The Trump administration ramped up immigration enforcement actions earlier this year in the wake of a massive series of fraud scandals among the immigrant Somali community. Taxpayer funds were siphoned from government grant programs under the guise of providing social services, but those services were never provided. An unknown sum of funds from American taxpayers was absconded with to fund Islamic terror groups.
“We’re in a position right now where we have residents that are asking the very limited number of police officers that we have to fight ICE agents on the street,” Frey said after a weekend of protests. “We cannot be at a place right now in America where we have two governmental entities that are literally fighting one another.”
DOJ Vows to Press Charges After Activists Disrupt Church Where Minnesota ICE Official Is a Pastor
The U.S. Department of Justice said Sunday it is investigating a group of protesters in Minnesota who disrupted services at a church where a local official with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement apparently serves as a pastor.
A livestreamed video posted on the Facebook page of Black Lives Matter Minnesota, one of the protest’s organizers, shows a group of people interrupting services at the Cities Church in St. Paul by chanting “ICE out” and “Justice for Renee Good.” The 37-year-old mother of three was fatally shot by an ICE agent in Minneapolis earlier this month amid a surge in federal immigration enforcement activities.
The protesters allege that one of the church’s pastors — David Easterwood — also leads the local ICE field office overseeing the operations that have involved violent tactics and illegal arrests.
U.S. Department of Justice Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon said her agency is investigating federal civil rights violations “by these people desecrating a house of worship and interfering with Christian worshippers.”
“A house of worship is not a public forum for your protest! It is a space protected from exactly such acts by federal criminal and civil laws!” she said on social media.
Attorney General Pam Bondi also weighed in on social media, saying that any violations of federal law would be prosecuted.
Nekima Levy Armstrong, who participated in the protest and leads the local grassroots civil rights organization Racial Justice Network, dismissed the potential DOJ investigation as a sham and a distraction from federal agents’ actions in Minneapolis-St. Paul.
“When you think about the federal government unleashing barbaric ICE agents upon our community and all the harm that they have caused, to have someone serving as a pastor who oversees these ICE agents, is almost unfathomable to me,” said Armstrong, who added she is an ordained reverend.
“If people are more concerned about someone coming to a church on a Sunday and disrupting business as usual than they are about the atrocities that we are experiencing in our community, then they need to check their theology and the need to check their hearts.”
The website of St. Paul-based Cities Church lists David Easterwood as a pastor, and his personal information appears to match that of the David Easterwood identified in court filings as the acting director of the ICE St. Paul field office. Easterwood appeared alongside DHS Secretary Kristi Noem at a Minneapolis press conference last October.
KANSAS CITY STAR | Eric Schmitt: 1 year in, President Trump restored law and order and put America first | Opinion
Donald Trump has restored law and order by reversing Biden-era policies, backing police, reducing violent crime and drug deaths, targeting cartels as terrorist organizations, and expanding federal support for local law enforcement after years of disorder under Joe Biden.
DHS | ICE Continues to Remove the Worst of the Worst from Minneapolis Streets as DHS Law Enforcement Marks 3,000 Arrests During Operation Metro Surge
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), as part of Operation Metro Surge in Minneapolis, says it has now made 3,000 law enforcement arrests of individuals it labels the “worst of the worst” criminal offenders on city streets, continuing its expanded immigration enforcement deployment in the area.
NEW YORK POST | How Trump’s first-year victories tee up affordability wins in year 2
President Trump’s first year back in office delivered significant economic relief—like sharply reduced inflation, lower gas and grocery prices, stronger wages, substantial tax cuts, and improved housing affordability—which, he says, sets the stage for further cost-of-living and affordability reforms in healthcare, housing, and energy in Trump’s second year.
DAILY CALLER | EXCLUSIVE: State Department Slashes $1.8 Billion During Trump’s First Year
U.S. State Department under Donald Trump cut $1.8 billion in spending during its first year back in office—reportedly by reducing professional services, logistics, and tech contracts—as part of broader administration efforts to cut costs and eliminate waste, fraud and abuse.
