Will leadership switch change Minneapolis immigration enforcement?
- - Will leadership switch change Minneapolis immigration enforcement?
Trevor Hughes, USA TODAYJanuary 28, 2026 at 1:42 AM
0
MINNEAPOLIS ‒ The replacement of Border Patrol Commander Greg Bovino has offered migrant-rights activists both in Minneapolis and nationwide a glimmer of hope that the Trump administration may be reconsidering its harsh approach to mass deportations.
But longtime immigrant-rights experts and many protesters say President Donald Trump's decision to replace Bovino with White House border czar Tom Homan is more likely a public relations move than anything, given Homan's longtime push for harsher enforcement.
Homan in July 2025 promised to unleash a "flood" of immigration enforcers onto Democrat-run cities, although it was Bovino who became the public face of that initiative, which surged from Los Angeles to Chicago, Charlotte, North Carolina, and New Orleans before crashing into Minneapolis.
On the other hand, some supporters of Trump's deportation efforts are urging the president to keep up the pressure, even if that means adjusting tactics to appease an increasingly unhappy public.
1 / 10Vigils held for Alex Pretti, killed in Border Patrol related shootingMourners kneel at a makeshift memorial in the area where Alex Pretti was shot dead a day earlier by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on Jan. 25, 2026. On January 24, federal agents shot dead US citizen Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse, while scuffling with him on an icy roadway, less than three weeks after an immigration officer shot and killed Renee Good, also 37, in her car.
Some on social media urged Trump to follow through on his promise of mass deportations and invoke the Insurrection Act to quell unrest in Minnesota.
"Don’t pull ICE out!" one user said on X, formerly Twitter. "Make it clear the people we are trying to deport and if Minnesota cooperates, it would be safe and quick."
"GO HARDER," another wrote. "DEPORT THEM ALL."
Protesters stand outside the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building near Minneapolis during Operation Metro Surge, a large immigration enforcement operation in the Twin Cities area, on Jan. 27, 2026.
But outside the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building near Minneapolis on Jan. 27, protesters saw Bovino's departure as a victory and motivation to keep pushing back.
Dan McGregor, 38, said he's hopeful Bovino's departure ‒ which he characterized as a firing ‒ signals Trump is feeling the pressure from the ongoing protests.
McGregor said he believes Trump will eventually fold under continued public pressure, a phenomenon some of the president’s critics have dubbed "Trump Always Chickens Out," or TACO.
"I think Trump’s TACO-ing right now with firing Bovino," McGregor said. "Even Trump's normal defenders are now deciding that they need to speak out and distance themselves from this ideology, this incident. So I think that's why Trump is chickening out. He can read the room, that he's losing popular support even from his supporters."
Bovino as the face of Trump's deportation campaign
Trump said on Fox News on Jan. 27 that the decision to pull Bovino out and send Homan in was "a little bit of a change," rather than a pullback, because Bovino is a “pretty out there kind of a guy.”
“And in some cases it’s good,” Trump said. “Maybe it wasn’t good here.”
A man is dead after being shot by DHS agents in Minneapolis, city officials say.
Bovino has been a near-ubiquitous presence during enforcement surges nationwide, both in person, online and on television, where he sparred with Democratic lawmakers like California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker.
And across the country, migrant-rights protesters increasingly directed their ire at Bovino as the face of Trump's campaign to carry out an aggressive deportation campaign. Some saw Bovino's removal as a win.
"It's a victory, a very small victory," said Alanah Odoms, executive director of ACLU Louisiana, which had opposed the Bovino-led "Catahoula Crunch" enforcement operation in the New Orleans area late last year. "Someone had to take the fall for this. The Republicans know they've gone too far. It's a victory but it may be a pyrrhic one."
Rising public opposition
A hand-drawn caricature sign of Border Patrol Commander Greg Bovino sits at a protest in New Orleans in December 2025. Bovino led "Operation Catahoula Crunch" in Louisiana, and migrant-rights groups targeted his participation in the weekslong enforcement effort.
Bovino's departure came just days after an immigration agent shot and killed ICU nurse Alex Pretti on Jan. 24 during a confrontation between protesters and federal agents. Although Pretti was armed with a licensed concealed handgun, he did not appear to have threatened federal agents with it.
After Pretti's death, Bovino blamed him for intervening and accused him of planning to inflict "maximum damage and massacre law enforcement" agents.
