Secret ICE Agent Tried to ‘Entice’ Minneapolis Activists Into Confrontational Tactics

Organizers in Minneapolis long suspected they were being surveilled by the federal government during the height of the winter protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement. It was not until a court filing on Thursday, however, that the youth-led Sunrise Movement and other groups learned the depths of infiltration.

The Sunrise Movement has long preached nonviolence even as it pursues aggressive tactics, such as making a racket outside of the hotels where ICE agents sleep.

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But the group’s public commitment to peaceful protest did not spare it from a months-long, aggressive campaign of government snooping that included ICE agents attending its meetings and protests undercover, subpoenas of its financial records, and at least one apparent attempt to entice an organizer into backing more confrontational tactics.

Sunrise Movement Executive Director Aru Shiney-Ajay said in an interview Thursday that the government’s tactics are a sign that the Trump administration is losing the battle for public opinion.

“What this is meant to do is scare protesters and scare people away from joining protest groups,” she said. “It is very essential that we remember that actually what we are doing is incredibly normal, it is incredibly popular, and we cannot let ourselves be scared out of organizing.”

Operation Puppet Master

The revelations about the tactics ICE used against Sunrise, along with a wide variety of labor unions and protest groups, came in a court filing from a defense attorney for one of 15 Minnesota activists charged in June for trying to stop the federal government’s immigration crackdown in the Twin Cities.

Shortly after federal agents killed Alex Pretti on Jan. 24, ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations opened two investigations it called “Operation Puppet Master” and “Project Whipple Shield,” the latter a reference to the federal building that was the site of many ICE protests.

Supposedly, those probes would focus on a network supporting “violent opportunists and agitators.” In reality, the investigative reports that the federal government has turned over to defense attorneys show that undercover ICE agents secretly recorded at churches, libraries, and schools even when organizers stressed the importance of nonviolence.

In the case of Sunrise, undercover agents were already targeting the group before the killings of Pretti and Renee Good.

Sunrise is a national organization with a Twin Cities chapter. Long known for its aggressive climate advocacy, the youth-led group pivoted just before the start of the federal government’s crackdown on immigrants in Minnesota to fighting the Trump administration’s authoritarianism.

One of the group’s most famous early acts was occupying then-Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s office in support of the Green New Deal. It brought that same energy to the protests in Minneapolis, playing a key role in the nighttime noise protests targeting hotels in the Twin Cities that were allegedly hosting ICE agents. But it has always counseled its supporters to remain peaceful, Shiney-Ajay said.

“We are a strictly nonviolent movement. We make that very clear in almost every training we run, in all the meetings we run,” she said.

Yet almost as soon as Operation Metro Surge started, ICE agents were attending Sunrise trainings on the sly.

Undercover agents attended a “how to stop ICE” training that Sunrise hosted at a church on Dec. 13. By Dec. 22, an undercover agent had been added to the Signal group for planning one of Sunrise’s hotel protests. On Jan. 9, two undercover agents attended a noise demonstration outside a Hilton Hotel, noting that a member of the crowd set off fireworks at one point.

The killing of Pretti — and the ensuing nationwide backlash against ICE — appears to have done nothing to slow the investigation. One week after Pretti’s slaying, two undercover agents attended a Sunrise Movement Twin Cities training on “resistance skills” hosted at a public library.

The meeting included primers on de-escalation at protests, and the ICE agent noted that it was “made clear that the Sunrise Movement organization focused on ‘peaceful’ protests.”

That did not stop the undercover agent from making a private approach to one of the organizers, according to a report the agent produced. The agent told the organizer that he worked in construction and “could build items that might assist other groups with more ‘direct-action’ protests.” When the undercover agent declared that “going to jail did not bother him,” the organizer “acknowledged” the agent’s comments and took down his phone number, according to the report.

Kevin Riach, the attorney representing one of the defendants in the indictment targeting Minneapolis activists, said in a court filing this week that that report was one of several showing that ICE’s undercover agents “actively participated in organizing and directing the groups they were surveilling, at times working to entice people into discussing or committing crimes.”

By the start of March, the federal government had scaled down its immigration crackdown in Minneapolis — but it was continuing to investigate groups such as Sunrise.

On March 9, ICE sent a subpoena to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York for the nonprofit’s wire transactions dating back to Jan. 1, 2023, long before Trump was even elected to his second term. That same date, ICE also sent a subpoena to the Clearing House, a private wire transfer company, for years of financial records from Sunrise and several labor unions.

The Sunrise Movement was never given notice of those subpoenas or an opportunity to contest them, Shiney-Ajay said.

Training for This Moment

None of the activists who were eventually charged in a June 16 indictment were members of the Sunrise Movement, Shiney-Ajay said.

ICE declined to offer an explanation for why it investigated Sunrise and the other groups.

“HSI investigates individuals and organizations when there is just and legal cause to do so and within the scope of its legal authorities. To preserve the integrity of our work and protect law enforcement sensitivities, we do not comment on ongoing investigations, investigative tactics, or procedures,” an agency spokesperson said.

While it had never been confirmed that ICE was closely studying the Sunrise Movement before this week, Shiney-Ajay said it had long been treated as a possibility. The group was specifically concerned that federal agents might act as provocateurs at protests.

“We put a lot of work into training de-escalation and safety leads at all of our protests,” she said. “I certainly think that that was a worthwhile investment, reading these things now.”

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She said it was “telling” that the investigation was led by the Department of Homeland Security rather than the FBI, which might be constrained by more “rules and regulations.”

The revelation of the widespread ICE probe has already sparked another backlash.

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, which has received funding from conservative and libertarian donors, said it found the investigation disturbing.

“Some activists have violated federal law, and the government is entirely justified in investigating and prosecuting them. But criminal conduct by some members of a movement does not justify government surveillance and investigation of anyone who shares their broader political goals. That type of aggressive scrutiny chills protected speech and association. It will likely make many Americans think twice before joining a protest, attending a meeting, donating to an advocacy organization, or speaking out at all,” said Aaron Terr, the group’s director of public advocacy.

On Thursday, a coalition of dozens of Minnesota groups promised that that they would not be cowed.

“We know the truth, and we will not be intimidated,” the groups said. “When self-serving politicians are losing, they lie and attempt political repression, trying to silence the voices of those who bravely stand up to them. Minnesotans will not be intimidated or divided by sham accusations or investigations of some of the countless groups and community members who organized, acted, and stood up together to protect their neighbors during Operation Metro Surge.”