What If Trump Made War on Minneapolis and Nobody Came?

Froma Harrop
Mon, 19 Jan 2026 14:12:03 -0800
Opinion

President Donald Trump's approval ratings are down the drain. The midterms are coming, and if Democrats prevail, his agenda gets boxed in fast.

What can he do to avoid that outcome? Well, what's worked in the past? Immigration! Former President Joe Biden had irresponsibly left borders open for too long, a failure that suited Trump just fine. A bipartisan fix emerged, and Trump pressured Republicans to reject it.

He needed a show.
Updated: Tue Jan 20, 2026

President Donald Trump's approval ratings are down the drain. The midterms are coming, and if Democrats prevail, his agenda gets boxed in fast.

What can he do to avoid that outcome? Well, what's worked in the past? Immigration! Former President Joe Biden had irresponsibly left borders open for too long, a failure that suited Trump just fine. A bipartisan fix emerged, and Trump pressured Republicans to reject it.

He needed a show.

Few foreigners are entering the country illegally these days, and so Trump had to create the appearance of a new immigration crisis. Easy. Send armies of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents into Minneapolis. In doing so, he tried to link a fraud investigation — one involving many members of the Somali community — to illegal immigration. The swindles are outrageous, but most of the Somalis involved are in this country legally. That is not an immigration issue, but Trump is an expert at mixing things up.

Another advantage to making war in Minneapolis was the knowledge that many in that generally liberal city would give him that war and provide street theater for media coverage. The performers came out on cue and put on shows. Some were clownish, though most were peaceful. Others threatened violence and brought tensions to a boil.

Cecil B. DeMille had nothing on Trump in creating spectacle. Unlike DeMille, Trump casts "order" as the hero and ragtag discontents as the villains.

The ICE officers didn't send themselves into these cities. Trump did. Some may have acted badly, but they are humans. They were being used by Trump on one side while being provoked by the other.

There was really no excuse for a protest at a church in St. Paul, where a pastor reportedly also worked as an ICE agent. The ICE agents really are not the enemies here. It's the people who put them in impossible situations.

What transpired in the fatal shooting of Renee Good should be settled by an in-depth federal investigation. Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara said that the more the Trump administration refuses to conduct one, "the more frustration builds here among the people I speak to."

To stoke more chaos, the Trump administration has given ICE daily quotas on the number of arrests. That forces — or incentivizes — them to hassle brown people without cause. Trump campaigned on the promise to at first limit these resources for undocumented immigrants who had committed crimes. He broke that promise, and his brutal campaign against immigrants, legal or otherwise, is a big reason his poll numbers on immigration went negative.

The worry for Democrats is that some of their prominent figures may help Trump by playing the "Abolish ICE" card again. That was very bad for them last time. Most Americans support immigration but want it kept legal. "Abolish ICE" sounds a lot like "Defund the Police." ("Abolish ICE" probably cost Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes — and Democrats — a Senate seat in 2022. He lost to Republican Sen. Ron Johnson by a hair.)

What if these armies of agents showed up and the town answered by pulling the shades and turning on the TV? Confrontation is Trump's preferred setting, and confusion caused by a multitude of players blurs the lines.

Note that Trump hasn't sent the forces into conservative Texas or Florida — states with far higher percentages of undocumented immigrants than Minnesota. And he has cut back on raids in California farm country, where undocumented immigrants provide much of the labor.

Trump's latest verbal escalation contained in threats to invoke the Insurrection Act and send in active-duty troops suggests he's worried the temperature may soon drop. Democrats, don't be suckers.