City targeted by Trump has seen swarm of immigration agents on the streets – and residents say the tension is palpable
Edwin Torres DeSantiago received a text message on Wednesday morning as he was tracking immigration enforcement across Minneapolis – a person was shot by ICE at 34th Street and Portland Avenue.
He jumped into his car to head to the scene. Torres DeSantiago manages the Immigrant Defense Network, a group that monitors ICE activity and responds to community needs after someone is taken. He’s responded to dozens of scenes in the past few months, and even more in the last few days since the federal government surged its presence in the midwestern city.
The scene was the most extreme the city has seen since the deployment here under Trump’s second term began: a 37-year-old woman, US citizen Renee Nicole Good, had been shot and killed by an ICE agent. Department of Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem has claimed that Good was “harassing and impeding law enforcement operations”, but video of the incident appears to show that she was driving away when she was shot.
Torres DeSantiago started documenting what he was seeing – how many agents, the cars they drove. He called in other observers to come to the scene and assist. He threw on a bright yellow vest and talked to dozens of people and made phone calls to report what he was learning.
