Editorial | The surge is ending. The damage remains. Now what?

Opinion editor’s note: Editorials represent the opinions of the Minnesota Star Tribune Editorial Board, which operates independently from the newsroom.

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Whatever their views on immigration enforcement, Minnesotans should welcome the announcement by border czar Tom Homan on Feb. 12 that Operation Metro Surge soon will end, and that a significant drawdown of the more than 3,000 agents who had been sent to the state under federal orders is underway.

They should also welcome the vow by Gov. Tim Walz to focus state policies and legislation on recovery from the impacts of the disruption to normal life. The state’s legislative session begins Feb. 17.

But as the Department of Homeland Security declares its mission accomplished and begins its retreat, many are left wrestling with an infuriating if not incendiary question. What was the point of the bloody spectacle? Stripped of politics and posturing, a state and a nation deserve clear answers.

When Operation Metro Surge descended on Minnesota, it was described by its champions as a mission to combat fraud tied to Somali American communities and to make the Twin Cities safer. That’s not remotely close to what we witnessed over the course of the past 70 days.

Indeed, it is the stunning gap between the stated purpose of the federal invasion of Minnesota, the campaign’s actual execution and the outcomes that occurred that completely undercuts the notion of a focused federal law enforcement operation. What we witnessed was a campaign steeped in blame and punishment. The fraud-based premise of the surge was arguably never more than a Trojan horse.

By what immediate or lasting measure, we ask? There has been little to no transparency to the spectacle we have just endured.

How many violent offenders were actually removed? If the goal was rooting out fraud or targeting dangerous individuals, why were broad sweeps conducted that netted people with little or no criminal history? If the goal was safety, why were these heavily armed and masked agents deployed in a manner that visibly destabilized neighborhoods, shuttered business and splintered families who had committed no crimes?

And then are the deaths.

Renee Good.

Alex Pretti.

There is no mistaking the reality that the harm that Minnesota will continue to bear goes beyond the abduction of children, the hollowing of schools, the wanton street persecution of Americans or even the two deaths. We will now be forced to grapple with “generational trauma” that goes beyond far beyond immigrant communities, as Walz aptly put it.

Trust in government — already fragile — has been further eroded. But trust can and must be rebuilt. There’s no doubt that Operation Metro Surge induced people to take sides. Which side can declare victory will be in the eye of the beholder, but the many Minnesotans who dedicated themselves to peaceful resistance to aggressive policy can be proud.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar, ever the Minnesota booster and who’s now running for governor, offered this observation with which we wholeheartedly agree:

“Our state has shown the world how to protect our democracy and take care of our neighbors. ICE withdrawing from Minnesota is just the beginning. We need accountability for the lives lost and the extraordinary abuses of power at the hands of ICE agents, and we must see a complete overhaul of the agency.”

Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Emmer, meanwhile, a Republican, laid blame on Minnesota Democrats for the unrest during the ICE surge. He called it “a direct result of radical sanctuary state and city policies in Minnesota by preventing local law enforcement from working together with federal law enforcement,” while testifying Feb. 12 in front of a Senate committee about the shootings of Good and Pretti.