Federal Immigration Training Deficient for Minneapolis Operation
- Border Patrol police disperse pepper spray at demonstrators,Sunday,Jan.
- President Trump has reshuffled the leadership of his immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota in the face of wide-spread anger over two fatal shootings of U.S.citizens by federal agents.
- But it's not clear changes at the top can solve a more basic problem: the immigration agents flooding the Twin Cities are generally less experienced in urban policing...
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Border Patrol police disperse pepper spray at demonstrators,Sunday,Jan. 11, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
Jen Golbeck/AP/FR172329 AP
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jen Golbeck/AP/FR172329 AP
President Trump has reshuffled the leadership of his immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota in the face of wide-spread anger over two fatal shootings of U.S.citizens by federal agents. Operation commander Gregory Bovino is out, and Trump is sending Border Czar Tom Homan to take over.
But it’s not clear changes at the top can solve a more basic problem: the immigration agents flooding the Twin Cities are generally less experienced in urban policing and crowd control than other police.
“The skills that these federal immigration agents are bringing to these cities are a complete mismatch for what we actually need,” says Irene Vega, an associate professor of sociology at UC Irvine. “That’s not what their job has been, historically, and I just think it’s a very perilous situation.”