CHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA - NOVEMBER 19: A person is detained by U.S. Border Patrol agents inside a fast food restaurant that is under construction on November 19, 2025 in Charlotte, North Carolina. The man sustained injuries to his face while agents wrestled him to the ground after he tried to run. Federal Agents are carrying out "Operation Charlotte's Web," an ongoing immigration enforcement surge across the Charlotte region.(Photo by Ryan Murphy/Getty Images)

This story was originally published by ProPublica.

Immigration agents have put civilians’ lives at risk using more than their guns.

An agent in Houston put a teenage citizen into a chokehold, wrapping his arm around the boy’s neck, choking him so hard that his neck had red welts hours later. A black-masked agent in Los Angeles pressed his knee into a woman’s neck while she was handcuffed; she then appeared to pass out. An agent in Massachusetts jabbed his finger and thumb into the neck and arteries of a young father who refused to be separated from his wife and 1-year-old daughter. The man’s eyes rolled back in his head and he started convulsing.

After George Floyd’s murder by a police officer six years ago in Minneapolis — less than a mile from where an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed Renee Good last week — police departments and federal agencies banned chokeholds and other moves that can restrict breathing or blood flow.

But those tactics are back, now at the hands of agents conducting President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign.

Examples are scattered across social media. ProPublica found more than 40 cases over the past year of immigration agents using these life-threatening maneuvers on immigrants, citizens and protesters. The agents are usually masked, their identities secret. The government won’t say if any of them have been punished.

In nearly 20 cases, agents appeared to use chokeholds and other neck restraints that the Department of Homeland Security prohibits “unless deadly force is authorized.”

About two dozen videos show officers kneeling on people’s necks or backs or keeping them face down on the ground while already handcuffed. Such tactics are not prohibited outright but are often discouraged, including by federal trainers, in part because using them for a prolonged time risks asphyxiation.

We reviewed footage with a panel of eight former police officers and law enforcement experts. They were appalled.

This is what bad policing looks like, they said. And it puts everyone at risk.

“I arrested dozens upon dozens of drug traffickers, human smugglers, child molesters — some of them will resist,” said Eric Balliet, who spent more than two decades working at Homeland Security Investigations and Border Patrol, including in the first Trump administration. “I don’t remember putting anybody in a chokehold. Period.”

“If this was one of my officers, he or she would be facing discipline,” said Gil Kerlikowske, a longtime police chief in Seattle who also served as Customs and Border Protection commissioner under President Barack Obama. “You have these guys running around in fatigues, with masks, with ‘Police’ on their uniform,” but they aren’t acting like professional police.

Over the past week, the conduct of agents has come under intense scrutiny after an ICE officer in Minneapolis killed Good, a mother of three. The next day, a Border Patrol agent in Portland, Oregon, shot a man and woman in a hospital parking lot.

Top administration officials rushed to defend the officers. Speaking about the agent who shot Good, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said, “This is an experienced officer who followed his training.”

Officials said the same thing to us after we showed them footage of officers using prohibited chokeholds. Federal agents have “followed their training to use the least amount of force necessary,” department spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said.

“Officers act heroically to enforce the law and protect American communities,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said.

Both DHS and the White House lauded the “utmost professionalism” of their agents.

Our compilation of incidents is far from complete. Just as the government does not count how often it detains citizens or smashes through vehicle windows during immigration arrests, it does not publicly track how many times agents have choked civilians or otherwise inhibited their breathing or blood flow. We gathered cases by searching legal filings, social media posts and local press reports in English and Spanish.

Given the lack of any count over time, it’s impossible to know for certain how agents’ current use of the banned and dangerous tactics compares with earlier periods.

But former immigration officials told us they rarely heard of such incidents during their long tenures. They also recalled little pushback when DHS formally banned chokeholds and other tactics in 2023; it was merely codifying the norm.

That norm has now been broken.

One of the citizens whom agents put in a chokehold was 16 years old.

Tenth grader Arnoldo Bazan and his father were getting McDonald’s before school when their car was pulled over by unmarked vehicles. Masked immigration agents started banging on their windows. As Arnoldo’s undocumented father, Arnulfo Bazan Carrillo, drove off, the terrified teenager began filming on his phone. The video shows the agents repeatedly ramming the Bazans’ car during a slow chase through the city.

Bazan Carrillo eventually parked and ran into a restaurant supply store. When Arnoldo saw agents taking his father violently to the ground, Arnoldo went inside too, yelling at the agents to stop.

One agent put Arnoldo in a chokehold while another pressed a knee into his father’s neck. “I was going to school!” the boy pleaded. He said later that when he told the agent he was a citizen and a minor, the agent didn’t stop.

“I started screaming with everything I had, because I couldn’t even breathe,” Arnoldo told ProPublica, showing where the agent’s hands had closed around his throat. “I felt like I was going to pass out and die.”

DHS’ McLaughlin accused Arnoldo’s dad of ramming his car “into a federal law enforcement vehicle,” but he was never charged for that, and the videos we reviewed do not support this claim. Our examination of his criminal history — separate from any immigration violations — found only that Bazan Carrillo pleaded guilty a decade ago to misdemeanor driving while intoxicated.

McLaughlin also said the younger Bazan elbowed an officer in the face as he was detained, which the teen denies. She said that Arnoldo was taken into custody to confirm his identity and make sure he didn’t have any weapons. McLaughlin did not answer whether the agent’s conduct was justified.

