The fast-moving situation in Minnesota with immigration enforcement and local protesters leaves city and state leaders calling for calm while ICE and other Homeland Security agents surge into the state. Wisconsin’s U.S. senators — Republican U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson and Democratic U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin — weighed in on the violence.

U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson and U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin
R-Wisconsin and D-Wisconsin

• Chaos in Minnesota follows the shooting death of Renee Good, a 37-year-old woman who was driving her car in the midst of an ICE blockade in Minneapolis. The federal government has dispatched thousands of Homeland Security agents to the city and President Donald Trump has floated invoking the Insurrection Act, which would authorize bringing in U.S. military personnel. Here & Now asked each of Wisconsin’s U.S. senators about whether they thought such an action would help or hurt the situation.
• Johnson: “Well, what you ought to do is take a look at different states, those that are actually cooperating with ICE as we try — as the Trump administration tries to clean up this enormous mess led behind by Biden and Democrats who opened up our borders, versus those states that are resisting. Where local law enforcement actually holds illegal immigrants that have committed crimes so that ICE can pick them up peacefully at the jails, you’re not seeing a problem. Where you’re seeing a problem is where you have insurgents like Gov. Walz and the mayor, inciting people to resist and obstruct justice, and that led to the tragedy of that one woman’s death.”
• Baldwin: “You know, when you see this president surge what is now close to 3,000 armed, masked ICE agents into neighborhoods, schools, residential areas, I think that makes our communities less safe, not more safe. And the chaos that is going on in Minnesota by these unaccountable actions taken by these ICE agents is the part that is causing tensions to rise. I think that the Trump effort to change the narrative and blame residents who are peacefully protesting this presence is wrongheaded. He’s been talking about “reckoning and retribution” — that’s what I think this is all about. And it is very, very disconcerting to see this surge. Right now ICE agents outnumber local law enforcement three to one.

• Each U.S. senator responded to whether they have concerns that Wisconsin will be similarly embroiled in immigration enforcement actions and protests.
• Johnson: “I would hope that Wisconsin county sheriffs and local officials would cooperate with ICE. I think generally they do. We don’t — we do not have, you know, pockets of large illegal immigration, immigrants in the state of Wisconsin. So it’s not as big an issue here as it is with the Somali population and others in Minnesota and some of these other big cities.
• Baldwin: “You know, I think we need to be watching and vigilant about what’s happening in our neighboring state of Minnesota and be ready. I think it is very responsible for our local leaders and state leaders to be talking actively about what this would look like in Wisconsin.

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