ICE “Not Nice” —Thanks To Trump

ICE agents not so nice? Well, duh. They’re only doing what Trump has been encouraging U.S. law enforcers to do for the past decade!

There’s Minnesota Nice. There’s Minnesota Not-So-Nice. Then there’s Trump’s gang of enforcement thugs yanking Minnesotans who are actually American citizens — not illegal aliens — out of their cars and dragging them across the icy pavement in the wintertime. Even when they’re on their way to the doctor’s office. Even when they can’t turn over their birth certificate on demand. Even when they keep crying out, “I’m an American citizen! I’m an American citizen!”

That’s not all ICE agents are doing. They’re also putting chokeholds and handcuffs on people who haven’t committed any crimes. They’re detaining citizens for no legal reasons. They’re breaking down doors after Minnesotans have legally asked them to see warrants. They’re even arresting(GASP!) Native Americans, then detaining them indefinitely. What’s going on here?

Welcome to dystopic occupation in The land of 10,000 Lakes. Or, in The North Star State. Whatever you call it, it’s feeling less and less like America and more and more like a “Twilight Zone” episode that’s so crazy unbelievable that even Rod Serling himself couldn’t imagine it.

Picture this scene. Thousands of armed and aggressive ICE agents in masks and hoods descend on residents at work, home, and school. They ignore due process. They laugh at Constitutional rights. They believe every Minnesotan is a violent criminal. So they rough up their human targets, hit their cars, hunt them down like wild animals. They even fire rubber bullets and tear gas at crowds of peaceful protesters exercising their right to assemble.

Then some guy in a crowd throws a snowball. It misses his target, only landing on the pavement in front of an ICE agent.

No harm done. No death, no injury from the lone snowball. But now the ICE man “fears for his life” and starts shooting!

This begs the question: Why are such fully armed, poorly trained enforcers always “fearing for their lives” whenever snowballs are involved? A better question would be this one: Why has Trump repeatedly encouraged such illegal over-reactions from ICE?

Ever since Trump okayed the invasion of these “national security” officers, Minnesotans have been stunned by the way ICE has mistreated people — along with their adamant refusal to follow legal and essential democratic protocols that American laws demand.

Like so many other residents, I was horrified. And yet, I wasn’t THAT surprised because Trump has had a long track record of ignoring all kinds of laws. In fact, I distinctly remember watching televised accounts of Trump actually encouraging the police to break the law, to stop being “so nice to criminals.”

He was saying things like wouldn’t you just like to, for once, not be THAT nice, just let them hit their heads?

That did sound pretty surreal, though, even if it was coming out of Donald Trump’s mouth…He couldn’t be THAT serious about mishandling suspects like that, could he?

So, in order to ensure the accuracy of the information and his quotes, research was done. Not only did he actually say these things to law enforcement, he elaborated on his own intolerance and personal rejection of “innocent until proven guilty.” Not once, but over and over in rallies across America. He didn’t say these things during 2024 campaign stops, either. He was encouraging these un-American responses during his first term as U.S. President — and even before that.

FYI, ABC News provided that information online, along with subsequent objections to his rhetoric from the ACLU and Suffolk County Police Department.

In Trump’s speech on July 28, 2017, at Suffolk County College in Brentwood, New York, he got on a roll as he kept telling law enforcement officers to “not be too nice:”
“When you see these thugs being thrown into the back of a paddy wagon, you just seen them thrown in, rough. I said, “Please don’t be too nice,” he said.
“When you guys put somebody in the car and you’re protecting their head you know, the way you put their hand over (their head),” Trump continued, mimicking the motion. “Like, ‘Don’t hit their head and they’ve just killed somebody, don’t hit their head.’ I said, ‘You can take the hand away, OK?’
“I have to tell you, you know, the laws are so horrendously stacked against us, because for years and years, they’ve been made to protect the criminal. Totally made to protect the criminal. Not the officers. You do something wrong, you’re in more jeopardy than they are,” he added.

As he continued his rant, there were smiles, even some smirks, from his audience of police officers. You could even hear a little laughter from them. Then he made some wry comments about the “tough” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer:
“I can tell you, I saw some photos when (acting ICE Director) Tom (Homan)’s guys, rough guys, they’re rough, I don’t want to…say it because they’ll say that’s not politically correct, you’re not allowed to have rough people doing this kind of work…Just like they don’t want to have rich people at the head of treasury,” Trump said.

Of course, the Suffolk County Police Department was not amused by his rhetoric:
“The SCPD has strict rules & procedures relating to the handling of prisoners,” it tweeted following the president’s speech. “Violations of those rules are treated extremely seriously.”

A later tweet from The Department was even more candid:
As a department, we do not and will not tolerate roughing up of prisoners. — Suffolk County PD(@SCPDHq) July 28, 2017

The reaction from The American Civil Liberties’ Union was also understandably critical of Trump’s remarks:
“By encouraging police to dole out extra pain at will, the president is urging a kind of lawlessness that already imperils the health and lives of people of color at shameful rates,” Jeffery Robinson, deputy legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union and director of the ACLU’s Trone Center for Justice and Equality, said in a statement.
“Innocent until proven guilty? Our president would rather not bother with that, expanding the role of the police officer to include judge, jury and executioner.” he said.
“This country is weary of the type of policing that Trump espouses, having seen over and over again that it only makes it harder for police to investigate and solve crime,” he said.

Such blatant criticism, however, never could stop Trump’s tirades. In many cases it actually seemed to energize his calls to ignore civil rights. Even before Trump became POTUS 45 he was advocating violence for dissenters who tried to disrupt his campaign speeches.

On February 1, 2016, on the same day of the Iowa caucus he openly encouraged attacking protesters — and then offered to pay any legal fees the attacks might incur:
“If you see somebody getting ready to throw a tomato, knock the crap out of them, would you? Seriously, OK? Just knock the hell…I promise you I will pay for the legal fees. I promise, I promise,” he said (on Feb. 1, 2016).

Later that same month, at a rally in Las Vegas, he complained that security guards were too nice to a protester:
“He’s walking out with big high-fives, smiling, laughing,” Trump said. “I’d like to punch him in the face, I’ll tell you.”

At yet another rally in Warren, Michigan, he let it be known once more that he was okay with roughing up a protester:
“Get him out,” he said of a protester. “Try not to hurt him. If you do, I’ll defend you in court. Don’t worry about it.”

But worried sick we all should be.

Trump has long had this curious habit of reframing his outrageous remarks in humor, like some hackneyed lounge lizard who has to shock and insult in order to get our attention. His delivery, his unexpected commentary, his flagrant disregard for protocol almost always leads audiences into thinking he’s kidding — when he’s not. He means business.

He has this way of being upfront about his plans and actions in such an unexpectedly funny way that almost no one takes him seriously. They should…but they don’t.

The Donald’s truths are so outrageously unbelievable that too many Americans can’t see him as a clear and present danger to our democracy.

And now ICE agents are strutting around Minnesota like some New Age Gestapo bullies and getting away with it. The threat was always hiding in plain sight, but only MAGA men could see it and — much to our shock and disbelief — believe it as truth.

What’s really surprising here is how quickly so many people have forgotten Trump’s blatant intolerance of civil rights. No wonder author Gore Vidal dubbed our country “The United States of Amnesia.”