Experts who reviewed video of the Bazans’ arrests could make no sense of the agents’ actions.

“Why are you in the middle of a store trying to grab somebody?” said Marc Brown, a former police officer turned instructor who taught ICE and Border Patrol officers at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers. “Your arm underneath the neck, like a choking motion? No! The knee on the neck? Absolutely not.”

DHS revamped its training curriculum after George Floyd’s murder to underscore those tactics were out of bounds, Brown said. “DHS specifically was very big on no choking,” he said. “We don’t teach that. They were, like, hardcore against it. They didn’t want to see anything with the word ‘choke.’”

After agents used another banned neck restraint — a carotid hold — a man started convulsing and passed out.

In early November, ICE agents in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, stopped a young father, Carlos Sebastian Zapata Rivera, as he drove with his family. They had come for his undocumented wife, whom they targeted after she was charged with assault for allegedly stabbing a co-worker in the hand with scissors.

Body camera footage from the local police, obtained by ProPublica, captured much of what happened. The couple’s 1-year-old daughter began crying. Agents surrounded the car, looking in through open doors.

According to the footage, an agent told Zapata Rivera that if his wife wouldn’t come out, they would have to arrest him, too — and their daughter would be sent into the foster system. The agent recounted the conversation to a local cop: “Technically, I can arrest both of you,” he said. “If you no longer have a child, because the child is now in state custody, you’re both gonna be arrested. Do you want to give your child to the state?”

Zapata Rivera, who has a pending asylum claim, clung to his family. His wife kept saying she wouldn’t go anywhere without her daughter, whom she said was still breastfeeding. Zapata Rivera wouldn’t let go of either of them.

Federal agents seemed conflicted on how to proceed. “I refuse to have us videotaped throwing someone to the ground while they have a child in their hands,” one ICE agent told a police officer at the scene.

But after more than an hour, agents held down Zapata Rivera’s arms. One, who Zapata Rivera’s lawyer says wore a baseball cap reading “Ne Quis Effugiat” — Latin for “So That None Will Escape” — pressed his thumbs into the arteries on Zapata Rivera’s neck. The young man then appeared to pass out as bystanders screamed.

The technique is known as a carotid restraint. The two carotid arteries carry 70% of the brain’s blood flow; block them, and a person can quickly lose consciousness. The tactic can cause strokes, seizures, brain damage — and death.

“Even milliseconds or seconds of interrupted blood flow to the brain can have serious consequences,” Dr. Altaf Saadi, a neurologist and associate professor at Harvard Medical School, told us. Saadi said she couldn’t comment on specific cases, “but there is no amount of training or method of applying pressure on the neck that is foolproof in terms of avoiding neurologic damage.”

In a bystander video of Zapata Rivera’s arrest, his eyes roll back in his head and he suffers an apparent seizure, convulsing so violently that his daughter, seated in his lap, shakes with him.

“Carotid restraints are prohibited unless deadly force is authorized,” DHS’ use-of-force policy states. Deadly force is authorized only when an officer believes there’s an “imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury” and there is “no alternative.”

In a social media post after the incident and in its statement to ProPublica, DHS did not cite a deadly threat. Instead, it referenced the charges against Zapata Rivera’s wife and suggested he had only pretended to have a medical crisis while refusing help from paramedics. “Imagine FAKING a seizure to help a criminal escape justice,” the post said.

“These statements were lies,” Zapata Rivera alleges in an ongoing civil rights lawsuit he filed against the ICE agent who used the carotid restraint. His lawyer told ProPublica that Zapata Rivera was disoriented after regaining consciousness; the lawsuit says he was denied medical attention. (Representatives for Zapata Rivera declined our requests for an interview with him. His wife has been released on bond, and her assault case awaits trial.)

A police report and bodycam footage from Fitchburg officers at the scene, obtained via a public records request, back up Zapata Rivera’s account of being denied assistance. “He’s fine,” an agent told paramedics, according to footage. The police report says Zapata Rivera wanted medical attention but “agents continued without stopping.”

Saadi, the Harvard neurologist, said that as a general matter, determining whether someone had a seizure is “not something even neurologists can do accurately just by looking at it.”

DHS policy bars using chokeholds and carotid restraints just because someone is resisting arrest. Agents are doing it anyway.

When DHS issued restrictions on chokeholds and carotid restraints, it stated that the moves “must not be used as a means to control non-compliant subjects or persons resisting arrest.” Deadly force “shall not be used solely to prevent the escape of a fleeing subject.”

But videos reviewed by ProPublica show that agents have been using these restraints to do just that.

In Los Angeles in June, masked officers from ICE, Border Patrol and other federal agencies pepper-sprayed and then tackled another citizen, Luis Hipolito. As Hipolito struggled to get away, one of the agents put him in a chokehold. Another pointed a Taser at bystanders filming.

Then Hipolito’s body began to convulse — a possible seizure. An onlooker warned the agents, “You gonna let him die.”

When officers make a mistake in the heat of the moment, said Danny Murphy, a former deputy commissioner of the Baltimore Police Department, they need to “correct it as quickly as possible.”

That didn’t happen in Hipolito’s case. The footage shows the immigration agent not only wrapping his arm around Hipolito’s neck as he takes him down but also sticking with the chokehold after Hipolito is pinned on the ground.

The agent’s actions are “dangerous and unreasonable,” Murphy said.

