A top Minnesota law enforcement official is rejecting repeated accusations by the Department of Homeland Security that state authorities have been releasing hundreds of dangerous criminals into the streets, rather than turning them over to federal immigration agents.
Paul Schnell, the commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Corrections, called the claims "fundamentally false" and warned that such federal messaging risks undermining public trust in both immigration enforcement and public safety.
"We cooperate with ICE and ICE detainers," Schnell told CBS News in an interview on Wednesday. "We have, as a matter of policy, done that for a long, long time. How they can say otherwise is unbelievable."
It came after Marcos Charles, ICE's acting executive associate director for Enforcement and Removal Operations on Tuesday accused Minnesota officials of failing to turn people over to federal custody — and claimed there were more than 1,360 pending ICE detainers statewide.
Those are federal requests to local law enforcement to detain individuals for up to 48 hours after they're set to be released from criminal confinement — which gives ICE time to decide whether to take them into custody to begin deportation proceedings.
"The best solution is to turn them over to us in a safe, controlled setting like a jail or prison instead of releasing them back onto the streets," Charles said at a news conference in St. Paul, Tuesday, warning that releases put communities "where your...
The National Police Agency said Friday it had referred a case involving the spread of misleading information to prosecutors, targeting a YouTuber surnamed Jo who allegedly made unsubstantiated cla...