President Donald Trump said Monday he and Gov. Tim Walz have agreed to cooperate on the federal immigration enforcement surge in the Twin Cities, a notable shift from earlier tension between the White House and the Democratic governor.
In a social media post, Trump said Walz “called me with the request to work together with respect to Minnesota.” The president described their call as “a very good call, and we, actually, seemed to be on a similar wavelength” on how to handle the deployment of federal immigration agents.
Trump said he would send Tom Homan, the federal “border czar,” to Minnesota to oversee operations focused on targeting criminal activity.
“Governor Tim Walz called me with the request to work together with respect to Minnesota,” the president wrote. “It was a very good call, and we, actually, seemed to be on a similar wavelength. I told Governor Walz that I would have Tom Homan call him, and that what we are looking for are any and all Criminals that they have in their possession,” Trump wrote.
“The Governor, very respectfully, understood that, and I will be speaking to him in the near future. He was happy that Tom Homan was going to Minnesota, and so am I! We have had such tremendous SUCCESS in Washington, D.C., Memphis, Tennessee, and New Orleans, Louisiana, and virtually every other place that we have ‘touched’ and, even in Minnesota, Crime is way down, but both Governor Walz and I want to make it better!”
Walz’s office did not immediately release a full transcript of Monday’s call, but the governor had publicly clashed with the administration earlier this month after the deployment of thousands of federal agents to Minneapolis under “Operation Metro Surge.”
The federal mission, aimed at arresting undocumented immigrants with criminal records and supporting local law enforcement, has drawn protests and legal challenges from Minnesota officials. State Attorney General Keith Ellison was in court Monday morning in a bid to limit continued federal enforcement actions.
Trump’s decision to send Homan to Minnesota comes as lawmakers and local leaders remain sharply divided over the aggressive federal presence. Republicans have touted drops in crime statistics where federal task forces have operated, while critics argue the surge undermines local authority and inflames tensions.
The standoff has been overshadowed by recent violence tied to the operation. On Jan. 24, 37-year-old Alex Pretti was fatally shot by a U.S. Border Patrol agent in south Minneapolis during a clash connected to immigration enforcement operations. Pretti’s death drew nationwide attention, with conflicting accounts of the circumstances surrounding the shooting and intense debate over the role of federal agents in the state’s largest city.