Asked about the case, McLaughlin, the DHS spokesperson, said that Hipolito was arrested for assaulting an ICE officer. Hipolito’s lawyers did not respond to ProPublica’s requests for comment.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Hipolito limped into court days after the incident. Another citizen who was with him the day of the incident was also charged, but her case was dropped. Hipolito pleaded not guilty and goes to trial in February.

Some of the conduct in the footage isn’t banned — but it’s discouraged and dangerous.

A video from Los Angeles shows a Colombian-born TikTokker who often filmed ICE apparently passed out after officers pulled her from her Tesla and knelt on her neck. Another video shows a DoorDash driver in Portland, Oregon, screaming for air as four officers pin him face down in the street. “Aire, aire, aire,” he says. “No puedo respirar” — I can’t breathe. Then: “Estoy muriendo” — I’m dying. A third video, from Chicago, shows an agent straddling a citizen and repeatedly pressing his face into the asphalt. Onlookers yell that the man can’t breathe.

Placing a knee on a prone subject’s neck or weight on their back isn’t banned under DHS’ use-of-force policy, but it can be dangerous — and the longer it goes on, the higher the risk that the person won’t be able to breathe.

“You really don’t want to spend that amount of time just trying to get somebody handcuffed,” said Kerlikowske, the former CPB commissioner, of the video of the arrest in Portland.

Brown, the former federal instructor and now a lead police trainer at the University of South Carolina, echoed that. “Once you get them handcuffed, you get them up, get them out of there,” he said. “If they’re saying they can’t breathe, hurry up.”

Taking a person down to the ground and restraining them there can be an appropriate way to get them in handcuffs, said Seth Stoughton, a former police officer turned law professor who also works at the University of South Carolina. But officers have long known to make it quick. By the mid-1990s, the federal government was advising officers against keeping people prolongedly in a prone position.

When a federal agent kneeled on the neck of an intensive care nurse in August, she said she understood the danger she was in and tried to scream.

“I knew that the amount of pressure being placed on the back of my neck could definitely hurt me,” said Amanda Trebach, a citizen and activist who was arrested in Los Angeles while monitoring immigration agents. “I was having a hard time breathing because my chest was on the ground.”

McLaughlin, the DHS spokesperson, said Trebach impeded agents’ vehicles and struck them with her signs and fists.

Trebach denies this. She was released without any charges.

Protesters have also been choked and strangled.

In the fall, a protester in Chicago refused to stand back after a federal agent told him to do so. Suddenly, the agent grabbed the man by the throat and slammed him to the ground.

“No, no!” one bystander exclaims. “He’s not doing anything!”

DHS’ McLaughlin did not respond to questions about the incident.

Along with two similar choking incidents at protests outside of ICE facilities, this is one of the few videos in which the run-up to the violence is clear. And the experts were aghast.

“Without anything I could see as even remotely a deadly force threat, he immediately goes for the throat,” said Ashley Heiberger, a retired police captain from Pennsylvania who frequently testifies in use-of-force cases. Balliet, the former immigration official, said the agent turned the scene into a “pissing contest” that was “explicitly out of control.”

“It’s so clearly excessive and ridiculous,” Murphy said. “That’s the kind of action which should get you fired.”

“How big a threat did you think he was?” Brown said, noting that the officer slung his rifle around his back before grabbing and body-slamming the protester. “You can’t go grab someone just because they say, ‘F the police.’”

Roving patrols + unplanned arrests = unsafe tactics.

In November, Border Patrol agents rushed into the construction site of a future Panda Express in Charlotte, North Carolina, to check workers’ papers. When one man tried to run, an officer put him in a chokehold and later marched him out, bloodied, to a waiting SUV.

The Charlotte operation was one of Border Patrol’s many forays into American cities, as agents led by commander-at-large Gregory Bovino claimed to target “criminal illegal aliens” but frequently chased down landscapers, construction workers and U.S. citizens in roving patrols through predominantly immigrant or Latino communities.

Freelance photographer Ryan Murphy, who had been following Border Patrol’s convoys around Charlotte, documented the Panda Express arrest.

“Their tactics are less sophisticated than you would think,” he told ProPublica. “They sort of drive along the streets, and if they see somebody who looks to them like they could potentially be undocumented, they pull over.”

Experts told ProPublica that if officers are targeting a specific individual, they can minimize risks by deciding when, where and how to take them into custody. But when they don’t know their target in advance, chaos — and abuse — can follow.

“They are encountering people they don’t know anything about,” said Scott Shuchart, a former assistant director at ICE.

“The stuff that I’ve been seeing in the videos,” Kerlikowske said, “has been just ragtag, random.”

There may be other factors, too, our experts said, including quotas and a lack of consequences amid gutted oversight. With officers wearing masks, Shuchart said, “even if they punch grandma in the face, they won’t be identified.”

As they sweep into American cities, immigration officers are unconstrained — and, the experts said, unprepared. Even well-trained officers may not be trained for the environments where they now operate. Patrolling a little-populated border region takes one set of skills. Working in urban areas, where citizens — and protesters — abound, takes another.

DHS and Bovino did not respond to questions about their agents’ preparation or about the chokehold in Charlotte.

Experts may think there’s abuse. Holding officers to account? That’s another matter.

Back in Houston, immigration officers dropped 16-year-old Arnoldo off at the doorstep of his family home a few hours after the arrest. His neck was bruised, and his new shirt was shredded. Videos taken by his older sisters show the soccer star struggling to speak through sobs.

