Trump’s tough-guy ICE act crumbles as his own appointed judge blasts the agency for denying constitutional rights by keeping detainees from lawyers

A federal judge just dropped a massive ruling, stating the Trump administration is violating the constitutional rights of people detained by ICE in Minnesota by denying them access to attorneys. According to Politico, this isn’t just any judge, either. U.S. District Judge Nancy Brasel, who is an appointee of President Trump, pulled no punches in her ruling on Thursday. 

Brasel found that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency had stashed people in an overcrowded and ill-equipped facility without letting them talk to their lawyers. She essentially said the administration surged law enforcement into the Twin Cities without even considering “the constitutional rights of its civil detainees.”

You can’t just ignore constitutional rights because it’s inconvenient. Judge Brasel definitely agreed with that sentiment. She challenged the government’s claim that providing legal access would cause “chaos,” writing, “The Constitution does not permit the government to arrest thousands of individuals and then disregard their constitutional rights because it would be too challenging to honor those rights.”

That was beautifully said

She pointed out the hypocrisy of the situation, too. The officials allocated substantial resources to sending thousands of agents to Minnesota, detaining thousands of people, and housing them. They can’t suddenly claim they lack the resources when it comes to protecting the detainees’ rights. “The United States Constitution—not Whipple’s operational capacity or internal ICE policies—is what sets the floor for reasonable access to counsel,” she wrote.

The judge ordered immediate changes at the Bishop Henry Whipple federal building, located on the grounds of Fort Snelling, southeast of Minneapolis. ICE now has to provide routine and unmonitored phone access to detainees. Crucially, they must also give detainees the chance to alert their attorneys and family members at least one hour before they are transferred out of state.

This legal rebuke came just hours after the White House announced the end of its recent immigration crackdown, known as Operation Metro Surge. This operation saw as many as 3,000 federal agents flood the Minneapolis region to conduct mass deportation operations. 

Judge Brasel repeatedly noted that before this massive surge began, immigration officials had actually allowed attorneys to meet in person with their clients at the Whipple Building. Those visits were totally discontinued once the operation got underway.

This ruling is just the latest, and perhaps most direct, challenge from Minnesota and other federal judges. They have repeatedly called out the administration for violating court orders, illegally transferring detainees out of state, missing numerous legal deadlines, and ignoring release orders. It’s clear that officials in Minnesota are facing an intense level of judicial scrutiny, and they aren’t happy about having their constitutional duties ignored.