For more than two months, Minneapolis has been an occupied city. Masked federal agents in tactical gear flooded our neighborhoods and outnumbered our police officers on the streets. Parents stopped taking their children to school. Businesses closed their doors. People were afraid to go to the grocery store, afraid to walk their dogs, afraid to exist in their own community.
Then the violence began.
Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, was shot and killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent. Three weeks later, Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse, was filming federal agents with his phone and directing traffic when he stepped between an agent and a woman the agent had pushed to the ground. He was pepper-sprayed, wrestled to the ground by multiple agents and shot 10 times. Both were U.S. citizens. Both died in their own neighborhoods at the hands of their own government.
We urge every mayor in America to pay attention.
Now we’re told that those agents are finally withdrawing. But their departure doesn’t erase what they did here, and it certainly doesn’t end the fight for accountability. Because to understand what really happened in Minneapolis, you need to see the bigger picture. This wasn’t just an immigration crackdown. It was a test case for something much larger: how far federal power could be pushed inside American cities.
Here’s the pattern we’re seeing — and we urge every mayor in America to pay attention.
When the courts say no, the Trump administration escalates. In the fall, the Trump administration sent the National Guard into multiple cities under the pretense of “public safety.” In reality, the administration was testing how much local power it could subvert and how the courts would respond.
The courts said no. Judges across the country blocked National Guard deployments in Los Angeles, Portland and Chicago. The Supreme Court delivered the final verdict in Chicago, establishing a clear constitutional limit on federal military power in cities.
This should have been the end of it. Instead, the administration escalated. It militarized ICE and sent its agents into Minneapolis. The occupation turned violent. Two American citizens were killed. Residents lived in fear.
But something else happened, too.
When federal agents occupied parts of Minneapolis, neighbors stepped up for one another. Residents created safety networks and mutual aid systems on a scale we haven’t seen before. Thousands marched in sub-zero temperatures, refusing to be intimidated. Community safety officers delivered food to people too afraid to leave their homes. This is what defending democracy looks like.
Here’s what connects all of this: They’re losing in court, so they escalate.
The proof came in a letter. On Jan. 24 — the same day immigration agents killed Pretti — U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi sent Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz a letter offering to withdraw ICE in exchange for what courts have refused to give them: voter data and an end to sanctuary policies. Minnesota’s secretary of state called that demand what it was: “ransom.”
This isn’t law enforcement. It’s coercion.
What happened in Minneapolis is a rehearsal. The administration is laying the groundwork to baselessly contest the 2026 midterm elections.
The administration knows its allies in Congress face significant losses in November. So it’s building the infrastructure to challenge election results before votes are cast. The administration has demanded voter rolls from 24 states — all of them states Trump lost in 2020 — seeking data it can use to challenge voter registrations, purge rolls and cast doubt on election integrity. The Bondi letter made it explicit: Comply with our demands, or the occupation continues.
The pattern extends beyond Minneapolis. Last month, the FBI raided Fulton County election headquarters and seized ballots from 2020 — not to investigate fraud, as the administration claims, but to control evidence that can be used to question future results. Again, Trump officials are losing in court, so they’re turning to brutal enforcement and election office raids instead. The next court decisions will either defend our democracy or derail it further. Every mayor watching needs to understand: This is about establishing what’s allowed when the stakes are highest. If federal agents can occupy cities, if the DOJ can raid election offices, if courts can’t stop them, then they’ll have the tools to contest any result they don’t like. Minneapolis was the experiment. How far can federal authority stretch? How much can they militarize cities and towns? What can they get away with as elections approach? Minneapolis was their testing ground, but our resistance should be other mayors’ playbook. We withstood occupation, our residents organized, our courts pushed back and coordinated legal action blocked federal overreach. They forget the job of a mayor isn’t to control our populace, but to represent them. The Trump administration fundamentally misunderstands what mayors do. As Portland Mayor Keith Wilson put it, “They forget the job of a mayor isn’t to control our populace, but to represent them.” That’s why this strategy of intimidation will ultimately fail. Our job isn’t to help the federal government suppress our residents; it’s to defend them. Minneapolis is the warning — not just about violent crackdowns on our communities, but about what the administration will do everywhere if mayors don’t stand together and speak up. The good news is that more than 130 cities, alongside the U.S. Conference of Mayors, have taken coordinated legal action to defend local authority and protect billions in funding. That approach is working. In city after city, courts are reinforcing constitutional guardrails. The occupation of Minneapolis may be coming to an end, but the damage will take decades to repair — and another city may be next. The administration tested how far it could push, how much violence it could inflict, how long it could sustain an occupation. It will apply those lessons in the next city, with free elections on the line, unless mayors unite to stop them. The future of democracy will be determined not in Washington, but in cities and towns across America. Every mayor must decide: Will I stand with other mayors before it’s too late? Hope is not a strategy. Solidarity is. Minneapolis was Trump’s test case. Let it be the country’s wake-up call.
Jacob Frey is the mayor of Minneapolis.
Jill Habig
Jill Habig is the founder and CEO of Public Rights Project and a former adviser to former California Attorney General Kamala Harris. 
