JD Vance has addressed the 'level of chaos' in Minneapolis following ICE agents sweeping through the Minnesota city and reports emerging of at least four children being detained.
US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents have been sweeping through Minneapolis, Minnesota, with reports of agents sitting down at a Mexican restaurant for lunch before returning to detain employees hours later. And Renee Nicole Good was fatally shot by ICE agent Jonathan Ross shortly after dropping her six-year-old off at school.
On Tuesday (January 20), five-year-old preschooler Liam Ramos was just returning home from school with his father when the pair were apprehended by ICE officials and taken into custody, superintendent of Liam's school, Zena Stenvik, said.
Liam is one of four children from the school district in Minneapolis suburb Columbia Heights who have reportedly been detained, fear having swept through the city.
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Stenvik has spoken out accusing ICE agents of 'roaming our neighborhoods, circling our schools, following our buses, coming into our parking lots and taking our kids' leaving children 'traumatized' and the whole community 'shaken'.
Vice President JD Vance has since commented on the outrage during a visit to Minneapolis, shifting the blame away from ICE agents.
In a meeting in which the mayor of the city and Minneapolis police chief allegedly weren't invited to, as reported by FOX 9 Minneapolis-St. Paul, Vance speculated the local authorities in the city are 'being told by somebody not to cooperate at all' with the federal agents.
"What kind of a person tells their local police, 'Don't protect somebody if they're being assaulted by a rioter'. It's crazy. And it's got to stop," he stated.
Vance continued by voicing he doesn't 'need Tim Waltz or Jacob Frey or anybody else to come out and say that they agree with JD Vance and Donald Trump on immigration'.
"What I do need them to do is empower their local officials to help our federal officials out in a way that this can be a little bit less chaotic and it can be a little more targeted," he said.
And the 'level of chaos' in Minneapolis? Well, it's on the city, Vance argued.
He said: "We're seeing this level of chaos, only in Minneapolis. LA and Chicago, we had some problems there. Pretty much every jurisdiction these guys are operating, you don't see the same level of chaos, you don't see the same level of violence, you don't see the same problems that we're seeing in Minneapolis."
The vice president resolved the government 'believe' the 'problem is unique to Minneapolis'.
"And it's the lack of cooperation being state law enforcement and federal law enforcement."
And mayor Jacob Frey held a news conference shortly after and addressed Vance's comments.
He said: "I get that they've got a messaging challenge here and it's predominantly because anyone can see with their own two eyes what's going on.
"You can't say with a straight face that pulling citizens off the street or going into a school is a targeted action when clearly it's not."
Poppy Bilderbeck