Justice Department subpoenas Walz and others in immigration enforcement
obstruction investigation
[January 21, 2026]
By STEVE KARNOWSKI and ALANNA DURKIN RICHER
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Federal prosecutors served grand jury subpoenas
Tuesday to Minnesota officials as part of an investigation into whether
they obstructed or impeded law enforcement during a sweeping immigration
operation in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, a person familiar with the
matter said.
The subpoenas, which seek records, were sent to the offices of Gov. Tim
Walz, Attorney General Keith Ellison, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, St.
Paul Mayor Kaohly Her and officials in Ramsey and Hennepin counties, the
person said.
The person was not authorized to publicly discuss an ongoing
investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of
anonymity.
The subpoenas are related to an investigation into whether Minnesota
officials obstructed federal immigration enforcement through public
statements they made, two people familiar with the matter said Friday.
They said then that it was focused on the potential violation of a
conspiracy statute.
Mayor: Subpoenas are to stoke fear
Walz and Frey, both Democrats, have called the probe a bullying tactic
meant to quell political opposition. Frey's office released a subpoena,
which requires a long list of documents for a grand jury on Feb. 3,
including “any records tending to show a refusal to come to the aid of
immigration officials.”
“We shouldn’t have to live in a country where people fear that federal
law enforcement will be used to play politics or crack down on local
voices they disagree with,” Frey said.
Her, a Hmong immigrant and a Democrat, also acknowledged a subpoena,
saying she's “unfazed by these tactics.” The governor's office referred
reporters to a statement earlier Tuesday in which Walz said the Trump
administration was not seeking justice, only creating distractions.
Vice President JD Vance, meanwhile, is expected to travel to Minneapolis
on Thursday for a roundtable with local leaders and community members,
according to sources familiar with his plans who spoke on condition on
anonymity because the trip had not yet been officially announced.
The subpoenas came a day after the government urged a judge to reject
efforts to stop the immigration enforcement surge that has roiled
Minneapolis and St. Paul for weeks.
The Justice Department called the state's lawsuit, filed soon after the
fatal shooting of Renee Good by an immigration officer, “legally
frivolous.”
“Put simply, Minnesota wants a veto over federal law enforcement,”
government attorneys wrote.
Ellison said the government is violating free speech and other
constitutional rights. He described the armed officers as poorly trained
and said the “invasion” must cease. It's not known when U.S. District
Judge Katherine Menendez will make a decision.
Ilan Wurman, who teaches constitutional law at University of Minnesota
Law School, doubts the state’s arguments will be successful. He said
immigration enforcement is clearly a matter of federal control.
Hard to track arrests
Greg Bovino of U.S. Border Patrol, who has commanded the Trump
administration's big-city immigration crackdown, said more than 10,000
people in the U.S. illegally have been arrested in Minnesota in the past
year, including 3,000 “of some of the most dangerous offenders" in the
last six weeks during Operation Metro Surge.
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People arrive for an MLK rally on, Monday, Jan. 19, 2026 in St.
Paul, Minn. (AP Photo/Angelina Katsanis)
He highlighted the capture of three people with criminal records from
Laos, Guatemala and Honduras.
“These are not technical violations. As I mentioned, these are
individuals responsible for serious harm,” Bovino said at a news
conference.
Julia Decker, policy director at the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota,
expressed frustration that advocates have no way of knowing whether the
government’s arrest numbers and descriptions of the people in custody
are accurate.
“These are real people we’re talking about, that we potentially have no
idea what is happening to them,” Decker said.
Bovino defends his ‘troops’ as ethical
Good, 37, was killed on Jan. 7 as she was moving her vehicle, which had
been blocking a Minneapolis street where ICE officers were operating.
Trump administration officials say the officer, Jonathan Ross, shot her
in self-defense, although videos of the encounter show the Honda Pilot
slowly turning away from him.
Since then, the public has repeatedly confronted officers, blowing
whistles and yelling insults at ICE and Border Patrol. They, in turn,
have used tear gas and chemical irritants against protesters. Bystanders
have recorded video of officers using a battering ram to get into a
house as well as smashing vehicle windows and dragging people out of
cars.
Bovino defended his "troops” and said their actions are "legal, ethical
and moral.”
“What we see when folks get swept up, as you say, oftentimes it's as
agitators, as rioters, and now I call them anarchists," he told
reporters, not “ordinary citizens, Ma, Pa America.”
Police in the region, meanwhile, said off-duty law enforcement officers
have been racially profiled by federal officers and stopped without
cause. In Brooklyn Park, a suburb of Minneapolis, police Chief Mark
Bruley said he has received complaints from residents who are U.S.
citizens, including his own officers.
Pastor says protesters invaded church
A Minnesota church targeted by an anti-ICE protest Sunday decried it as
unlawful, while one of the protest leaders called for the resignation of
a church leader who works at a local ICE office. About three dozen
people entered Cities Church in St. Paul, some walking right up to the
pulpit.
“Invading a church service to disrupt the worship of Jesus — or any
other act of worship — is protected by neither the Christian Scriptures
nor the laws of this nation,” Cities Church in St. Paul said Tuesday in
a statement shared by its pastor, Jonathan Parnell.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem described the protesters as
“agitators” in a post on X and said, “arrests coming.”
Nekima Levy Armstrong, a lawyer and local activist, called for another
pastor who works at ICE to resign from the church, saying his dual role
poses a “fundamental moral conflict.”
___
Richer reported from Washington. Associated Press reporters Ed White in
Detroit; Sarah Raza, Jack Brook and Giovanna Dell'Orto in Minneapolis;
Rebecca Boone in Boise, Idaho, and Ali Swenson in Washington
contributed.
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