DHS disputes Augsburg’s account of ICE arrest as enforcement actions escalate in Minneapolis

Federal immigration officials are contradicting key elements of Augsburg University’s account of a weekend arrest on its Minneapolis campus as enforcement action continued to escalate in the metro this week.

The Department of Homeland Security’s Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin said in an emailed statement that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers arrested Jesus Saucedo-Portillo, whom she described as an unauthorized immigrant, on Dec. 6 while he was getting into his vehicle in a campus parking lot.

In a divergence from what school officials have said about the incident, McLaughlin said officers had a warrant and were obstructed by a university administrator and campus security during the encounter.

McLaughlin said Saucedo-Portillo “is a registered sex offender and has a previous arrest for driving while intoxicated.” A search of Minnesota court records by the Minnesota Star Tribune found no record of a DWI case under that name, and Saucedo-Portillo does not appear in the national sex-offender registry.

An Augsburg community member not authorized to speak on behalf of the university publicly said Saucedo-Portillo is an education major.

“He’s being horribly misrepresented,” they said. “He’s a normal college student. Not the worst of the worst. He’s the best of the best.”

Augsburg officials say they stand by their original account of the incident.

McLaughlin’s response came amid another day of heightened immigration activity in Minneapolis.

Around 2 p.m. Tuesday, as snow began to fall, ICE agents appeared near the Riverside Plaza housing complex in Cedar-Riverside, where livestreams and witnesses showed officers confronting protesters and deploying chemical irritants.

According to a release from Minneapolis City Council Member Jamal Osman, a 20-year-old man was detained in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood despite being a U.S. citizen. In a statement Tuesday night, Osman said the man had been working upstairs at a restaurant when he saw ICE agents harassing people. When he stepped outside, agents tackled him to the ground and put him in a chokehold, Osman said.

The man was taken to a Bloomington detention center despite providing a digital copy of his passport, according to Osman’s statement. After his citizenship was verified, the man was released, as the area was experiencing heavy snowfall, and he was told to walk after asking how he was supposed to get back.

“Incidents like this echo dark chapters in our nation’s history, such as the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, when U.S. citizens were targeted and detained based on how they looked and prejudice rather than evidence. … We must learn from these past injustices to prevent their repetition today," Osman said, in a statement.

Susan Tincher said she was ordered by agents wearing ICE and Enforcement Removal Operations vests to move back from where she was observing. She said she refused to, as she didn’t think there was any need to move. Tincher was then pushed down by agents and taken into custody, she said.

She was ultimately taken to the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building near the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport where she spent four hours isolated in a cell before being released. She was told she would be charged with obstruction.

DHS officials have said Augsburg staff also tried to obstruct immigration enforcement officers.

McLaughlin said that during the arrest at Augsburg, “a university Administrator and campus security attempted to obstruct the arrest,” alleging that an administrator ordered campus security personnel to stand in front of an ICE vehicle as officers attempted to leave campus.

She said officers warned that blocking the vehicle could constitute obstructing justice and used “the minimum amount of force necessary to clear the area.”

Though the arrest happened outside, Augsburg President Paul Pribbenow reiterated Monday that the parking lot is still private property owned by the university.

The conflicting accounts have raised unresolved questions about what kind of warrant officers carried. According to the National Immigration Law Center, a judicial warrant, signed by a federal judge, is required for officers to enter private property or detain someone there. By contrast, most ICE arrest warrants are administrative documents signed by immigration officials and do not authorize entry into private areas without consent.

The incident shook many Augsburg students, particularly those from immigrant and East African backgrounds. Asma Muhumed, a 19-year-old freshman who grew up in Minneapolis and is an Ethiopian-born Somali American and naturalized U.S. citizen, said she was at work Saturday when her father called to warn her to carry her passport.

“You’re going to need it because people are going to target you regardless,” he told her.

The advice stunned her.

She said she and her classmates have been rattled by the videos circulating online and have noticed fewer students in class since the arrest. On Tuesday morning, only a smattering of students slipped in and out of Augsburg’s academic buildings, their breath hanging in the air as they crossed snow-dusted walkways. University public safety vehicles were visible across campus.

“It’s horrible,” Muhumed said. “For your ethnicity to be the thing that draws that attention is really disappointing.”