Trump administration will end immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota: Homan

Border czar Tom Homan on Thursday said President Donald Trump has agreed to conclude the monthslong federal immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota.

“We’ve seen a big change here in the last couple of weeks,” Homan said at a press conference in Minneapolis. “All good changes.”

Homan said the number of enforcement targets in the Twin Cities region, which has been flooded since December with thousands of officers from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement as well as U.S. Customs and Border Protection, has been “greatly reduced.”

Homan last week had announced a drawdown of 700 agents from the area encompassing Minneapolis and St. Paul, a roughly 25% pullback that still left about 2,000 officers in place.

The total withdrawal “will continue to the next week,” he said Thursday morning.

Homan added that a “small footprint” of personnel will stay in the area “for a period of time” to transition command back to a local field office, and to ensure “agitator activity” does not flare back up.

The conclusion of “Operation Metro Surge” was announced less than three weeks after Trump deployed Homan to Minnesota to run the sweeping deportation mission, replacing Border Patrol commander at large Gregory Bovino.

That shake-up followed the deaths of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, two U.S. citizens who were fatally shot by federal agents in separate altercations in January.

The killings massively inflamed tensions over the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement efforts in Minnesota, spurring widespread protests and rapidly souring public opinion toward ICE.

Homan on Thursday touted a recent de-escalation in those tensions, crediting improved coordination between the federal government and state and local leaders since he took over.

“With that, and success that has been made arresting public safety threats and other priorities since this surge operation began, as well as the unprecedented levels of coordination we have obtained from state officials and local law enforcement, I have proposed, and President Trump has concurred, that this surge operation conclude,” Homan said.

But he stressed that the Trump administration’s efforts to remove vast numbers of undocumented immigrants will continue.

“For those who say we are backing down from immigration enforcement or the promise of mass deportations, you are simply wrong,” he said.

Homan praised Minnesota’s Democratic leaders, including Gov. Tim Walz, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and state Attorney General Keith Ellison, for cooperating with the federal efforts despite their political differences.

Around the same time Homan was speaking, Ellison sharply criticized the federal actions in Minnesota.

“The surge is contributing to violent crime,” he said in testimony before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

“Two of the three homicides committed in Minneapolis in 2026 have come at the hands of federal immigration agents,” the attorney general testified.

Homan in Thursday’s presser said, “There were some issues here,” but insisted that they have been addressed.

“We’ve had great success with this operation, and we’re leaving Minnesota safer,” he said.