As hundreds of thousands continue to protest against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) after officers fatally shot Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, local leaders are calling for justice for the fallen American citizens and an end to the Trump administration’s federal interference in Minnesota and cities around the country.
“I want to comment directly to ICE officers today, as there are members of the administration like JD Vance and Stephen Miller, telling them they have absolute immunity, and they certainly are acting like it,” said Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-Md.) during a Congressional hearing held in Minneapolis on Jan. 16, held by Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Mn.) and Pramila Jayapal (D-WA). “They’re acting like they are above the law. I want to make sure they know they’re not. We can prosecute these guys, and we do.”
He emphasized that ICE agents can be held accountable, considering his own past and that of Minnesota, where George Floyd was killed in 2020 by a Minneapolis police officer, who in 2021 received a guilty verdict on three counts of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.
“I was a former prosecutor and we put some of these people in jail before,” he continued. “We put Derek Chauvin in jail because he broke the law.”
Ivey, who also criticized the National Guard deployment into D.C. in August and other cities, explained that ICE officers and other administration officials can still be brought up on state and/or local charges, even if Trump can pardon them at the federal level.
“You get convicted in state court, you’re staying in jail. Just because you’re an officer and wearing camouflage, that doesn’t matter. I don’t care what Kristi Noem says, as she attacks the victims of these shootings,” he continued. “Bondi, you can’t hide evidence from the state prosecutors like Attorney General Keith Ellison. We’re gonna get the information and move forward with these prosecutions.”
Eight days after the Jan. 16 hearing, Pretti, an ICU nurse for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, was also fatally shot by ICE officers.
With what is happening in Minnesota, the National Guard’s presence in D.C., and the Trump administration’s federal takeover of the District’s Metropolitan Police Department last summer, Maryland leaders are working to keep the president out of state affairs.
Del. Nicole Williams (D- District 22) is introducing a bill in the General Assembly to end 287(g), an agreement for federal law enforcement to deputize local law enforcement for the purpose of immigration enforcement.
“The tactics that we saw happen in Minneapolis, I know, are in violation of the training that law enforcement typically receives,” she said in an early January interview with WUSA9. “This is why I’m introducing legislation to ban masking by police officers and to end the 287(g) agreements here in Maryland. I represent District 22 which includes Hyattsville, Greenbelt, University Park, and Riverdale Park. I have large immigrant communities in my district. I hear from my constituents every single day about the concerns and fears that they have.”
Sen. Angela Alsobrooks is also using her legislative influence to combat ICE.
“The Gestapo tactics used by ICE reveal their inhumanity and lack of training. The lawlessness and abject cruelty of this administration are harming our country, making us less safe here and across the world,” she said on Jan. 22. “I will not support the proposed Homeland Security appropriations bill.”
Further, Alsobrooks spoke out after the release of videos showing dozens of men sleeping in emergency blankets in a Baltimore ICE detention facility.
“The content suggests yet another instance of ICE’s utter depravity,” the barrier-breaking senator said in a social media statement on Jan. 26. “We cannot let another penny go to [President] Donald Trump’s ICE.”