Uncertain what exactly had happened to him, his sister Maria Bazan took him to Texas Children’s Hospital, where staff identified signs of the chokehold and moved him to the trauma unit. Hospital records show he was given morphine for pain and that doctors ordered a dozen CT scans and X-rays, including of his neck, spine and head.

From the hospital, Maria called the Houston Police Department and tried to file a report, the family said. After several unsuccessful attempts, she took Arnoldo to the department in person, where she says officers were skeptical of the account and their own ability to investigate federal agents.

Arnoldo had filmed much of the incident, but agents had taken his phone. He used Find My to locate the phone — at a vending machine for used electronics miles away, close to an ICE detention center. The footage, which ProPublica has reviewed, backed the family’s account of the chase.

The family says Houston police still haven’t interviewed them. A department spokesperson told ProPublica it was not investigating the case, referring questions to DHS. But the police have also not released bodycam footage and case files aside from a top sheet, citing an open investigation.

“We can’t do anything,” Maria said one officer told her. “What can HPD do to federal agents?”

Elsewhere in the country, some officials are trying to hold federal immigration officers to account.

In California, the state Legislature passed bills prohibiting immigration officers from wearing masks and requiring them to display identification during operations.

In Illinois, Gov. JB Pritzker signed a law that allows residents to sue any officer who violates state or federal constitutional rights. (The Trump administration quickly filed legal challenges against California and Illinois, claiming their new laws are unconstitutional.)

In Colorado, Durango’s police chief saw a recent video of an immigration officer using a chokehold on a protester and reported it to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, which announced it was looking into the incident.

In Minnesota, state and local leaders are collecting evidence in Renee Good’s killing even as the federal government cut the state out of its investigation.

Arnoldo is still waiting for Houston authorities to help him, still terrified that a masked agent will come first. Amid soccer practice and making up schoolwork he missed while recovering, he watches and rewatches the videos from that day. The car chase, the chokehold, his own screams at the officers to leave his dad alone. His father in the driver’s seat, calmly handing Arnoldo his wallet and phone while stopping mid-chase for red lights.

The Bazan family said agents threatened to charge Arnoldo if his dad didn’t agree to be deported. DHS spokesperson McLaughlin did not respond when asked about the alleged threat. Arnoldo’s dad is now in Mexico.

Asked why an officer choked Arnoldo, McLaughlin pointed to the boy’s alleged assault with his elbow, adding, “The federal law enforcement officer graciously chose not to press charges.”

Mariam Elba contributed research. Joanna Shan, Haley Clark and Cengiz Yar contributed reporting.

 

Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul addresses the Wisconsin Farmers Union at its annual lobby day in Madison. (Henry Redman | Wisconsin Examiner)

Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s large presence in Minnesota, which has resulted in the shooting death of one resident and numerous clashes between community members and federal agents, is not the right way to make communities safe. 

Speaking at the Wisconsin Farmers Union’s annual lobby day Wednesday morning, Kaul said he’s concerned about the federal government “obstructing” the investigation into the death of Minneapolis resident Renee Nicole Good, touted his office’s briefs in support of jurisdictions suing to get federal personnel out of cities and said he’s preparing for similar federal actions in Wisconsin. 

“What’s happening in Minneapolis now could very well be repeated in other communities around the country,” he said. “And so making sure that we’re prepared if that does happen is really important to me.”

He said that targeting people based on their race, ethnicity and political beliefs weaponizes the justice system in a way that makes communities less safe. 

“We do a lot of thinking about public safety at the Department of Justice, it is my top priority,” he said. “Taking actions that strengthen communities, that strengthen community ties, that build trust, that ensure that laws are evenhandedly enforced … and ensure that people who commit serious crimes are held accountable” is the Wisconsin DOJ’s focus, Kaul said.

“If you start targeting people based on any number of inappropriate factors, whether it’s their race or ethnicity or their viewpoint on political issues or any other inappropriate topic, that takes you away from the kind of law enforcement that makes a positive impact and makes communities safer,” he added. 

Kaul noted he’s worked often with Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison and said that the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension needs to be involved in the investigation so there is transparency for everyone involved. 

“I’m very concerned that Minnesota BCA has so far been excluded from the investigative process into the death that happened,” he said. “It is critically important that there be transparency and that there be fairness. That, by the way, is important for everybody involved. If you were an officer involved in a critical incident, you deserve to have a fair investigation conducted so that the public knows what happened in that case, because without a fair, transparent investigation, there’s going to be uncertainty.”

“There’s been reporting recently that the FBI is not investigating necessarily the incident, but rather the wife of the woman who was killed,” he added later. “There’s the fact that six Assistant U.S. Attorneys, six federal prosecutors, have resigned in Minnesota because of the way that that investigation is being conducted. And I think it is really important that we distinguish between good faith efforts to get to the truth, that provide information clearly, and what’s going on in Minnesota, because what’s going on right there is obstructing full investigation and full review and risks that we not have information publicly available.”

Three cars filled with federal agents stop in front of Elle Neubauer and another observer, surrounding the car and threatening arrest during an early morning watch observing ICE in South Minneapolis Monday, Jan. 12, 2026. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)

As Elle Neubauer drove before dawn past the darkened windows of the immigrant-owned businesses on Lake Street in Minneapolis, her co-pilot and friend Patty O’Keefe scanned the passing vehicles with binoculars, searching for signs of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.

