Minnesota asked a federal judge Monday to issue an immediate order shutting down President Trump’s immigration surge and booting thousands of federal officers out of the state, saying the latest shooting death of an American citizen requires the courts to rein in the White House.
Lawyers for the state and some of its communities told Judge Katherine Menendez, a Biden appointee, that the fate of “our republic” could rest on the case and whether Mr. Trump is stopped here.
“This situation is unprecedented in the 250 year history of our country. We have never had a federal government amass what is essentially an army of 3,000 to 4,000 masked, heavily armed federal agents and send them into a state to basically stir the pot with conduct that is pervasive and includes widespread illegal violent conduct,” said Brian Carter, a lawyer with the state attorney general’s office.
Judge Menendez was clearly sympathetic to the complaints and to the ongoing chaos in communities in and around Minneapolis. She questioned the Justice Department’s legal justification for sending in that sort of heavy force.
But she also wondered whether she had the power to order a total pullout of the federal officers.
“One of the things I’m struggling with is that not all crises have a fix from a district court injunction. There are other things that are supposed to rein in this kind of conduct,” she said.
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The case has become a central battleground in the escalating war over Mr. Trump’s immigration enforcement plans and the resistance to them in Democrat-led communities.
Mr. Trump suggested a potential break in the escalation.
He announced on social media that he’d taken a call from Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who had requested they “work together.”
“It was a very good call, and we, actually, seemed to be on a similar wavelength,” Mr. Trump said.
He had previously said he was sending White House border czar Tom Homan to the state to take stock of things, and he said Mr. Homan will now confab with Mr. Walz to try to figure out steps forward.
That was a decidedly different note than earlier this month, when Mr. Trump announced Minnesota’s “day of retribution” was at hand.
In the courtroom, Judge Menendez said that sort of comment undercut the administration’s argument that it had to surge so many officers to the state to arrest illegal immigrants that state and local authorities would not turn over from their prisons and jails.
“What do I do with that?” the judge said.
She also questioned Attorney General Pam Bondi’s letter over the weekend suggesting a sort of deal that would see Minnesota tear down some sanctuary policies and cooperate on sharing voter information with the feds, and in exchange, the federal officers would disappear.
Judge Menendez said that sounded like a quid pro quo, which could violate the Constitution’s 10th Amendment, which protects state sovereignty from overbearing federal interference.
Brantley Mayers, a Justice Department lawyer, said it wasn’t a quid pro quo, but rather a statement of reality: The federal government has sent thousands of officers into the state because there is little cooperation. He said if there were more cooperation, fewer agents would probably be needed.
Judge Menendez then questioned him on the fact that a large portion of the arrests appear to be what Homeland Security considered “collateral.” Those are when agents go looking for a target and come across others in the country illegally.
Judge Menendez said those arrests don’t seem to match the stated purpose of the surge.
Mr. Mayers, though, said those arrests are also legal under the law.
“I don’t think that would negate the fact that there’s legit law enforcement activity,” he said.
Judge Menendez, though, wondered if she could draw a line.
“Is there no limit to what the executive can do in the guise of enforcing immigration law?” she demanded.
She also seemed miffed that Mr. Mayers could not say how many federal officers had been deployed as part of the surge. His best answer was that it was more than 2,000 U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, and perhaps thousands more Customs and Border Protection personnel.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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