Both Pretti and Renee Nicole Good, who was shot and killed by federal agents earlier in January during another confrontation, were White U.S. citizens. Bovino's comments on their deaths angered civil rights groups, among others.
Protesters have repeatedly filled the streets, and hundreds of them each day chase around the approximately 3,000 immigration enforcers temporarily stationed in the state. Protesters have at times likened the federal presence to an occupying force, buoyed with tens of billions of dollars in new funding appropriated by Congress to hire officers and agents, build detention centers and fly people out of the United States.
Mourners pay their respects at a memorial site on Nicolett Avenue in Minneapolis marking where Alex Pretti was shot and killed by federal immigration agents.
Bovino's departure came as a new poll found 39% of Americans support Trump's aggressive immigration policy, the lowest level since his return to the White House. More than half ‒ 53% ‒ of Americans, meanwhile, disapprove of the work Trump is doing on immigration, according to the Reuters/Ipsos poll.
Prof. Michael Kagan, who runs the Immigration Clinic at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas law school, said it's not yet clear whether Bovino's departure represents little more than damage control by a worried White House or a sea change in approach to the entire deportation initiative.
Kagan noted that the White House replaced many regional ICE leaders with their Border Patrol counterparts last year as administration officials sought a harsher approach to deportation efforts. He said Bovino's rise to command high-profile surge operations reflected the administration's priorities.
"One scenario is that this is just damage control from the fiasco that has been Minneapolis. It wouldn't be the first time in politics that someone has to be the sacrificial lamb when an administration finds itself in a little bit of trouble, but there may be no actual policy change," Kagan said. "I think we're going to have to watch what happens, not just what happens in Minneapolis but what happens afterward nationwide."
Who is Bovino's replacement, Tom Homan?
Trump on Jan. 26 said he was dispatching Homan to take over in Minneapolis after talking with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
Homan was acting ICE head for more than a year during the first Trump administration, having previously served as director of ICE enforcement and removal operations under President Barack Obama. He returned to the White House as border czar when Trump took office last year.
President Donald Trump sends Border Czar Tom Homan to Minnesota amid scrutiny over ICE operations and rising political concern in Minneapolis.
Michelle Brane, a longtime migrant-rights activist who served as immigration detention ombudsman at the Biden-era Department of Homeland Security, said Homan was essentially the father of family separation policy, which he began promoting during the Obama administration and then implemented during Trump‘s first presidency.
Under the family separation policy, parents and children who crossed the border without advance permission were detained separately, which critics said was designed as a cruel deterrent.
"To think that Homan is really a solution to a crisis of this magnitude … is a bit too hopeful. But I do think it's a step," Brane said. "It's almost as if they're saying 'I'm sorry that you feel bad about what we did,' rather than actually acknowledging they did something wrong or changing their practices on the streets. But it is a sign that the pressure is working. People need to continue to raise their voice ‒ this behavior by federal officials is unacceptable.”
'Get up and keep fighting'
Some of the president's fiercest supporters have worried publicly that replacing Bovino with Homan signals that Trump is softening on his deportation goals due to public pressure.
Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies said he hopes that state and federal officials can come to an understanding to allow immigration enforcement to proceed in Minnesota without more conflict. The center advocates for less immigration into the United States and has largely supported Trump's deportation agenda.
"I don't think they should back off and I don't think they are backing off," Krikorian said. "It is just a change in tactics."
A sign on a post in Minneapolis seen on Jan. 26, 2026, near where Alex Pretti was killed by a federal immigration officer encourages the public to speak out if they see federal agents
Krikorian said he hopes to see more worksite and employment-related immigration enforcement actions because he believes those operations are both more effective and less likely to end in violent confrontations. And he warned that Trump's changes in Minneapolis risk emboldening protesters and Democratic politicians opposing the president.
"The federal government can't let a state or even radicals within a state just say that they don't want federal law to be enforced," he said. "That's not acceptable."
Outside the Minnesota federal building, however, McGregor the protester, said he's hopeful that's exactly what's happening: Trump is adjusting tactics because he recognizes it's unpopular.
"I think now that there's a crack, we have to go harder," McGregor said. "Bovino got fired. That means that what we do is working. We have to keep going harder. This is a moment of weakness for them. We need to get up and keep fighting."
Contributed: N'dea Yancey-Bragg
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Tom Homan replaces Greg Bovino in Minneapolis immigration enforcement
Source: “AOL Breaking”