As the sun rose, more community patrollers arrived on Lake Street, keeping eyes on the Ecuadorean grocery stores, Somali restaurants and Mexican taco shops that line the street. With such a high concentration of patrollers and relatively few federal agents in the area that morning, Neubauer and O’Keefe decided to head south to the suburb of Bloomington, where O’Keefe said she had encountered ICE the day prior.

The goal is to “distract them, to occupy their time,” O’Keefe said. “The more time they’re trying to get away from us, the less time they’re spending searching for people to abduct.”

The pair quickly located and started following a white Ford Explorer they suspected belonged to ICE. The driver began weaving through suburban parking lots with Neubauer close behind, seemingly trying to confirm he was being followed.

“They do and will say anything to try to intimidate and scare people,” Neubauer said that morning. “One of their favorite lines recently is, ‘This is your one and only warning.’”

The Explorer came to a stop in a hotel parking lot, and Neubauer parked nearby. The driver of the Explorer then pulled his vehicle behind Neubauer’s car, blocking the exit.

A man with a black face covering and a tactical vest peeking through his flannel shirt exited his car and approached the passenger door, gesturing for O’Keefe to roll down the window.

“No, thank you,” Neubauer said, smiling and waving at the man.

“Stop following us,” he said, his voice muffled through the closed car window and the gaiter. “This is your first warning.”

Neubauer and O’Keefe started patrolling their south Minneapolis neighborhood recently as the Trump administration has ramped up its mass deportation campaign in Minnesota, sending in thousands of ICE and Border Patrol agents, with more on the way. They are some of the many thousands of Twin Cities residents who have come together over the past year to protest ICE and divert the agents from their mission, often resulting in tense confrontations.

Minnesota has been the focus of President Donald Trump’s deportation efforts since December, when a right-wing media outlet published unsubstantiated allegations that Somali Minnesotans were funding terrorism with money stolen from government programs. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced “Operation Metro Surge” in December, which purported to target Somali immigrants, the vast majority of whom are citizens or legal permanent residents. 

The effort to disrupt ICE operations has only grown in the days after ICE agent Jonathan Ross fatally shot Renee Good in her car in south Minneapolis, as Minnesotans look for ways to push back against what many view as an occupation of the city by unwelcome federal forces. There are now at least four times more immigration agents in the state than there are Minneapolis police officers. 

Citizen observers are gathering on street corners and posting on social media to connect with each other, and immigrant rights organizations are quickly reaching capacity at training sessions for people who want to learn how to support and defend immigrants.

ICE did not respond to the Reformer’s emails for comment for this story.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Good was attempting to run over a federal agent in an act of “domestic terrorism.” Appearing on a Sunday morning Fox News show, Noem said her agency is investigating the funding behind anti-ICE operations, and claimed nonprofit organizations are training people to “distract them, assault them and do exactly what we’ve seen with these vehicle rammings.”

After the man finished talking to the patrollers and got back in the white Explorer, a second vehicle — a black GMC Yukon SUV— pulled in behind him, blocking in Neubauer’s car while the Explorer drove away. 

Neubauer and O’Keefe followed the black SUV out of the parking lot.

“I wonder how many first warnings we can get today,” O’Keefe said, half-jokingly.

She evidently ran out of warnings two days later, when federal agents smashed in her car window, dragged her and her co-pilot out of the car, and held them for eight hours in the belly of the Whipple Federal Building.

Neighbors join forces to track ICE, warn potential targets

When Trump assumed the presidency for the second time, immigrant rights activists landed on a strategy to respond to the coming increase in immigrant arrests: rapid response networks. Grouped by geographic proximity, they would quickly arrive at the scene of an ICE raid to protest, warn nearby neighbors, tell detainees about their rights and convince agents to leave. A common tactic is pointing out that agents can’t enter private property without permission or a judicial warrant.

Around the country, as ICE deployments escalated in cities like Chicago and Los Angeles, anti-ICE protesters have adopted and spread the tactics of honking horns and blowing whistles to alert entire city blocks to agents’ presence. The practice has become common in the Twin Cities, especially since “Operation Metro Surge” began in December.

Over the past year, immigrant rights groups have hosted “know your rights” trainings for immigrants and rapid responders, outlining the laws governing ICE and the protocols observers should follow to avoid arrest. At these trainings, neighbors meet each other and plug into their local rapid response networks. 

Following cars, making noise and filming law enforcement operations is legal, according to Tracy Roy of the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota. Physically blocking ICE agents from making an arrest is not. (And getting arrested, Neubauer said, takes resources away from the movement, in addition to the high personal cost.)

Rapid responders have gathered en masse at protracted federal raids in Minneapolis and St. Paul in the past year, resulting in standoffs between protesters and ICE, in which ICE agents used physical force, pepper spray and tear gas on the demonstrators. 

But with the explosion in new agents arriving to the state, federal tactics seem to have shifted: ICE agents are conducting arrests quickly, in smaller groups than those that have provoked mass protest. By the time rapid responders arrive at the scene of a reported immigration raid or arrest — even if it only takes a few minutes — the ICE agents are often long gone. 

So, the rapid responders have gotten more proactive, setting off on neighborhood patrols, finding and following ICE agents to try to discourage them from making arrests. They also film the agents in action to document potential violations of the law.

“If they know that somebody is watching, they’re significantly less likely to stop somebody,” Neubauer said. “Often when they pull over and people hop on a whistle or on their horn, they’ll just leave.”

In group chats, neighbors using anonymous nicknames volunteer to assist with various aspects of the operation. No one assigns shifts or jobs; group members take on a needed role when they’re available, alert the group to their activities and let everyone know when they’re done.

