Judge Won’t Halt Trump’s ‘Metro Surge’

At a time when left-leaning activists on the federal bench seem bent on thwarting President Trump’s agenda, a United States district judge at Minnesota, Katherine Menendez, is an exception. Judge Menendez, nominated in 2021 by President Biden, just denied an effort by Democrats to put the kibosh on Mr. Trump’s immigration enforcement surge in the North Star state. Her ruling evinces a judicial modesty that is all the more welcome for its rarity today.The decision by Judge Menendez allows, for now, Mr. Trump’s “Operation Metro Surge” to continue. The president has dispatched thousands of federal agents to Minneapolis and other major cities in Minnesota to help enforce America’s immigration laws. The campaign has sparked resistance from left-wing officials, including Mayor Jacob Frey, who used crude language to urge Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials to clear out.Mr. Trump’s efforts to enforce the laws, per his constitutional duty, have also raised hackles because of the deaths of two protesters who tangled with ICE officers at Minneapolis. In this contentious climate, Judge Menendez’s decision offers a dose of legal clarity. She declined to endorse the rhetoric by Minnesota’s attorney general, Keith Ellison, who says that the ICE agents “are here to intimidate Minnesota and bend the state to the federal government’s will.”As a legal matter Judge Menendez refused to grant the request of Mr. Ellison and his fellow Democrats to stop Mr. Trump’s law enforcement surge, or to limit its breadth. On the one hand her ruling acknowledged the “costs and consequences” of what Mr. Ellison et al “characterize as an excessive and extreme law enforcement operation that is causing harm to the Twin Cities and State themselves, as well as to their residents.”On the other hand, though, Judge Menendez marked the arguments by Mr. Trump and the federales who “highlight the importance of immigration enforcement.” She noted the statistics marshaled by the government as far as “the number of undocumented people that have been arrested, including people with serious criminal histories.” Plus, too, she pointed out the pressure being placed on ICE personnel.The government has put forward evidence, Judge Menendez wrote, disclosing “how immigration enforcement agents have been met with resistance and, in some cases, threats and violence by protestors.” Faced with these competing arguments, the judge said she was “particularly reluctant to take a side in the debate about the purpose behind Operation Metro Surge,” and that her decision “depends more on the relevant law than the granular facts.” Judge Menendez concludes that even if the ICE push has had what she calls “profound and even heartbreaking, consequences,” the law would not allow her to block the effort to enforce federal writ. She marked the potential of “irreparable harm to the government because it would hamper their efforts to enforce federal law.” In this regard, the judge is bowing to a higher legal authority, that of the riders of the Eighth Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals.The riders, Judge Menendez explained, rebuked her earlier decision to put limits on the tactics used by ICE agents against protesters in Minnesota. If her prior ruling “went too far, then the one at issue here — halting the entire operation — certainly would,” Judge Menendez said. With Mr. Trump’s border tsar, Tom Homan, on the ground in Minnesota to defuse tensions, Judge Menendez’s show of judicial restraint could also help calm the waters.

Judge Won’t Halt Trump’s ‘Metro Surge’

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