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By Billal Rahman
Immigration Reporter
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Two United States citizens who work at a Target store in Minnesota were “aggressively and violently” detained by federal agents during an immigration enforcement operation, according to a local official. During the operation, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said one individual was arrested for assaulting federal law‑enforcement officers
Democratic State Representative Michael Howard, a member of the Minnesota House, told Newsweek that both individuals detained during a January 8 enforcement action at the store in Richfield were injured and later released, describing the arrests as “pure madness” and criticizing what he called an escalation of federal enforcement in his community that he says has created fear.
“It is an escalation of what we've seen for the past several weeks here in Minnesota, where ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] is acting with impunity and trampling the civil rights of U.S. citizens, as well as our immigrants,” Howard told Newsweek in a phone interview on January 12.
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"During an immigration enforcement operation, USBP [United States Border Patrol] arrested a United States Citizen for assault in Richfield, Minnesota,” a spokesperson for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) told Newsweek.
Newsweek has contacted Target for comment via email.
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Footage from the incident shows one of the individuals shouting, “I’m a U.S. citizen,” and saying his name as he was dragged by the U.S. Border Patrol agents. The footage below shows scenes some people may find distressing and contains some profanity.
The encounter sparked backlash on social media, and protesters gathered outside the Richfield Target to demand that federal agents respect workers’ rights and protect civil liberties. Some in the crowd also called on the company to ensure employees and customers are safe from aggressive federal enforcement actions.
DHS officials told Newsweek that federal agents approached the two individuals working in the Target drive‑up area and asked about their immigration status. When one person responded to questions with profanity and resisted efforts to detain him for further questioning, including grabbing an agent’s arm, officers took action to detain him, officials said.
“As I understand, individuals were injured in these arrests. And our community is really outraged on behalf of these workers,” Howard said.
“From my understanding, one of the individuals was driven to a nearby parking lot and released. And then the other individual was detained for a large part of that day and at some point was also released,” he added.
Minnesota has become a focal point in the national conversation about immigration enforcement after a federal agent fatally shot 37‑year‑old U.S. citizen Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis during an operation earlier this month, an incident that sparked widespread protests and heightened tensions across the country.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has since deployed hundreds more federal agents to the state under what officials describe as an expanded enforcement effort that includes ongoing investigations, including a large‑scale fraud probe.
While President Donald Trump's administration and the DHS have defended the shooting and the expanded federal presence as justified, local leaders have disputed the government’s account, citing video footage they say contradicts official statements.
Amid the Trump administration's hard-line mass deportation push, dozens of reports have emerged of U.S. citizens being questioned or detained by immigration authorities, raising concerns over racial profiling. Multiple federal agencies, including Border Patrol, ICE, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the FBI, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, are being mobilized to carry out coordinated immigration operations as the administration pursues its goal of removing millions of migrants without legal status.
“Two U.S. citizen target workers were arrested by federal immigration officers. I mean, that's just not a sentence I would think I would be saying in 2026 in the United States of America,” Howard said.
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