The system is both highly organized and decentralized, with no clear leaders — just longer-time members of the network helping newcomers learn the communication style and security practices of the group.

As Neubauer drove on Friday morning’s patrol, O’Keefe monitored their local chat and listened to a group call. Both looked for what they’d learned were the hallmarks of ICE vehicles: out-of-state license plates, tinted windows, at least two people in the car — usually male, almost always masked.

When they spotted a suspicious vehicle in Bloomington, Neubauer maneuvered into position to follow it. An immediate giveaway that the vehicle belongs to federal agents, the patrollers said, is that the drivers quickly realize they’re being followed and start driving erratically. Early Friday morning, O’Keefe and Neubauer suspected a vehicle carried ICE officers; it aggressively accelerated towards Neubauer’s car while she made a U-turn at an intersection. Another vehicle they were following ran a red light, leaving the patrollers’ car behind.

“Well, if my plate wasn’t in their database, it is now,” Neubauer said Friday as she and O’Keefe followed the black SUV that had just boxed them in.

O’Keefe shared a description of the car and its license plate number so it could be added to the observers’ crowdsourced list.

As a countermeasure to the activists’ license plate tracking, ICE agents have been frequently switching license plates, drawing a warning from state regulators. 

Even after they lost the SUV — the driver cut abruptly across several lanes of traffic — the encounter was a successful waste of ICE resources, in the patrollers’ eyes. ICE had dedicated an entire vehicle to impeding the observers for several minutes, rather than conducting arrests.

“Deep breaths,” Neubauer said, reaching over to pat O’Keefe on the leg.

Managing one’s own emotions and staying calm is key to patrolling, because ICE agents are “emotional and not well-trained,” Neubauer said. 

‘I feel changed’

Neubauer and a different observer were following three apparent federal vehicles Monday when the convoy pulled onto a side street and came to a stop. Five agents hopped out of their vehicles, and one wearing a face covering and ICE vest approached the drivers’ side window as the others surrounded the car. 

As he approached the window, he greeted the driver with Neubauer’s wife’s legal name — the name on the car’s registration.

“If you keep following us…we’ll have to pull you out and arrest you,” the agent said. Neubauer and her co-pilot decided to keep following them — after all, they figured, they weren’t doing anything illegal. 

The convoy took them straight to Neubauer’s house, where they stopped and idled for a few minutes before moving on. 

According to a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union, ICE agents have routinely identified the drivers following them, then led them to the observers’ home — apparently using a law enforcement database to connect license plate numbers to drivers’ home addresses in an effort to intimidate observers.

On Monday, they took the intimidation tactics one step further. 

Two cars split off from the group, and Neubauer and her partner for the day decided to follow the third vehicle, a grey pickup truck. They stayed close behind for several minutes until they realized the truck was leading them towards the Whipple Federal Building. 

As Neubauer and her co-pilot followed the truck, agents returned to Neubauer’s house and banged on the front door. Her wife, who asked the Reformer not to publish her name out of fear of ICE, pretended she wasn’t home. The agents left after several neighbors stepped out of their houses and started blowing whistles.

When Neubauer realized what had happened, she called off the patrol and headed home.

“I feel changed, and afraid,” Neubauer’s wife said, looking at Neubauer. “I was very fearful — not for me, but for what could have happened to you.”

They set out on another patrol that afternoon, together.

Killed in the act

Since Ross shot and killed Good, immigrant rights activists and elected officials have referred to her as an “observer.”

When Neubauer saw video of the shooting, however, she noticed something that suggested Good may not have been trained, or experienced, in interacting with ICE: Her window was rolled down, and she was speaking to the agents, against the advice of many immigrant rights activists.

“The shooting on Wednesday was 1000% not Renee’s fault. It was an ICE officer panicking and shooting into her car,” Neubauer said. “If we can manage the emotions of ICE officers so they’re not panicking … they’re less likely to f*ck up and make a mistake and hurt someone.”

Several leaders of immigrant rights groups and members of Good’s local neighborhood rapid response network told the Reformer they did not know Good.

Even if Good were in the group chat, the people interviewed by the Reformer may not have known, because they use code names and generally do not know each other’s real identities.

Friday morning, one patroller spoke up in the group call to say their car had been boxed in and ICE agents were approaching.

Another group member repeated the collective mantra: Lock your doors, roll up the windows, do not engage.

Broken glass

Sunday morning, O’Keefe was patrolling south Minneapolis with her friend Brandon Sigüenza when they heard ICE agents had surrounded another patroller’s car and were deploying pepper spray. When they arrived at the scene, they saw two federal vehicles surrounded by people blowing whistles and honking horns, O’Keefe said.

The agents got back in their cars and drove away. O’Keefe and Sigüenza followed them down a residential street until the vehicles stopped in the middle of the road and agents came up to the car — again giving them a “final warning” to stop following the officers, O’Keefe said.

O’Keefe shouted through the closed windows that she wasn’t obstructing them and that they could move forward if they wanted to, she said.

Sigüenza, for his part, said he kept repeating Renee Good’s name.

As the agents were walking back to their cars, one turned around and sprayed pepper spray into the car’s intake vent, Sigüenza said. 

The pair continued following the convoy, O’Keefe honking her horn, until the agents stopped and got out of their cars again.

This time, they shattered both front windows and dragged Sigüenza and O’Keefe from the car, according to video captured by observers. Sigüenza said both of their phones flew from his hands, his landing in the frozen street. Agents handcuffed both activists and placed them in separate unmarked vehicles bound for the Whipple Federal Building, they said.

