In Homan’s Hands, Could Minneapolis Become Model for How Trump Deals With Sanctuary Jurisdictions?

Border czar Tom Homan has arrived in Minnesota to oversee the immigration enforcement operation there and “hopefully” pioneer a model that the Trump administration could use in other sanctuary states, an immigration expert explains.  

Minnesota is a “sanctuary state,” according to the Department of Justice, meaning state and local law enforcement do not cooperate with federal immigration officials.

Homan arrived in Minnesota on Tuesday and met with Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, both Democrats. The negotiations could produce “some sort of agreement that could serve as a model for other sanctuary jurisdictions around the country,” Cooper Smith, director of homeland security and immigration at America First Policy Institute, tells The Daily Signal.  

The administration needs to find a way for immigration enforcement operations to continue, something for which “the American people voted,” Smith said, “while at the same time working with sanctuary jurisdictions to ensure limited public safety threats, limited violence and mayhem that neither side wants to see.” 

Successful negotiations in Minneapolis could provide a blueprint for other cities around the country, Smith noted.

If Homan is able to negotiate with Walz, the Trump administration “can perhaps take that model to Portland, to Chicago, to LA, to New York with [Mayor Zohran] Mamdani, and hopefully that’s a path forward that everyone can be happy with,” Smith said.  

Walz and Frey have called on the Trump administration to end immigration enforcement operations in the state and have only increased those demands following the Border Patrol-involved shooting of 37-year-old nurse Alex J. Pretti in Minneapolis on Saturday. Pretti was killed less than three weeks after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed 37-year-old Renee Good. 

The two recent deaths have prompted concerns over enforcement operations not just on the political left, but also from some Republicans.  

‘Can’t Go Wobbly’

Following a phone call with President Donald Trump on Monday, Frey announced that “[s]ome federal agents will begin leaving the area tomorrow, and I will continue pushing for the rest involved in this operation to go.”

Now is not the time to pull back immigration enforcement, according to Lora Ries. 

“What I’m concerned with right now is some on the right retreating, and we can’t go wobbly. We can’t nullify federal laws or enforcement of our federal laws,” Ries, director of the Border Security and Immigration Center at The Heritage Foundation, said.  

If federal immigration officials stop operations in Minnesota, then “these rioters win,” Ries said.  

The Trump administration launched a large immigration enforcement operation in the Twin Cities in December and has since deployed about 3,000 agents to the region.

Anti-immigration protests have continued in recent days following Pretti’s death. Minnesota police made multiple arrests of protesters outside a hotel Monday night after the gathering was declared no longer peaceful.  

Ries stressed that the anti-ICE demonstrations in Minnesota are not traditional protests, but are rather highly coordinated operations meant to undermine federal agents.  

The ‘Information War’

The Trump administration and those who support enforcement of U.S. immigration laws are “losing the information war,” a senior Trump administration official told The Daily Signal. 

The senior official said there is likely not a new “marketing strategy” the Department of Homeland Security could employ that would end the opposition to ICE “because it’s just one of those impossible battles.”  

“The other side is behaving in ways that guarantee people are going to get killed and shot and maced in the face, in front of cameras, [but] then that’s the point,” the Trump administration official said.  

Despite the challenges, the senior official said retreat is not an option.  

“I don’t think that the administration can pull back,” the senior official said, “because if they do, then these tactics will spread nationwide and defeat all … of our operations in all 50 states. And so, the Trump administration can’t really afford to take a defeat here or to look weak.”