Remember me
Refugees in Minnesota filed a class action lawsuit against the Trump administration on Friday, demanding that the federal government end its "detention dragnet" operation that is "terrorising" and targeting the most vetted group of immigrants in the state, according to lawyers leading the case.
About 100 lawfully admitted refugees from several countries, including European ones, have been detained without charge by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in Minnesota since the federal government launched "Operation Post-Admission Refugee Reverification and Integrity Strengthening" on 9 January, Stephanie Gee, senior director of US legal services at the International Refugee Assistance Project (Irap), told Middle East Eye.
Some of those detained are children.
Irap, along with the Centre for Human Rights and Constitutional Law and the class action law firm Berger Montague, is representing the refugees in the case.
"This operation itself is unlawful on many levels, and it not only violates the government's own policies and procedures and rules for how they're supposed to deal with this population and how they're supposed to handle refugee applications and cases inside this country - there's also obvious and blatant constitutional violations," Gee said.
Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters"So we're asking a court to put a stop to all of it immediately."
'Unprecedented'As has been the case with ICE arrests across the US, the crackdown in Minnesota has oftentimes been violent, and immigrants have been dragged out of their homes and cars and put into a local detention facility before being shipped off to a site in Texas.
The Trump administration has long used this practice when detaining immigrants - both documented and undocumented - given Republican-led states in the south with conservative immigration judges have shown a penchant for ruling in the federal government's favour.
The detention sites have been decried as "concentration camps" by critics due to severe overcrowding, lack of hygiene, and food unfit for consumption.
'You’re pre-vetted for years... the most layers of review and vetting that any immigrants coming to this country really go through'
- Stephanie Gee, Irap
Those held in the facilities are not formally charged, and there is no timeframe for how long they can be held before being deported, sometimes to third countries they have never been to.
They are also unable to find out exactly where they are or how to reach their families.
Some immigrants have been released by ICE based on further examination of their paperwork, but they are physically dropped off outside the detention site without access to money, adequate clothing, or a way to get back to their home state, Irap said in a press release.
"In my legal experience, I have never seen anything like this before. It's completely unprecedented," Gee told MEE.
"I can see that this is part of the Trump administration's broader effort to attack immigrants of all statuses in this country, regardless of whether they have lawful status or not," she added.
Refugees in particular are so thoroughly screened before being flown to the US, that by the completion of the process, it's the federal government that pays for their tickets and arranges for them to be housed and oriented in their new American communities, Gee explained.
"You're pre-vetted for years... the most layers of review and vetting that any immigrants coming to this country really go through," she said.
"The reward on the other side is that we tell you affirmatively that we believe you. We welcome you. We're not only allowing you to come to this country, but we're facilitating your arrival to this country... so it's a population that never expected to be vulnerable to detention and removal [by ICE] like this."
Death at hands of ICEICE has now killed two US citizens in Minnesota who were observing and documenting its activities. The actions of the citizens were protected by the law but also encouraged by local officials, including the governor, Tim Walz.
US: ICE agents shoot dead another person in Minneapolis
Read More »US President Donald Trump defended the agents before the investigations were underway, and as of Monday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt struck a defiant tone.
"Every life is equal to President Trump," she told reporters, naming three Americans who were killed by immigrants in recent years.
"This rhetoric against ICE - comparing them to Nazi Gestapo, 'Donald Trump's Police Force' - is despicable. It is shameful, and it is precisely what has led to the escalation of tensions in Minneapolis and in other places across the country."
Thousands of ICE agents have been deployed to Minneapolis since late last year as the Trump administration intensified its nationwide campaign to detain and deport what it said were "the worst of the worst".
But the vast majority of arrested immigrants and visa-holders have no criminal record, the Department of Homeland Security's own figures show.
"Get the fuck out of Minneapolis," mayor Jacob Frey publicly said to federal agents earlier this month.
"A great American city is being invaded by its own federal government," he said, speaking on Saturday. “How many more residents, how many more Americans, need to die or get badly hurt for this operation to end?”