MINNEAPOLIS — Thousands of people rallied in subzero temperatures in a march against the federal government’s immigration crackdown taking place in the city.
Organizers gave hand-warmers to demonstrators as they shouted “ICE out,” waved American flags and carried signs calling for the arrest of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who fatally shot Renee Nicole Good on Jan. 7.
“Today is the coldest day of the entire year in Minnesota, and we have the biggest protest to date happening,” said Amal Ahmed, 30, as she and others gathered downtown and marched toward the Target Center arena Friday afternoon.
Temperatures in Minneapolis were and will remain below zero degrees Fahrenheit on Friday, with a high of minus 9, a low of minus 17 and wind chill values as low as minus 35, according to the National Weather Service.
On Friday morning, video posted on social media showed thousands of people gathered outside the Minneapolis airport, forming a picket line so long it spanned the length of the terminal for departing flights. The morning action served as a precursor for a statewide “ICE Out” day of protest in the afternoon. Throughout the week, several groups including clergy, immigrant groups and labor unions, exhorted residents to support the Friday protest and not shop nor attend school or work that day.
KARE, NBC’s affiliate in Minneapolis, captured video of airport demonstrators being zip-tied and loaded into yellow school buses by police officers. Organizers told KARE that about 100 people were detained. Airport officials told KARE that law enforcement took action after the protesters’ “permitted activity went beyond the agreed-upon terms.”
Some businesses across the Twin Cities were closed on Friday and some business owners previously told NBC News they would be attending the rally.
Mati Hanson, 31, said she was protesting because she felt that she could as a white person. “A lot of people aren’t leaving their houses … Those are the people I want to support, since they can’t be here,” she said.
Yubi Hassan, 24, who immigrated to the U.S. from Somalia when he was a teenager, handed hot tea to protesters in The Commons.
His friend waved a sign from behind him that read “Free Somali tea.”
“We realized it’s negative 20 degrees out today, and anybody would appreciate something warm,” said Hassan, who owns a local tea company. He said it was important to be out protesting, despite his fears.
“We have seen this happen before, right? It always starts with one group of people, until it spreads to everybody,” he said. “Today is us, tomorrow it might be somebody else.”
As the sun set in the Twin Cities, the demonstration moved as planned to a rally at the Target Center arena, where thousands again gathered. Banners that read “Stop kidnapping our neighbors” and “No more masked militia” were hung throughout the city-owned stadium. Several local activists and religious leaders addressed the crowd.
“Today, we are not gathering out of fear. We gathered out of love for our neighbors, for our children and for our future,” activist Imam Youssef Abdullah said. “When the violence escalated, we did not turn away. We showed up, we shared food, we marched together.”
Yubi Hassan at the ICE Out protest in Minneapolis, MN on January 23, 2026.Matt Lavietes / NBC News
The Trump administration has sent more than 3,000 federal immigration personnel to Minneapolis since December, in what the administration has dubbed Operation Metro Surge.
Over the past six weeks, officers have apprehended more than 3,000 undocumented immigrants, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
In a statement to NBC News on Thursday evening, a DHS spokesperson criticized Friday’s protests saying, “The fact that those groups want to shut down Minnesota’s economy, which provides law-abiding American citizens an honest living, to fight for illegal alien murderers, rapists, gang members, pedophiles, drug dealers, and terrorists says everything you need to know.”
Operation Metro Surge came after a YouTube video by right-wing influencer Nick Shirley alleging massive fraud at child care centers owned by Somali immigrants went viral. The video generated fierce and renewed attention on a yearslong investigation by the Justice Department into an alleged $250 million fraud scheme in Minnesota. The scheme involved some members of Minnesota’s Somali community.
At the protest on Friday, Abdi Hassan, 19, a Somali American who’s been in the U.S. since he was 2 years old, said that in recent weeks he’s had friends racially profiled by ICE. He takes his ID everywhere he goes, he said, “or I might just be snatched up for no reason … it’s been scary lately. It’s terrifying.”
The immigration operation has been fiercely criticized by some residents and local officials, including Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey. This week, the Justice Department sent subpoenas to Walz, Frey and other state leaders, escalating its investigation into whether they conspired to impede immigration operations.
Tensions have flared since the fatal shooting of Good, an unarmed U.S. citizen, by ICE officer Jonathan Ross, who federal officials have said was acting in self-defense.
On Thursday, Homeland Security and FBI agents arrested three protesters in connection with a demonstration that interrupted Sunday service at a church in St. Paul. That same day, news broke that four children had been apprehended by immigration authorities in recent weeks, including a 5-year-old boy.
Images of the 5-year-old boy, Liam Conejo Ramos, were plastered to some of the protesters’ signs on Friday downtown. One read “Not bait.” Officials with Ramos’ school district accused federal authorities of using the boy as bait to arrest his parents, which DHS has denied, stating they made “multiple attempts” to get the boy’s mother to take custody of him, but she refused.
“It’s super heartbreaking to know that even a 5-year-old can be placed in detention centers,” Ahmed said. Nobody is safe.”
Border Patrol and ICE officials said at a news conference on Friday that the father had fled on foot as they were trying to arrest him, and that he had left the boy. Officials have said the father and son have been reunited at the detention facility in Texas.
“To the federal government, look at this gathering here. I know you’re watching,” Youssef Abdullah said. “Take good pictures. Your division did not work. You division failed. Your cruelty has been exposed.”
Matt Lavietes reported from Minneapolis and Nicole Acevedo from New York.