness, and a strong emphasis on staff wellness.”
The Wisconsin Examiner’s Criminal Justice Reporting Project shines a light on incarceration, law enforcement and criminal justice issues with support from the Public Welfare Foundation.
For years, the Lincoln Hills School for Boys and the Copper Lake School for Girls were notorious among the nation’s largest juvenile prisons. Children and teens incarcerated there, most of them from Milwaukee, described being subjected to pepper spray, solitary confinement, and man-handling by guards. Guards also reported experiencing violence and injuries caused by incarcerated youth.
Those reports culminated in a lawsuit filed in 2017 by the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin, the Juvenile Law Center, and the Milwaukee-based law firm Quarles & Brady LLP over conditions in both corrections facilities. A settlement agreement was eventually reached, and included a consent decree which mandated that policies, practices, and conditions improve at Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake, while also appointing a monitor to ensure that the facilities came into compliance with the settlement.
“When we started this lawsuit in 2017, the use of pepper spray on children, solitary confinement, shackling, and strip searches were rampant at Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake,” Tim Muth, staff attorney at the ACLU of Wisconsin said in a statement. “Today, those practices have been eliminated or significantly restricted at the facilities, and the reforms codified into binding regulations.”
Gov. Tony Evers praised the facilities’ progress. “This has been a goal a decade in the making, and it’s tremendous to be able to celebrate the completion of reforms at Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake schools today…This is a win for our state, a win for youth in our care, and a win for those who dedicate their time and energy to supporting the needed advancement of our justice system.”
Abreu’s most recent assessment noted that the overall climate, safety and culture at Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake had seen “a demonstrable improvement,” but stressed that sustaining reforms to the facilities “must remain a top priority, not just to protect youth and staff but also to ensure continued compliance with the Consent Decree, which has now been codified by the Wisconsin Administrative Code.”
Kate Burdick, senior attorney at the Juvenile Law Center, commended Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake as being a “far cry from where we started” in a statement. “Yet we know that no child should grow up in prison — even an improved one. Across Wisconsin, the focus should be on building up alternatives to incarceration that support young people and help them thrive at home and in their own communities.”
Today there are 112 youth incarcerated by the Wisconsin Department of Corrections according to the most recent population report. That number includes 71 boys at Lincoln Hills and 22 girls at Copper Lake. While improvements have been made to both facilities, plans to eventually close the two prisons have been stalled by years of legislative debate and local pushback from communities that don’t want new juvenile prisons built in their backyards.
In 2024, Lincoln Hills was engulfed by a new wave of controversy after a staff member died from injuries he’d received during an assault. One of the involved teens, 18-year-old Rian Nyblom, pleaded guilty last year, and a trial for 17-year-old Javarius Hurd has been delayed. Hurd pleaded guilty to homicide and battery charges, but has argued that he was not responsible due to mental illness
Abreu stressed in her monitoring report more improvements are needed at Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake. “Despite this progress, critical work remains,” the monitor wrote. “The Defendants must establish a comprehensive, long-term strategy for youth who are not suited for a juvenile correctional setting. As the Monitor has consistently advised, greater emphasis must be placed on transferring youth from [Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake] to more appropriate placements or diverting them from confinement altogether. The opening of new facilities should not result in increased incarceration; rather, it should advance the vision of placing youth closer to home and ultimately closing [Lincoln Hills and Copper Lake].”
Rep. Andrew Hysell said Wisconsin’s state level officials need to act when the federal government is “failing” people. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)
Wisconsin’s freshman Democratic lawmakers are calling for the state’s constitution to be amended to include an explicit protection for Wisconsinites’ fundamental right to privacy.
“For months, we have seen agents of the federal government run roughshod over the law and the Constitution. Doing so is harming and even killing Americans,” Rep. Andrew Hysell (D-Sun Prairie) said at a press conference. “Not surprisingly, people here in Wisconsin are very afraid. If members of ICE can kill with impunity, how can anyone feel safe? This should not be happening in the United States.”
The recent shooting of Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse from Green Bay, by federal Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis has prompted an array of reactions from Wisconsin politicians including Gov. Tony Evers, who joined a lawsuit challenging the presence of federal immigration agents in the Twin Cities, and candidates for governor, including U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, who said that “cooperation is how you avoid tragic consequences.”
Hysell said Wisconsin’s state level officials need to act when the federal government is “failing” people.
“When federal agents operate outside the limits set by the United States Constitution, state constitutions become the last meaningful line of defense for individual liberty,” Hysell said.
