Vice President JD Vance is in Minneapolis Thursday to reinforce the White House's support for ICE.
"Many of the people standing behind me are members of the Minneapolis community. Many officials that I met today who work in federal immigration enforcement. This is their home. They love this place. These are their neighbors. They want this to work a lot more smoothly. I think that we can get there. We've just got to work at it a little bit and we need some cooperation from state and local officials," Vance said, while giving remarks about ICE's operations.
"We could do a lot better. We could do a lot more with more cooperation," Vance said. "The directive that I got from the president of the United States is 'meet these guys halfway.' Work with them so that we can make these immigration enforcement operations successful without endangering our ICE officers and so that we can turn down the chaos a little bit at least — I think a lot, actually. But for us to do that. We need some help from the state and local officials. We will keep on working with them. As long as they're willing to work with us, they will always find a partner in public safety, law enforcement and the Trump administration."
The vice president met with ICE officers amid continued tension between federal agents and the local community.
Customs and Border Protection Commander Gregory Bovino threw a gas canister into a crowd on Wednesday.
He says agents were responding after being stalked by protesters.
"We were set up by rioters who tried to stop us at every point yesterday," Bovino said. "Being stalked for eight or ten hours at a time is not a very favorable climate."
The Trump administration and ICE officials claim over 10,000 arrests during its operation in Minnesota, including many people who they allege are dangerous criminals.
Bovino has declined to put an end date on ICE's presence there.
"This mission's ongoing until there's no more of those criminal illegal aliens roaming the streets of Minneapolis," he said.
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Americans are split on ICE and its tactics.
Half of voters say they support the administration's deportations of immigrants living in the U.S. illegally, but more than 60% say they disapprove of how ICE is handling its job and say ICE's tactics have gone too far.
Meanwhile, a newly publicized internal ICE memo authorizes federal agents to enter someone's home without a judge's warrant in some cases — setting up potential legal challenges.
"This DHS memo is a complete shift from supreme court precedent," said Neama Rahmani, president of West Coast Trial Lawyers. "If DHS implements this new procedure, what will happen is those arrests will be challenged as an unlawful search and seizure under the Fourth Amendment."
