Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said sending troops to Minnesota to help with the government's deportation campaign was a "ridiculous and unconstitutional idea" and urged protesters to remain calm so that United States President Donald Trump "doesn't see the need" to send in the military.
US media previously reported allegations by anonymous officials that the Pentagon had ordered about 1.500 active-duty soldiers stationed in Alaska, who specialize in operating in Arctic conditions, to prepare for a possible deployment to Minnesota.
Protests have been held there every day throughout January, after the Department of Homeland Security stepped up immigration enforcement in Minneapolis and St. Paul, deploying more than 2.000 federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers. Republican President Trump has deployed federal agents in a series of interventions, mostly in cities run by Democrats.
Three hotels where protesters said ICE officers were staying in the area stopped accepting reservations yesterday.
Yesterday, in one neighborhood, where immigration officers are often seen, US postal workers marched, chanting: "Protect us. ICE out."
President Donald Trump threatened to use the Insurrection Act on Thursday.
This rarely used 19th-century law would have allowed the president to send the military into Minnesota, where protesters have been clashing with federal immigration agents for weeks. Trump has since backed off on that threat, at least for now.
"It's ridiculous, but we will not allow ourselves to be intimidated by the actions of this federal government. It's not fair, it's not just, and it's completely unconstitutional," Mayor Frey told CNN.
He added that thousands of citizens were exercising their rights and that the protests were peaceful.
"We're not going to get caught. We're not going to respond to Donald Trump's chaos with our own kind of chaos here," Frey said.
Clashes between residents and federal officers are becoming increasingly tense in Minneapolis, Minnesota's most populous city, after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent shot and killed Renee Goode, a U.S. citizen and mother of three, on Jan. 7 as she tried to walk away after being ordered out of her car.
Another incident occurred on Thursday, January 15, when an ICE officer fired a gun and wounded a Venezuelan who allegedly failed to stop his car when ordered to.
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