Hysell said that elevating an individual right to privacy in Wisconsin would place clear constitutional limits on government intrusion, including administrative warrants issued by enforcement agencies rather than judges, civil detentions that function as criminal restraints without criminal process, pretextual entry into homes and the collection or use of personal data and location information without individualized judicial review.
Hysell said a constitutional amendment would act as a stronger protection than a change in state law.
“A fundamental right flips the script in court. Instead of you having to plead to the judge that the government has done something wrong, the government has to justify how it had the power to do it in the first place,” Hysell said. “Wisconsin has a statutory right to privacy that provides some protection, but it’s not enough. Elevating the right to privacy to a constitutional level here in Wisconsin gives us protection from governmental overreach and abuse, exactly the kind of things we’ve seen in Minneapolis.”
Hysell said the bill has the support of all 23 first-term Democratic representatives.
“It’s actually quite simple,” Sen. Melissa Ratcliff (D-Cottage Grove) said. “It affirms Wisconsinites constitutional right to privacy. It’s very simple in language, and it’s a fundamental promise that deeply personal decisions belong to individuals and families — not politicians or the government.”
Constitutional amendments in Wisconsin have to pass two consecutive sessions of the state Legislature and receive approval from a majority of voters to become law.
Wisconsin voters have decided on 10 constitutional amendment questions in the last five years. There are likely to be three on deck, including one to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, on the ballot in November alongside Wisconsin’s open race for governor, Congressional races and state legislative races.
“Wisconsin constitutional amendments used to mean something, but now they have become weaponized by the Republican majority and used as a way to circumvent the governor’s desk all while debasing our state constitution,” Ratcliff said. “Today’s proposed Wisconsin constitutional right to privacy amendment is not political theater or abstract language. It’s about ensuring that government power has clear limits, that individuals are protected from unreasonable intrusion and that all of our core liberties are upheld.”
Hysell said there are 11 other states, including Montana and Alaska, that have privacy rights covered in their state constitutions.
The proposal will face a difficult path in the Republican-led Legislature.
Hysell said in response to a question about getting Republicans on board that “this really should be a nonpartisan issue because it’s about protecting all Americans.”
(The Center Square) - Wisconsin has now collected $567 million more this fiscal year in general purpose taxes than it did a year ago from Wisconsin residents.
(The Center Square) – Washington County Executive Josh Schoemann dropped out of the Republican race for Wisconsin governor on Wednesday, less than 24 hours after President Donald Trump endorsed Congressman Tom Tiffany in the race.
A Shorewood judge ruled Wednesday that a man who deliberately tested the boundaries of public access along Lake Michigan’s shoreline in late July trespassed on private property.
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee professor Paul Florsheim grew up just a few houses away from where a Shorewood resident who lives in a prominent lakeside home recorded him walking on the beach adjacent to his house multiple times and called police. Florsheim was eventually fined $313 for trespassing after walking past signs marking private property north of the public beach and cordially ignoring warnings from the police.
He previously told Wisconsin Watch that, despite Wisconsin law, the stretch of beach along Lake Michigan just north of Milwaukee had long been treated by locals like a public right of way.
Municipal Court Judge Margo Kirchner found Florsheim guilty and ordered him to pay a $313 trespassing fine, citing Wisconsin precedent that limits public access along privately controlled Lake Michigan shorelines.
Unlike other states bordering Lake Michigan like Michigan and Indiana, Wisconsin law does not guarantee public access to the beach up to the point where sand typically meets vegetation.
Under a 1923 Wisconsin Supreme Court ruling, private property owners adjacent to the shoreline are granted “exclusive” use of the beach, even though the land is publicly owned. The court held that Wisconsinites may walk along the shoreline only if they remain in the water.
Florsheim previously told Wisconsin Watch he hopes to appeal the case to the Wisconsin Supreme Court, where a favorable ruling could reshape public access along Wisconsin’s Lake Michigan shoreline.
Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters for original stories and our Friday news roundup.
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Anna Mykhailova and Sasha Druzhyna fled Ukraine after Russia invaded, leaving behind careers as physicians.
Wisconsin needs more medical professionals, including physicians. But those with foreign training face hurdles that can keep them from filling that gap.
State officials recently eased requirements for foreign-trained doctors, but Mykhailova isn’t sure what the change means for her.
Anna works as a sonographer at a Madison hospital, while Sasha is studying for a master’s degree in medical perfusion at the Milwaukee School of Engineering.
The family is among 100,000 Ukrainians with Temporary Protected Status, allowing them to live and work in the United States for renewable 18-month stretches.
Sasha Druzhyna knows all about transplants.
