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ICE's No. 1 Ally - The Atlantic
On Saturday, the same day that federal agents shot and killed Alex Pretti on a Minneapolis street, the Justice Department sent a letter to Minnesota Governor Tim Walz. The letter did not have anything to say about the violence caused by the Department of Homeland Security’s presence in the state. Nor did it offer Minnesota any assistance in the investigation of Pretti’s death or that of Renee Good’s just more than two weeks earlier. Instead, Attorney General Pam Bondi complained that Walz had “refused to support” DHS, insisted that the state cooperate more fully with ICE, and demanded that the governor hand over its voter rolls and records on Medicaid and food-stamp recipients. Walz had “better support President Trump,” Bondi declared on Fox News.
This abusive behavior by DHS has stood out in the chaos of Operation Metro Surge. But the Justice Department has done its part, too. It has shielded federal agents from accountability, launched needless criminal investigations into Minnesota officials and residents, and pumped out propaganda to aid the far-right press in justifying ICE’s tactics. The president has always treated DOJ like his own personal law firm. Now the department is acting like DHS’s law firm as well.
DOJ first undertook the role of ICE defender in Minneapolis in the days after Good’s death, on January 7. Video captured by the phones of both bystanders and the ICE agent Jonathan Ross showed Ross firing into Good’s car repeatedly, killing her and sending her car barreling down the icy street. In prior administrations, a death at the hands of a federal officer would have been cause for the Justice Department to begin a probe into potential wrongdoing by law enforcement. But this time, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche announced, “There is currently no basis for a criminal civil rights investigation.” Though federal and local investigators typically collaborate in the aftermath of shootings by law enforcement, the FBI blocked state and local governments from accessing evidence. When a journalist asked Trump about this development, he explained that Minnesota officials should not be allowed to look at evidence, because they are “crooked.”
Most galling, instead of probing Ross’s actions, the Justice Department decided to investigate the woman he killed. According to MS NOW, FBI agents in Minnesota drafted a search warrant for Good’s car to examine the path of the bullets fired by Ross, intending to carry out a civil-rights probe. But Blanche’s office demanded that they alter the warrant for use in an investigation of whether Good had assaulted Ross. (A magistrate judge denied the request on the grounds that Good was dead.) The New York Times reported that DOJ also considered launching a criminal probe into Good’s widow, Becca Good, who was with Renee that morning. Six prosecutors in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota resigned in protest of the department’s handling of the case, along with an FBI agent who’d sought to open a civil-rights investigation but was rebuffed. Several attorneys in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division have since resigned as well.
This abusive behavior by DHS has stood out in the chaos of Operation Metro Surge. But the Justice Department has done its part, too. It has shielded federal agents from accountability, launched needless criminal investigations into Minnesota officials and residents, and pumped out propaganda to aid the far-right press in justifying ICE’s tactics. The president has always treated DOJ like his own personal law firm. Now the department is acting like DHS’s law firm as well.
DOJ first undertook the role of ICE defender in Minneapolis in the days after Good’s death, on January 7. Video captured by the phones of both bystanders and the ICE agent Jonathan Ross showed Ross firing into Good’s car repeatedly, killing her and sending her car barreling down the icy street. In prior administrations, a death at the hands of a federal officer would have been cause for the Justice Department to begin a probe into potential wrongdoing by law enforcement. But this time, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche announced, “There is currently no basis for a criminal civil rights investigation.” Though federal and local investigators typically collaborate in the aftermath of shootings by law enforcement, the FBI blocked state and local governments from accessing evidence. When a journalist asked Trump about this development, he explained that Minnesota officials should not be allowed to look at evidence, because they are “crooked.”
Most galling, instead of probing Ross’s actions, the Justice Department decided to investigate the woman he killed. According to MS NOW, FBI agents in Minnesota drafted a search warrant for Good’s car to examine the path of the bullets fired by Ross, intending to carry out a civil-rights probe. But Blanche’s office demanded that they alter the warrant for use in an investigation of whether Good had assaulted Ross. (A magistrate judge denied the request on the grounds that Good was dead.) The New York Times reported that DOJ also considered launching a criminal probe into Good’s widow, Becca Good, who was with Renee that morning. Six prosecutors in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota resigned in protest of the department’s handling of the case, along with an FBI agent who’d sought to open a civil-rights investigation but was rebuffed. Several attorneys in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division have since resigned as well.
Gift Link
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/01/ice-trump-minnesota-justice-department/685788/?gift=mTq34Ny-ZVr996jdTJS9TvzRmBocVP69WUVJpNdI0Z0&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share
Since we published this, Pam Bondi's X account has started posting mugshots of Minnesotans arrested for impeding ICE/CBP. Sharing a defendant's photo publicly in this way is forbidden under DOJ rules
— Quinta Jurecic (@qjurecic.bsky.social) 2026-01-28T20:23:25.547Z
Absolutely this. This whole collection of photos does the exact opposite of what Bondi thinks this is doing.
— Mike Masnick (@mmasnick.bsky.social) 2026-01-28T22:31:44.859Z
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