In the moments after Renee Good was killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey issued a combative message. “To ICE, get the fuck out of Minneapolis,” he said.
A little more than two weeks later, as Frey responded to another killing of a Minneapolis resident by federal agents, he was similarly defiant.
This time, even as he pleaded with President Donald Trump to “act like a leader,” Frey also aimed his message at the American public.
“To everyone listening: Stand with Minneapolis. Stand up for America,” Frey said at a news conference today.
“Recognize that your children will ask you what side you were on. Your grandchildren will ask what you did to act to prevent this from happening again.”
Frey, a 44-year-old third-term Democratic mayor who represents the moderate wing of the party in the overwhelmingly blue city where progressives control the council, rocketed into the national spotlight with his response to Good’s killing.
The Trump administration and Republicans have sought to focus the blame for weeks of conflicts between ICE agents and those protesting their presence in the Twin Cities on local Democratic leaders and on the actions of protesters.
“I’m done being told that our community members are responsible for the vitriol in our streets. I’m done being told that our local elected officials are solely responsible for turning down the temperature,” he said.
Frey has at times urged protesters to remain peaceful and heed the directions of local police. A week after Good’s killing, he warned against “taking the bait” as protests grew confrontational in the wake of a second ICE shooting.
US Border Patrol Commander-at-Large Gregory Bovino claimed the man immigration agents shot and killed approached agents with a handgun on Saturday.
“The agents attempted to disarm the individual, but he violently resisted,” Bovino said, claiming a Border Patrol agent “fired defensive shots.”
But as videos of the incident emerged, Frey offered a much different analysis of what had unfolded.
He described watching a video of “more than six masked agents pummeling one of our constituents and shooting him to death.”
Frey said blame for the violence lies with the Trump administration.
“The invasion of these heavily armed masked agents roaming around on our streets of Minneapolis, emboldened with a sense of impunity – it has to end,” he said.