As an anesthesiologist and perfusionist in Kyiv, Ukraine, Sasha used specialized equipment to keep patients’ blood pumping during heart transplants and keep donor organs alive until they reached their recipients.
Now, after fleeing Russia’s full-scale invasion, the 52-year-old is learning his profession all over again as a student in Milwaukee School of Engineering’s medical perfusion program.
Eighty miles away, his wife Anna Mykhailova, 42, is starting over, too. In 2024, she started a job as a cardiac sonographer at a Madison hospital, using skills she refined as a cardiologist in one of Ukraine’s top heart hospitals. She’s also studying for the medical board exams in hopes of one day practicing medicine in the United States.
But as they work to rebuild their careers, they still don’t know if they’ll be allowed to stay.
“It’s so stressful because of this immigration process. I will do these really hard exams and they (might) say, ‘Oh, you have to leave this country,’” Anna said of the family’s immigration limbo.
Wisconsin needs more medical professionals, including physicians. But as the couple’s experience shows, those who arrive in the country with foreign training face hurdles that can keep them from filling that gap.
Anna Mykhailova, right, worked as a cardiologist in Ukraine before fleeing with the couple’s daughter in 2022 when Russia invaded the country. Sasha Druzhyna worked as an anesthesiologist and perfusionist. He stayed in Ukraine to work for a year after his wife and daughter left.
Sasha Druzhyna, left, and Anna Mykhailova settled in Madison with the help of friends. The family has Temporary Protected Status, which allows them to stay in the U.S. for 18-month stretches.
Anna Mykhailova, left, works as a sonographer at a Madison hospital while her husband, Sasha Druzhyna, studies for a master’s degree in medical perfusion at the Milwaukee School of Engineering.
A new life begins
Had the couple fled to Europe instead, their career paths might have been simpler. Sasha might be the teacher instead of the student. Anna might still be a doctor.
But the invasion left no time to deliberate. Anna and her colleagues moved their patients to the hospital’s basement, then brought their own families to shelter there, too. Anna and Sasha brought their daughter, Varya, who was 6 years old at the time.
They listened to the news as Russian troops occupied the suburbs around Kyiv.
“When they showed civilian kids killed by Russians … I realized that nobody will protect us and (we) just have to go,” Anna said.
A friend with military connections warned that Ukrainian forces would soon blow up Ukraine’s own bridges to stop Russian troops from taking more ground.
“They told us, if you want to leave, you have to leave right now,” Anna said. Sasha drove his wife and daughter west, past sirens and explosions, toward the border with Poland.
A week later, Anna and Varya were on a plane to Boston, where Anna had a friend from medical school. Arriving with tourist visas, she thought they’d be away for just a few weeks. Sasha, who didn’t speak English, opted to stay.
“Coming here, starting from zero, no money, no nothing, no job — he didn’t want to come and wash floors in a supermarket … It’s really difficult to immigrate when you already had something in your home country,” Anna said.
Anna Mykhailova and Sasha Druzhyna’s 10-year-old daughter, Varya, plays on her mother’s smartphone at their home in Madison, Wis., on Oct. 25, 2025. Varya was 6 years old when she fled Ukraine with her mother.
Drawings by their daughter hang on the front door of Anna Mykhailova and Sasha Druzhyna’s home on Oct. 25, 2025. It might have been easier for the couple to practice medicine if they immigrated to somewhere in Europe, but they said they don’t want to uproot their daughter again.
From left, Sasha Druzhyna, Varya and Anna Mykhailova sit on the couch together at their home on Oct. 25, 2025. They try to stay positive. Druzhyna sees his graduate degree program as an adventure, and Mykhailova is thankful for the support they’ve received from Americans.
He kept working in the hospital, caring for his usual patients and the war-wounded. They figured the fighting would end soon.
But about a year later, Sasha joined his family in Madison, where friends helped them get settled.
“We realized that this war is going to be forever,” Anna said. “I don’t believe that they will stop it.”
The three are among more than 100,000 Ukrainians who’ve been granted Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, because the federal government deems it unsafe to return. The status allows them to live and work in the United States for renewable 18-month stretches.
Almost four years later, they’re still here — and hoping to stay. The war rages on, and they’ve embraced their new home. Varya, 10, now speaks mostly English.
“She doesn’t want to speak Ukrainian anymore,” Anna said in an interview at her Madison apartment building in September. “So for her to go back to school in Ukraine … it’s possible, but it’s going to be really difficult.”
But staying isn’t easy either. Restarting their careers has come with significant personal and financial costs, and there’s no guarantee their efforts will pay off.