O’Keefe said the agents ridiculed her while she was in the backseat of the car. 

“You guys gotta stop obstructing us,” O’Keefe recalls one agent saying. Then, referring to Renee Good: “That’s why that lesbian b*tch is dead.”

O’Keefe became enraged, calling the agent a “f*cking bigot.” She committed his comment to memory and quoted it to everyone she could inside the Whipple Building, she said.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security did not respond to requests for comment Monday.

O’Keefe’s partner, Mitch Ditlefsen, called her as he was leaving his job as a prep cook at around 9:45 a.m. 

“Someone picked up and said, ‘The owner of this phone has been abducted by ICE,’” Ditlefsen said. 

“I showed up, and there was just shattered windows and pepper spray, and no indication of where Patty and Brandon were,” Ditlefsen said. 

The pair said they spent eight hours in custody, mostly in holding cells with other U.S. citizens who said they were also arrested while protesting ICE. O’Keefe said she was never provided a phone call; Sigüenza was able to call his wife. 

While in custody, Sigüenza said, agents suggested they would pay him or expedite immigration proceedings for his relatives if he provided the agents with names of undocumented immigrants or protest organizers. Both were released without charges. 

Sigüenza said he’ll take a short break from patrolling for his wife’s sake — she feared for his safety long before his arrest — but he’s ready to get back out there. 

O’Keefe said the experience has strengthened her resolve, but also ratcheted up her fear. 

“They don’t realize this is coming from a deep place of love and empathy and care for my community,” O’Keefe said. “And that is a stronger feeling that I have in me than fear.”

Feeling besieged, a neighborhood fights back

When thousands of people showed up to mourn Good at a vigil the night she was killed, organizers urged attendees to get connected to their local immigrant defense networks in whatever role they are comfortable with.

Everyone has different skills and risk tolerances, Neubauer said, so there’s a role for everyone. For example, going door to door to meet one’s neighbors is one important way to increase safety and support people who may be staying home for fear of ICE, Neubauer said. 

“But honestly, I have too much social anxiety,” she said. “It was just too much for me to do that. And for whatever reason, my brain works in such a way where (patrolling) is less anxiety-inducing than talking to my neighbors door-to-door.”

She wouldn’t be able to deal with the emotional toll of patrolling without support from her wife, she said. The movement needs all kinds of help; whistles and volunteers to distribute them; plate checkers and people to coordinate among different networks in various languages; food delivery for immigrants sheltering in place.

And, more people in more neighborhoods who are ready to jump into action when ICE shows up next door.

The crashed SUV after an ICE agent shot the driver at point-blank range through the window on Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2026. The driver died, according to the Department of Homeland Security. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)

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An ICE officer fatally shot a 37-year-old woman driving an SUV through her car window in south Minneapolis on Wednesday morning.

The deadly confrontation immediately ratcheted up the intensity of what was already a brutal crackdown on Minnesota and its immigrants by the Trump administration — and in a community with raw memories of the police murder of George Floyd.

Video of the incident shared with the Reformer shows masked ICE officers approach a Honda Pilot stopped in the middle of Portland Avenue near 34th Street. One officer tells the driver to “get out of the f*cking car” and tries to open the door. The driver then slowly backs up and then pulls forward, appearing to try to leave. An officer at the front of the vehicle fires three shots and the SUV travels a short distance before crashing into a parked car.

The woman was transported to Hennepin County Medical Center, where she was pronounced dead, the Minneapolis chief of police said.

A group of Minneapolis City Council members identified her in a statement as Renee Nicole Good, a Minneapolis resident. They said she was a “member of our community” and demanded justice for her killing.

The witness who took the video, Caitlin Callenson, said she was on a walk when she saw an ICE vehicle stuck in the snow. As more ICE vehicles arrived, bystanders blew whistles in protest, and the driver of the SUV tried to block the ICE vehicles.

Callenson said she did not see ICE agents attempting to detain anyone leading up to or after the shooting.

Tricia McLaughlin, assistant Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, quickly confirmed the death on X but gave a contradictory version of what happened. She accused the driver of attempting to run over and kill a law enforcement officer in an “act of domestic terrorism.”

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, at a news conference in Minnesota for the second day in a row, accused Good of “stalking and impeding” ICE operations and that the officer acted appropriately in killing her.

“He used his training to save his own life and that of his colleagues,” she said Wednesday.

Noem said ICE will continue its operations as usual after the killing in what the agency said is its largest operation ever, with more than 2,000 agents and officers in Minnesota.

U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, who represents Minneapolis, accused ICE officers of “terrorizing neighborhoods.”

“I am beyond outraged that their reckless, callous actions led to the killing of a legal observer in Minneapolis,” Omar said in a statement. “This administration has shown, yet again, that it does not care about the safety of Minnesotans.”

MAGA supporters showed video from different angles that purported to show the officer acting in self-defense, while former senior Obama administration official Tommy Vietor reshared the Reformer video on X and called the incident, “an execution by this ICE officer.” Americans can expect a debate over the shooting for years to come, regardless of the outcome of any investigations.

Law enforcement sprays demonstrators with chemical irritants at the scene where an ICE office shot and killed a 37-year-old woman in her car in Minneapolis on Jan. 7, 2026. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)

After the shots were fired, the driver “then was completely slumped over in the vehicle,” said Emily Heller, another witness.

