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On Saturday, a federal judge dismissed a bid by Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, a Democrat, aiming to halt the Trump administration’s escalation of immigration enforcement resources in the state.
In a detailed 30-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez determined that Ellison’s arguments were unlikely to prevail, particularly those asserting that the federal government’s actions infringed upon the 10th Amendment, which safeguards the rights of states from federal overreach.
Judge Menendez noted that the plaintiffs sought to broaden existing legal precedents to address what they see as a novel situation: the unprecedented deployment of armed federal immigration officers for an assertive enforcement of immigration laws. She pointed out that the cases cited by the plaintiffs did not offer sufficient parallels to support their claims.
“None of the cases on which they rely have even come close,” Menendez remarked in her decision.
It is worth mentioning that Judge Menendez was appointed by former President Joe Biden, further emphasizing the impartial nature of her ruling.
Minnesota has become the latest hotspot in President Trump’s aggressive immigration crackdown, which has involved sweeping enforcement efforts in various blue cities across the country.
First announced in December, the government has said roughly 3,000 personnel from Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) are on the ground as part of “Operation Metro Surge.”
But the effort has taken a turn since last weekend’s fatal shooting of ICU nurse Alex Pretti, the second time this month that a U.S. citizen was shot and killed by federal agents in the North Star State.
Ellison had filed the lawsuit alongside the cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul before Pretti’s death. Menendez considered it at a hearing on Monday.
The plaintiffs claimed the surge violated the 10th Amendment’s anti-commandeering doctrine, which the Supreme Court has held prevents the federal government from compelling states to implement federal regulatory programs.
Minnesota argues that “Operation Metro Surge” forces it to divert police resources and pressures the state to drop its “sanctuary city” policies.
Menendez ruled that the suit isn’t without merit — even suggesting at one point that immigration agents have engaged in racial profiling and used excessive force — but she said the case isn’t clear enough to authorize sweeping preliminary relief as it moves forward.
Beyond the issue of the immigration surge’s constitutionality, the judge was also bound at this stage to consider the harms on both sides. Menendez wrote that issuing an injunction would impose significant harm on the federal government in its immigration agenda.
She went on to note that an appeals court earlier this week paused another injunction she had imposed in a different case that restricted ICE’s tactics while responding to protests.
“If that injunction went too far, then the one at issue here—halting the entire operation—certainly would,” the judge added.