Covert cardiologist
Until recently, all foreign-trained physicians seeking to practice medicine in Wisconsin had to pass three licensing board exams — offered only in English — then compete against recent medical school graduates for a three-year residency at a U.S. hospital.
To Anna, the process seemed daunting. The tests cost around $1,000 each — not counting textbooks and study materials — and she was still taking classes to improve her English. She heard that hospitals preferred recent graduates, and she feared they’d be particularly reluctant to accept someone whose immigration status expires every 18 months.
Meanwhile, she and her husband struggled to find a place to live. The prestige they commanded back home was irrelevant to U.S. landlords running background checks.
“Could you imagine? I’m in my 40s. I don’t have any credit score … I just got my work permit. I couldn’t find a job,” Anna said. “Nobody wants me. They don’t know who I am (or) what is our culture; everybody’s afraid of us.”
Anna Mykhailova poses for a portrait on Oct. 27, 2025, at SSM Health St. Mary’s Hospital in Madison, Wis. Mykhailova worked as a cardiologist in Kyiv, Ukraine, before fleeing to the United States and having to start over due to the Russian invasion.
She began applying for research jobs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
“I don’t know how many interviews I had,” Anna said. “Everybody was so nice, but (they said), ‘You are overqualified for this job.’”
Then the mom of one of her daughter’s soccer teammates mentioned that her employer, SSM Health St. Mary’s Hospital, was hiring student sonographers. She encouraged Anna to apply.
The roles are designed for people currently studying medical sonography, but Anna already had the relevant training: Ukrainian doctors regularly do their own sonography. She applied for the job with help from teachers at the Madison nonprofit Literacy Network, where she’d been taking classes to improve her English and prepare for next steps in school or work.
She started the job in 2024, running ultrasounds to aid in medical procedures and to diagnose things like heart attacks, heart murmurs, strokes and birth defects. She was promoted to a full-time position soon after.
On a typical day, she might see half a dozen patients. She doesn’t tell them she’s a doctor.
“Nobody knows,” Anna said.
Some patients get rude when they hear her accent. “I had a couple patients, they told me, ‘Don’t touch me. Call somebody else. I don’t trust you,’” she said.
Once a hospital security officer heard the way a patient spoke to her and urged her to file a report. The hospital sent a letter threatening to deny care if the patient acted that way again.
“I have a really good experience working here,” Anna said. “I really like my job right now.”
Leaves change colors on Oct. 27, 2025, outside SSM Health St. Mary’s Hospital where Anna Mykhailova works as a sonographer. Mykhailova already had the relevant training: She regularly did her own sonography as a physician in Ukraine.
Under the new rules, qualifying foreign-trained physicians can work under the supervision of another physician without repeating residency training if they’ve passed U.S. board exams and have a Wisconsin job offer.
Anna heard the news from a friend and asked about it at work.
“I showed this bill to people in the medical field here, and they were just like, ‘Oh, we don’t know,’” Anna said. “So I don’t know how does it work here, or where to go and who to ask.”
It’s also not clear she’d qualify. The new rules require applicants to have practiced medicine in their home country for at least one year in the last five years. She left her job nearly four years ago, and she figures it will likely be a couple years before she passes the board exams.
Lately, she’s been reading up on the licensing rules in other states and contemplating a move after her husband finishes school.
She wonders if things might have been easier if the family had immigrated to Poland, say, or Italy, instead of the United States. Back in Ukraine, her husband ran a perfusion school certified by the European Board of Cardiovascular Perfusion, and he received his own training in Europe. But she doesn’t think it’s worth emigrating again.
“It doesn’t matter where you go, everything is going to be different,” Anna said. “If I go to Europe, I have to start over. I have to study a new language, and then all of the education and activities for our daughter, and she also has to study a new language. So I just don’t want to do it a second time. I don’t have the energy to do it.”
From professor to pupil
Sasha, meanwhile, decided not to try to become a doctor again. His top priority was perfusion, the field to which he dedicated two doctoral dissertations and decades of work. In the United States, perfusionists don’t need to be doctors, but they do need specialized training.
“The perfusion specialty board, they do not recognize European diplomas,” Anna said. “They want them to go back to school here. But he’s happy to do it. He was so happy that they admitted him.”
Last fall, he started the two-year master’s degree program at MSOE.
“This wasn’t about choosing an easier path. Perfusion is a highly specialized and demanding field … This is where my experience is most relevant,” Sasha said, “and it’s work I genuinely value.”
