ICE data show Metro Surge swept mostly non‑criminals

Internal ICE data pried loose in a lawsuit show that Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota arrested about 3,800 people between December and February, with more than 60% of them having no criminal convictions at all and only about one in four showing any record, even for misdemeanors or traffic violations. Another 13% had only pending charges, and ICE’s own figures indicate that 63% of those picked up also had no immigration‑related convictions or charges, meaning they were not previously documented as lawbreakers under any code. The Deportation Data Project, which analyzed the dataset, says a national quota of 3,000 arrests a day pushed agents away from targeting violent offenders and toward grabbing immigrants "going about their daily lives," including people attending ICE check‑ins and immigration court in the Twin Cities. Ecuadorians were by far the most targeted group in Minnesota: more than 1,000 natives of Ecuador were arrested here during the surge, drawn from roughly 12,000 pending immigration cases and 1,900 asylum claims, a pattern that includes high‑profile cases like 5‑year‑old Columbia Heights resident Liam Conejo Ramos and his family. DHS has so far refused to respond to FOX 9’s questions about the data, even as local courts, lawmakers and Walz’s new Metro Surge council wrestle with the fallout from an operation now shown, by ICE’s own numbers, to have focused primarily on people with clean records rather than the "worst of the worst" the agency advertised.