AP —
Federal prosecutors have charged 15 people with impeding the Trump administration’s massive immigration crackdown in Minnesota earlier this year, accusing them of coordinating efforts to block arrests and deportations as part of a conspiracy against the US government.
The monthslong investigation focused on members and associates of “Direct Action Minnesota,” a left-wing coalition of protest groups that played a role in the “surveillance, operational planning and rapid mobilization against law enforcement,” Minnesota US. Attorney Daniel N. Rosen said.
Rosen said some of the defendants self-identified as Antifa, an umbrella term referring to a broad group of people whose political beliefs lean toward the left — often the far left — but do not conform with the Democratic Party platform. President Donald Trump has labeled it as a domestic terror group.
Their actions included “stalking” Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents, throwing blocks of ice at their vehicles and setting up blockades around federal buildings. Rosen declined to say whether any federal agents were injured as a result.
