The Latest: ICE officer’s killing of a motorist during Minneapolis immigration crackdown
Jan 7, 2026, 12:17 PM | Updated: 3:30 pm
An Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed a Minneapolis motorist on Wednesday during the Trump administration’s latest immigration crackdown on a major American city — a shooting that federal officials claimed was an act of self-defense but that the city’s mayor described as “reckless” and unnecessary.
Videos taken by bystanders and posted to social media show an officer approaching an SUV stopped across the middle of the road and trying to open the driver’s side door. Seconds later, the car drives away and a different ICE officer standing in front of the car fires at least two shots toward the driver. The SUV knocked the officer back but not down. The car then sped into two cars parked on a curb nearby before crashing to a stop. Witnesses screamed obscenities, expressing shock at what they’d seen.
The shooting marks a dramatic escalation of the latest in a series of immigration enforcement operations in major American cities under the Trump administration. The killing was at least the fifth in a handful of states since 2024.
The Latest:
Minnesota initially grabbed President Donald Trump’s and Republicans’ attention over a series of fraud cases where many of the defendants had roots in Somalia. Prosecutors say that billions of dollars were stolen from federally funded health care benefits and a COVID-19 program in recent years.
Minnesota has the largest Somali population in the U.S., a group Trump called “garbage” in December and said he didn’t want them in the country.
The president has also criticized Democratic Gov. Walz for failing to catch the alleged crimes.
Late last month, a right-wing influencer posted a video claiming that a day care center in Minneapolis run by Somali residents had taken over $100 million in fraud. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and FBI Director Kash Patel then posted on social media about increased operations in the city partly targeting, as Patel put it, “large-scale fraud schemes.”
On Tuesday, DHS said it planned to deploy 2,000 federal agents and officers to the Minneapolis area.
In October, a Chicago woman was shot five times by a Border Patrol agent in a similar incident involving a vehicle, though she survived.
Almost immediately, Homeland Security officials issued a statement labeling Marimar Martinez, a 30-year-old teaching assistant at a Montessori school, as a “domestic terrorist” who had “ambushed” and “rammed” agents with her vehicle.
She was charged in federal court with assaulting a federal officer, a felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison. But federal prosecutors were later forced to dismiss the case against Martinez before trial after security camera video and bodycam footage emerged that her defense lawyers said undermined the official narrative.
The videos showed a Border Patrol agent steering his vehicle into Martinez’s truck, rather than the other way around, her attorney said.
“I’ve seen the video. Don’t believe this propaganda machine,” Walz wrote on X, responding to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s post alleging that a woman had “weaponized her vehicle” before she was shot and killed by an ICE officer.
The state will ensure there is a full, fair, and expeditious investigation to ensure accountability and justice,” wrote the governor.
Daniel Borgertpoepping, a spokesperson for the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office, says that “We have jurisdiction to bring charges, as do the feds.
“It’s a little bit of a complicated interplay but the bottom line is yes, we have jurisdiction to bring criminal charges.”
Secretary Kristi Noem, during a visit to Texas, says it was carried out against ICE officers by a woman who “attempted to run them over and rammed them with her vehicle. An officer of ours acted quickly and defensively, shot, to protect himself and the people around him.”
But Mayor Frey blasted that characterization as well as the federal deployment in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul.
“They are not here to cause safety in this city. What they are doing is not to provide safety in America. What they are doing is causing chaos and distrust,” Frey said.
The location is just a few blocks from some of the oldest immigrant markets in the area and a mile from where George Floyd was killed by police in 2020.
During a news conference in Texas on Wednesday, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem confirmed that the agency had deployed more than 2,000 officers to the Twin Cities and already made “hundreds and hundreds” of arrests.
The mayor says in a social media post that immigration agents are “causing chaos in our city.”
“We are demanding ICE leave the city and state immediately. We stand rock solid with our immigrant and refugee communities,” Frey said.
The crowd vented its anger at the local and federal officers who were there, including Gregory Bovino, a senior U.S. Customs and Border Patrol official who has been the face of crackdowns in Los Angeles, Chicago and elsewhere.
In a scene that harkened back to the Los Angeles and Chicago immigration crackdowns, bystanders heckled the officers and blew whistles that have become ubiquitous during the operations.
“Shame! Shame! Shame!” and “ICE out of Minnesota!” they loudly chanted from behind the police tape.
That’s according to a statement from department spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin.
The shooting marks a dramatic escalation of the latest in a series of immigration enforcement operations in major American cities under the Trump administration. It’s at least the fifth person killed in a handful of states since 2024.
The twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul have been on edge since DHS announced Tuesday that it had launched the operation, with more than 2,000 agents and officers expected to participate in the crackdown tied in part to allegations of fraud involving Somali residents.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said Wednesday that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who shot and killed a motorist acted recklessly. Fry rejected federal officials’ claims that the officer had acted in self-defense.
During a news conference hours after the ICE officer shot the woman, an angry Frey blasted the federal immigration crackdown on the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul.
“They are not here to cause safety in this city. What they are doing is not to provide safety in America. What they are doing is causing chaos and distrust,” Frey said. “They’re ripping families apart. They’re sowing chaos on our streets and in this case quite literally killing people.”
“They are already trying to spin this as an action of self-defense. Having seen the video myself, I wanna tell everybody directly, that is bullshit,” the mayor said.
