Minneapolis Mayor Frey Reaffirms City Won’t Enforce Federal Immigration Laws

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey told The New York Times’ “The Interview,” in comments highlighted by Fox News, that his city was “never going to agree” to enforce federal immigration law and still refuses to do so even after President Donald Trump warned he is “playing with fire.” Frey said it is not the job of Minneapolis police to act as immigration agents, arguing their focus must remain on responding to 911 calls and violent crime rather than “hunting down” undocumented parents heading to work, and he cited Rudy Giuliani–era New York policies as precedent for encouraging all residents, regardless of status, to call police. He described the Trump administration’s deployment of an estimated 3,000–4,000 ICE and Border Patrol personnel to Minneapolis—alongside about 600 city officers—as an “invasion,” but said federal officials have since told him they will “significantly” draw down those numbers and change how agents operate. Frey’s remarks crystallize the core sanctuary‑style position of a large U.S. city in direct conflict with Trump’s interior‑enforcement surge, at a time when fatal shootings by federal agents in Minneapolis and congressional fights over DHS funding are already making Minnesota ground zero in the immigration wars.