Posts Made By: James Brown

Originally Posted by James Brown

I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.  👍🏼

Originally Posted by James Lacey

All, legalese aside, what Trump, Kristi Noem, and the DHS are doing in Minnesota is nothing short of outrageous, since we all know that what it's really all about is political retribution. Trump and the DHS have surged thousands of ICE and other armed, masked, and obviously under-trained federal agents into Minnesota. Not only did they unjustly shoot and kill Renee Good by shooting her in the face, but they are also conducting themselves in a way that makes it impossible not to make comparisons to a state police that acts outside the law, has no accountability, and that is carrying out political repression at the behest of Trump. At this point, there are many examples of arbitrary and unjust detention and violence carried out by ICE, not to mention the secrecy and anonymity of most of the agents with their masks and plainclothes attire.

And how do we know it's really all about political retribution? Because Trump has a vendetta against Walz, the state and people of Minnesota, who rejected him three times, Ilhan Omar, and Somali immigrants in general, and if this was really all about immigration enforcement, then they would do the same to Texas, Arizona, Florida, etc., which have far more illegal immigrants than Minnesota. We don't have exact numbers, but according to the data we do have, Minnesota would not even be in the top 20 when it comes to the raw number of illegal immigrants.

Honestly, if ICE were not conducting itself in such a provocative, aggressive, and violent way, especially against the general population, most of us probably wouldn't even know they were there doing it. But that's not Trump's style. He thrives on chaos, vengeance, and retribution, and has zero shame when it comes to using the power of the office he occupies to feed his psychotic need for it. All I can say is the midterms cannot get here fast enough, and I hope that, then, the balance of power in Congress shifts so that they can hold Trump accountable, because right now it seems there is no end to the harm he can cause.

Originally Posted by Russ Carroll

Judge Curbs ICE Actions Against Minneapolis Protesters

 https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/justice-department-investigating-minnesota-governor-and-minneapolis-mayor-b1f5f1b1?mod=hp_lead_pos3

"A federal judge imposed new limits Friday on how immigration-enforcement officials can interact with demonstrators in Minnesota, including blocking them from pepper-spraying or arresting peaceful protesters who aren’t obstructing their work.

Separately, the Justice Department is investigating whether Minnesota’s governor and the mayor of its largest city conspired to impede federal immigration officers, people familiar with the matter said.

The probe examines statements Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey made amid last week’s killing of a woman by an immigration agent, escalating a weekslong battle between the Trump administration and Minnesota’s Democratic leaders.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers were deployed en masse to Minnesota on the heels of a welfare-fraud scandal in which most of the people convicted have been Somali immigrants. ICE’s presence in the state has grown in size since protests erupted and the Department of Homeland Security has said it is the largest operation in the agency’s history.

Friday’s court order, issued by U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez, stems from a lawsuit filed last month by a group of protesters accusing immigration-enforcement officers of violating their constitutional rights to freedom of speech and against unreasonable search and seizure by law enforcement.

Besides barring federal agents from detaining or using crowd-dispersal tools against peaceful protesters, including those that are observing the activities of immigration agents, the order blocks agents from stopping drivers unless they are interfering with immigration enforcement actions. It also blocks agents from retaliating against peaceful protesters and observers.


“Plaintiffs allege they have been subject to a variety of retaliatory behavior by Defendants, including traffic stops, arrests, the indiscriminate use of chemical irritants, and pointing of firearms,” said Menendez, a Biden appointee. “These kinds of conduct are those that undoubtedly give rise to an objective chill of First Amendment rights.”

Minnesota separately sued the Trump administration earlier this week, arguing that ICE’s operations violate the state’s residual sovereignty under the 10th Amendment. A judge has yet to rule on that lawsuit.


An ICE agent’s killing of 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis last week has further inflamed tensions, sparking widespread protests. Just hours after the shooting, Frey demanded that ICE “get the f— out” of the city. Walz has called the agents’ deployment “organized brutality against the people of Minnesota by our own federal government.”

The Justice Department didn’t respond to requests for comment. DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said the department “is taking appropriate and constitutional measures to uphold the rule of law and protect our officers.”

Walz’s office said he hadn’t received any notice of the Justice Department investigation, but the governor issued a statement pointing to recent federal investigations launched against political figures who have been critical of President Trump.

“Weaponizing the justice system and threatening political opponents is a dangerous, authoritarian tactic. The only person not being investigated for the shooting of Renee Good is the federal agent who shot her,” Walz said.


Frey, in a statement, called the investigation “an obvious attempt to intimidate me for standing up for Minneapolis, our local law enforcement, and our residents against the chaos and danger this administration has brought to our streets.”

Videos of the shooting, which took place on a residential street south of downtown Minneapolis, were shared widely on social media.