Sasha Druzhyna takes classes on Nov. 5, 2025, at the Milwaukee School of Engineering in Milwaukee. Druzhyna worked as an anesthesiologist and perfusionist in Kyiv, Ukraine, before fleeing to the U.S. and having to start over due to the Russian invasion. He takes classes Monday through Friday and returns to his family in Madison on weekends.
Anna teases him about being so much older than the other students in the program.
“He’s like a father for all his classmates,” Anna said. “The first day, he brought actual paper, a notebook with different colored pens. His classmates brought just iPads. They were like, ‘What is that? Are you a dinosaur?’”
Paying for tuition for the first semester took most of the couple’s savings, Anna said. Their immigration status makes them ineligible for federal student loans.
She’s not sure how they’ll cover the remaining costs.
Sasha was also accepted to the perfusion school at State University of New York Upstate Medical University, which offered him a job that would have offset his tuition costs, but he didn’t want to uproot his family again.
“My daughter would need to change her school, leave her friends,” Sasha said. “You know how important it is for a girl of 10 years, your friends? It’s the most important thing in your life.”
But being in school has meant far less time with her. Since September, Sasha has spent his weekdays in Milwaukee, attending classes and shadowing other perfusionists during surgery. When he’s not in the operating room, he spends the night in a spare room he rents from a friend.
The Milwaukee School of Engineering campus is seen on Nov. 5, 2025. Sasha Druzhyna is studying for a master’s degree in medical perfusion, a profession he dedicated two dissertations and decades of work to in Ukraine.
Back in Madison, Anna is “basically a single mom” five days a week. On Fridays, Sasha drives home to see his family and work on a transplant team at UW Health, where he uses perfusion techniques to keep donated organs alive and healthy until they’re transplanted.
With luck, he’ll move back to Madison after he finishes his coursework in May. He’s hoping to do his second-year rotations at Madison hospitals.
Status: Pending
Back in Kyiv, the couple’s condo stands vacant, full of the things Anna left behind when she packed hurriedly for a few weeks away.
The high-rise penthouse, located beside the many bridges on Kyiv’s east side, boasts an impressive view of the city and the river — and Russian missile strikes. The couple can’t sell it, or go back, until the war ends.
“Nobody wants to live on the 27th floor when you don’t have electricity, elevator or water, and you can see rockets and jets in front of your eyes,” Anna said.
Meanwhile, despite the time and money the two doctors have invested in their new lives, their future in the United States is uncertain.
The family’s Temporary Protected Status expired in April, and they still haven’t received an answer on the renewal application they submitted a year ago.
“The Homeland Security office said that our work permits are still valid (while) we are waiting for their decision,” Anna said. “We’re just waiting to see.”
If their application is approved, they could be on the hook for thousands of dollars. The Department of Homeland Security announced in October that Ukrainians’ applications, including those already waiting to be processed, will be subject to a new fee of $1,000 per person.
Anna has been looking into other visa options, too. Many foreign doctors practice in the United States on H1-B visas, an employer-sponsored visa for workers with specialized skills. If Sasha can eventually get one of those visas as a perfusionist, Anna will get a work permit, too. But in September, the Trump administration announced a $100,000 fee on most new H1-B visas, raising concerns that employers — including hospitals — will cut back on those visas.
Sasha Druzhyna, right, and Anna Mykhailova head home after their daughter’s soccer game on Oct. 25, 2025, in Oregon, Wis.
Even if the family is able to renew their status, it will end in October unless the Department of Homeland Security extends Ukraine’s TPS designation. Since President Donald Trump took office last year, his administration ended TPS for immigrants from 10 countries, revoking legal status for more than 1.6 million immigrants, NPR found.
Anna worries that she and her family could become targets for deportation before they ever get a decision on their application.
“I don’t feel safe,” Anna said. “When you are waiting, you are legally in the United States, but this new administration and ICE police, they think that you are illegal here.”
Still, she said, she and Sasha try to stay positive.
“My husband says this is a good opportunity. He feels so young because he is studying as a student, and he says it’s just an adventure,” Anna said.
She looks for the bright side, too. She points to the support and kindness Americans have shown her and the fact that she’s learned she can survive “without anything.”
“I feel like a homeless person. I feel like Ukraine is not my home anymore, and the United States is not my home yet,” Anna said, “but people are trying to make it feel like home.”
This story is part of Public Square, an occasional photography series highlighting how Wisconsin residents connect with their communities. To suggest someone in your community for us to feature, email Joe Timmerman at jtimmerman@wisconsinwatch.org.
Natalie Yahr reports on pathways to success statewide for Wisconsin Watch, working in partnership with Open Campus. Email her at nyahr@wisconsinwatch.org.
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