At least 54 people were arrested on Sunday after an Anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Riot in Minnesota unfolded outside the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building in Minneapolis, with local and state law enforcement saying officers were targeted with thrown objects and forced to issue dispersal orders.
The news came after a week of demonstrations branded 'Bring the Heat, Melt the ICE', a rolling campaign by activists who say they are resisting immigration enforcement and pushing for the abolition of ICE and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
Anti-ICE Riot In Minnesota And The Arrest Numbers
The Hennepin County Sheriff's Office said 38 people were cited and released, and that one person was booked into jail. The Minnesota State Patrol confirmed an additional 15 arrests, bringing the total cited by officials to at least 54.
Deputies described the gathering as an unlawful assembly and said their dispersal orders came after people allegedly blocked roadways and access to local businesses, dumped or scattered glass into the street, and threw objects at law enforcement.
In its public statement posted to Facebook, the sheriff's office wrote, 'This morning, our deputies issued dispersal orders at an unlawful assembly outside the Whipple Building after individuals blocked roadways, blocked access to local businesses, dumped glass into the street, and threw rocks, ice chunks and water bottles at law enforcement creating a serious public safety hazard. Arrest are being made.'
Officials were careful to draw a line between protest and criminality, and they drew it with legal language rather than warmth.
'Freedom of speech and peaceful assembly is a right. Endangering the public is not,' the sheriff's office said, adding that 'unlawful activity including blocking roads, intentionally creating hazards and assaultive behavior will not be tolerated.'
Anti-ICE Riot In Minnesota Caps Week Of Escalating Tension
The demonstration was described as the culminating event of the 'Bring the Heat, Melt the ICE' week of action, built around public opposition to ICE operations and a broader call to dismantle the enforcement architecture around US immigration.
It also sits inside a much tenser backdrop in Minnesota. Fox News reported that the current surge of anti-ICE demonstrations to multiple fatal shootings involving federal immigration agents in Minneapolis earlier this year, including the deaths of Renée Good and Alex Pretti. Those deaths, and the arguments that inevitably follow them, have a way of changing the temperature of every gathering that comes after.
According to report, the protests are also brushing up against national politics in predictable but still combustible ways. The unrest is unfolding as congressional Democrats have blocked DHS funding for more than two weeks to push for ICE reforms.
The Minnesota State Patrol has, so far, limited its public role to confirming that troopers made 15 arrests, on top of the 39 recorded by the sheriff's office. Federal officials, whose building was at the centre of the protest, have been quieter still.
The Department of Homeland Security and Hennepin County Sheriff's Office, according to Fox News, could not be immediately reached for further comment, leaving a gap where a fuller federal response might normally sit.
The demonstration marked the climax of a week-long 'Bring the Heat, Melt the ICE' campaign, complete with teach-ins and panels, amid a wider surge of protests linked to Operation Metro Surge, which brought in around 3,000 federal agents, according to report.
Originally published on IBTimes UK
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