JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
President Trump's border czar, Tom Homan, today announced he's pulling 700 federal personnel out of Minnesota. This is a partial drawdown of the immigration enforcement surge that has stood at 3,000. The move comes in the aftermath of the shooting deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis and intense anti-ICE protests. NPR's law enforcement correspondent Martin Kaste joins us to talk about these developments. Hi there.
MARTIN KASTE, BYLINE: Hey, Juana.
SUMMERS: Martin, just first, is this a sign that the administration is backing down in Minnesota?
KASTE: I'd say this is probably the most conciliatory tone we've heard from them since this operation started. These press conferences in Minnesota used to be headed up by CBP commander at large Greg Bovino, you may recall. He'd take the podium in that olive, drab uniform and say just scathing things about state and local leaders. Now he's gone. He's been pushed out. And today, we had Tom Homan up there in his suit saying he'd had good conversations with Minnesota officials.
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TOM HOMAN: I'm actually amazed at the cooperation and agreements we've already talked about and the willingness to work with us. We're doing better than I ever thought we would.
SUMMERS: When you hear Homan there talking about cooperations and agreements, what is he referring to?
KASTE: That's not really clear. He celebrated the fact that Minnesota counties are now willing to notify ICE when they're releasing someone from jail that ICE wants to pick up. He says the number of counties doing this now is, quote, "unprecedented." But many if not most Minnesota counties were already willing to do that. And at the state level, officials have already said long ago that they do cooperate with immigration enforcement in transfers like that, that state prisons routinely release people with immigration violations into ICE custody.
SUMMERS: Yeah, we were in Minneapolis last week when Tom Homan was just coming into town. I'm curious now, though, Martin, how are officials in Minnesota responding to this new announcement?
KASTE: They really want to see more here. I mean, the common message is this is a step in the right direction, but the surge should end. State and city officials have been calling the operation a campaign of political retribution or framing it as a federal occupation. And to them, you know, bringing this federal contingent down to just 2,000 people isn't enough. It's still many more than the usual immigration enforcement presence would be in that region. Usually, it would be only about 150. So, you know, it's still a far cry from what they were expecting.
SUMMERS: And did Homan say whether a complete end to the surge is possible?
KASTE: Well, he said he wants to end the surge as soon as possible. But that came with a big caveat.
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HOMAN: That is largely contingent upon the end of the illegal and threatening activities against ICE and its federal partners that we're seeing in the community. We will not draw down on personnel providing security for our officers. I will not let our officers be put at risk.
KASTE: And that's really the rub here because what Homan and the administration view as illegal interference with immigration enforcement, many people in Minnesota see as their First Amendment right to observe and protest that enforcement. Many protesters do not want to see federal officers picking up people just on immigration violations, people who haven't committed other serious crimes. And Homan said his priority now is immigrants with criminal records, but he said the feds will continue to arrest those other people. So if those arrests continue, that sets up some potential for continued tension in the streets of Minneapolis.
SUMMERS: And there has been a lot of tension, as we saw firsthand. And I have to say that when I talk to people, they've noted that this whole operation has been so intense. There are, of course, those two shooting deaths, violent confrontations, people being tackled, car windows broken. And then the White House made the move of removing the previous commander. Now that Homan is in charge, what is his take on how this whole operation has been conducted?
KASTE: Well, he concedes that it has not been perfect, as he puts it. And you can infer what he thinks went wrong by looking at some of the changes he's announcing today. A big one is he says Customs and Border Protection officers and ICE will now be under a single, unified command structure to streamline things. The idea is to reduce overlaps in terms of who they're going after. Deconflicting is how the law enforcement usually puts that.
He also says there's going to be improved communication with local police, and of course, now body cameras. They've announced that there will be body cameras for everyone on the ground in the Twin Cities. Homan himself said that was a gap that some of the officers came to him and said that was a problem. And so now we're going to see body cameras on all the officers in the Twin Cities.
SUMMERS: NPR's Martin Kaste. Thanks so much.
KASTE: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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