Federal agents wouldn’t allow a man who said he is a physician to examine the driver, Heller said. Emergency medical technicians arrived 15 minutes later, she said. First responders were unable to get close to the scene because ICE agents did not move their cars to let them through.

“There was chaos and ambulance and fire trucks couldn’t get through,” Callenson said. “They had to walk through all of the ICE vehicles on foot to try to administer first aid.”

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said he had been dreading this moment since the Department of Homeland Security began ramping up immigration enforcement in the Twin Cities.

Frey called ICE’s statement saying the shooting was in self-defense was “bullsh*t” and blasted the agency’s presence in the city saying they’re only “causing chaos and distrust.”

“To ICE, get the f*ck out of Minneapolis,” Frey said.

He urged residents to remain peaceful and not “take the bait” from the federal government.

“They want us to respond in a way that creates a military occupation in our city,” Frey said. “Let’s not let them.”

Dozens of federal agents from ICE and the FBI, as well as Minneapolis police officers and Hennepin County sheriff deputies responded to the scene.

While ICE agents left the scene, the standoff between law enforcement and protesters is ongoing.

As some federal officers attempted to leave, protestors blocked their vehicle. The officers fired a noxious gas at close range, causing distress and vomiting for many demonstrators and journalists.

Protesters hurled insults at Minneapolis Police officers, who are not supposed to assist with immigration enforcement, but were on the scene Wednesday morning.

After law enforcement cleared the scene, demonstrators placed white roses where blood stained the snow.

City Council members including Robin Wonsley and Jamal Osman addressed the crowd, saying the area was an active crime scene, and that MPD was present to investigate.

Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara said at a Wednesday press conference that they have yet to see information indicating that the shooting was justified and there was nothing to indicate the woman was a target of immigration enforcement activity, O’Hara said.

Minneapolis police officers secured the crime scene to preserve evidence, O’Hara said. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is now jointly conducting an investigation into the use of deadly force with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension.

Hennepin County Sheriff Dawanna Witt emphasized the need for local involvement in the investigation for transparency: “With all due respect to the federal level, we do need to make sure that our local agencies are involved.”

Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty issued a statement soon after the shooting saying “pushing hard for a local investigation which is the only way to ensure full transparency and review by our office.”

U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum, a St. Paul Democrat, called on Noem, who filmed herself observing ICE actions in Minneapolis on Tuesday, to immediately stop the ICE operation “to restore order and prevent further injuries.”

ICE agents stage outside of Hibachi Buffet in South Minneapolis Tuesday, Jan. 6, 2026 as an estimated 2,000 more federal agents are deployed in the metropolitan area. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was in the Twin Cities Tuesday as the Trump administration launches what it’s calling “the largest DHS operation ever.”

CBS News reported over the weekend that around 2,000 Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents are being deployed in Minnesota, in addition to the 700 already present in the state as part of “Operation Metro Surge,” which began in December.

In a video posted to the Department of Homeland Security’s official X account, Noem and several heavily armed and masked agents arrested a man in St. Paul. In another video, Noem appeared to greet and thank local ICE staff.

One photo showed Noem meeting with Assistant U.S. Attorney Joe Thompson, who is leading the prosecutions of people accused of defrauding Minnesota’s social services programs.

The Trump administration’s focus on Minnesota was sparked by unsubstantiated allegations shared by right-wing media figures that Somali Americans who committed fraud were using the proceeds to fund terrorist organizations abroad.

“@POTUS Trump and @Sec_Noem have rallied DHS law enforcement personnel to keep Americans safe and ERADICATE fraud,” DHS posted on X.

ICE did not respond to the Reformer’s requests for comment.

Immigrant rights organizations have been fielding many reports of ICE arrests around the metro, but an exact number of arrests is difficult to confirm. Unlike a few high-profile raids in Minneapolis and St. Paul in 2025, which involved dozens of agents and attracted large crowds, ICE appears to be focused on conducting smaller and faster operations.

Walz blasted the deployment as a waste of government resources on social media, sharing a video from a little over a week ago showing dozens of agents leading a single person out of a Hennepin County government building. He said the Trump administration did not give his office advance notice or any additional information on the operation.

“We have a ridiculous surge of apparently 2,000 people not coordinating with us that are for a show of the cameras,” Walz said at a news conference on Tuesday. “We don’t even know they are, they’ll be wearing masks.”

Noem fired back at the governor for accusing them of misusing taxpayer dollars given the widening scandal of fraud in state-run social service programs that led him to end his campaign for a third term on Monday.

Around the country and in Minnesota, immigration agents have been accused of violating constitutional rights: detaining U.S. citizens for days, targeting individuals based on their speech; and arresting and holding people without probable cause.

In late December, ICE agents entered a private area of the Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis without a judicial warrant, according to immigrant rights activists and Democratic elected officials, who urged Hennepin Healthcare to adopt a clear policy and train employees on how to interact with immigration agents.

Janna Gewirtz O’Brien, a pediatrician and president-elect of the Minnesota Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said fear of ICE is keeping immigrant families from seeking health care.

“There is a sense of fear that has been perpetuated by our administration, and we need hospitals to step up,” Gewirtz O’Brien said.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota and three Minnesota-based law firms recently sued federal immigration authorities, alleging that ICE agents and their leaders are also routinely violating the constitutional rights of the people protesting their actions.

Minnesota Reformer is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Minnesota Reformer maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor J. Patrick Coolican for questions: info@minnesotareformer.com.