DHS said an agent fired in self-defense after Good attempted to run over officers, but state and city officials have disputed that version of events after seeing videos on social media that support witness accounts that Good was attempting to flee the scene rather than harm anyone.

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

"Most compelling perhaps, is the truth that Renee Goode and the other activists disrupting ICE in Minneapolis and elsewhere are not actually helping any immigrants."

So, when they blow whistles, honk their horns and alert people of their presence, they're not helping? And when they temporarily block a lane, hold up signs, and yell, none of the latter is really an example of "not helping immigrants," it's called a protest, Jim, just like the thousands did today in Minneapolis, despite the snow and the subzero temperatures.  

And when a school prncipal speaks out like this, it isn't "helping"?    https://www.cnn.com/2026/01/23/us/video/ebof-liam-conejo-ramos-principal-jason-kuhlman

Originally Posted by James Lacey

I think the Memphis model is good, but the blame for all of the unrest in Minnesota doesn't lie with Democrats or the rapid response networks that are responding to ICE alone. Trump and Republicans have as much blame, given how they have gone after Minnesotans politically; citizens, immigrants, and political leaders. Also, do we even know whether ICE or any federal law enforcement agency tried to work with Minnesota's state and local law enforcement? Or did ICE and the federal government flood Minnesota with thousands of ICE and other federal agents with impunity? And if ICE had approached state and local law enforcement in Minnesota, met with some pushback on their tactics, and been asked to make compromises, would they have even entertained the idea? Or would ICE, Trump, and Stephen Miller simply pull their usual tough-guy act, double down, and do what they wanted to anyway via a monopoly of force and violence? Needless to say, it's a complicated situation, with lots of culture, history, and dynamics on both sides. Still, I think we have to blame Trump and his ridiculous bravado and take-no-prisoners style as much as anything.

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

And when a school prncipal speaks out like this, it isn't "helping"?    https://www.cnn.com/2026/01/23/us/video/ebof-liam-conejo-ramos-principal-jason-kuhlman

Originally Posted by James Lacey

I think the Memphis model is good, but the blame for all of the unrest in Minnesota doesn't lie with Democrats or the rapid response networks that are responding to ICE alone. Trump and Republicans have as much blame, given how they have gone after Minnesotans politically; citizens, immigrants, and political leaders. Also, do we even know whether ICE or any federal law enforcement agency tried to work with Minnesota's state and local law enforcement? Or did ICE and the federal government flood Minnesota with thousands of ICE and other federal agents with impunity? And if ICE had approached state and local law enforcement in Minnesota, met with some pushback on their tactics, and been asked to make compromises, would they have even entertained the idea? Or would ICE, Trump, and Stephen Miller simply pull their usual tough-guy act, double down, and do what they wanted to anyway via a monopoly of force and violence? Needless to say, it's a complicated situation, with lots of culture, history, and dynamics on both sides. Still, I think we have to blame Trump and his ridiculous bravado and take-no-prisoners style as much as anything.

Originally Posted by James Brown

I don't want to misread or minimize your point James, so please tell me if I am wrong concluding that your main point is that blame for the "unrest" in Minnesota lies predominately with Trump and his people?  I'm not sure the author of the article would disagree, but it is beside her point.

Even if we choose to apportion blame to Trump, that does not legitimize the actions of those who actively disrupt law enforcement.  Renee Goode did not need to die and she was the victim of a manslaughter or incredibly negligent police work at the very least.  That does not mean that she had any right to do what she did with her car, and she did not have any right to refuse to get out of her car.

Also, as we dig deeper into the blame game, the existence of Memphis (and other states or cities that have cooperated with the administration) suggests that there are better paths forward as Trump executes on his campaign promise to deport illegal aliens.  Pritzker, Walsh, Newsome and the like are as chock full of "ridiculous bravado and take-no-prisoners style" as Trump is.  They are motivating people like Renee Goode, but of course they are not the ones taking bullets.

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

Oh please, they didn't obstruct anyone and if they did, they were arrested,  and when Renee Good tried to drive away, which she had initially been instructed to do, she was shot in the face. And there's nothing wrong with blowing whistles, either. You know WHAT IS WRONG? The SCOTUS decision of a conservative court on Citizens United Vs FTC wherein the cons decided giving as much money anyway you can, i.e. superpacs, somehow constitutes "free speech." And all the dark money and otherwise followed. But in your book, "blowing whistles" isn't free speech or a protest...

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

Oh, excuse me, "blowing whistles" in your words, is  "self-indulgent theater"  and not free speech or an alert to the presence of ICE or a protest of it.

And I'm not buying the ICE explanation of not using a minor as "bait", either in the case you've cited or in others of similar nature.