What will you say when its one of your relatives or friends?
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Federal immigration agents bashed open a door and detained a U.S. citizen in his Minnesota home at gunpoint without a warrant, then led him out onto the streets in his underwear in subfreezing conditions, according to his family and videos reviewed by The Associated Press.
ChongLy “Scott” Thao told the AP that his daughter-in-law alerted him on Sunday afternoon that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were banging at the door of his residence in St. Paul. He told her not to open it. Masked agents then forced their way in and pointed guns at the family, yelling at them, Thao recalled.
“I was shaking,” he said. “They didn’t show any warrant; they just broke down the door.”
Amid a massive surge of federal agents into the Twin Cities, immigration authorities are facing backlash from residents and the local leaders for
warrantless arrests,
aggressive clashes with protestors and the
fatal shooting of mother of three Renee Good.
“ICE is not doing what they say they’re doing,” St. Paul Mayor Kaohly Her, a Hmong American, said in a statement about Thao’s arrest. “They’re not going after hardened criminals. They’re going after anyone and everyone in their path. It is unacceptable and un-American.”
Encounter caught on video
Thao, who has been a U.S. citizen for decades, said that as he was being detained he asked his daughter-in-law to find his identification but the agents told him they didn’t want to see it.
Instead, as his 4-year-old grandson watched and cried, Thao was led out in handcuffs wearing only sandals and underwear with just a blanket wrapped around his shoulders.
Videos captured the scene, which included people blowing whistles and horns and neighbors screaming at the more than a dozen gun-toting agents to leave Thao’s family alone.
Thao said agents drove him “to the middle of nowhere” and made him get out of the car in the frigid weather so they could photograph him. He said he feared they would beat him. He was asked for his ID, which agents earlier prevented him from retrieving.
Agents eventually realized that he was a U.S. citizen with no criminal record, Thao said, and an hour or two later, they brought him back to his house. There they made him show his ID and then left without apologizing for detaining him or breaking his door, Thao said.
