Minneapolis, MN — A Sunday morning march to the Whipple Federal Building ended with state police and sheriff’s deputies making mass arrests once again, continuing a trend among state and local law enforcement that has been kept consistently alongside the federal government’s Operation Metro Surge in the Twin Cities.

Hundreds attended the ‘March on Whipple,’ the last protest of the ‘Bring the Heat Melt the ICE!’ week of action against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations in Minnesota. The Whipple Federal Building houses a detention center for immigrants and is the headquarters for the largest federal immigration crackdown in the country’s history.

Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office deputies, who regularly police the area around Whipple, arrested up to 39 people, some violently, on March 1 with the help of state police. This comes on top of many other mass arrests this year in response to anti-ICE protests, including at Whipple.

The main protest began at 9 a.m. in the parking lot to the south of Whipple, where hundreds of protesters gathered for a march that would take them down Minnehaha Avenue onto Bloomington Road, and then rounding back to Whipple by the Airport Service Road.

Sheriff’s deputies routed the protest at the intersection with Tower Road to the east of Whipple, blocking the march from continuing to its destination on the road.

Protesters heckled the deputies, who told them they were not allowed to protest on the street without a permit. A large group left the encounter to walk south along the sidewalk to Whipple’s eastern gate where the majority of protests have occurred since January.

Dozens of state troopers stood in the Whipple driveway as sheriff’s deputies blocked protesters from accessing the road from the Fred Wells Tennis and Education Center’s driveway, which itself became the new point of contention for the law enforcement officers.

Not long after, the number of protesters began to swell at this location, the amount of state police waiting for orders in Whipple’s driveway doubled, and the Sheriff’s Office brought out a vehicle with a Long-Range Acoustic Device, or LRAD, attached to the front to declare an unlawful assembly for blocking the tennis court’s driveway.

State troopers rushed the crowd from the west while sheriff’s deputies rushed the crowd from the east, kettling everybody between two chain-link fences, shoving people aside, and throwing protesters to the ground to arrest them. Police marched dozens of arrestees from this encounter into the Whipple complex, including one who was carried by several state troopers.

Officers held the road, closing off the northern side of the sidewalk to protesters. In the parking lot immediately to the southwest, behind a chain-link fence, Kalpulli Yaocenoxtlian conducted a ceremonial dance.

One of the protesters put into zipties refused to walk himself along with arresting officers. After officers couldn’t pick him up, a van was brought to the scene, where officers attempted to load him into the van. After repeated failures, officers instead opted to write him a citation and let him go.

As police were dealing with this, a couple of snowballs flew overhead from somewhere in the massive crowd that was squeezed onto the sidewalk – one hitting an officer in the shoulder. A rock was later lobbed and hit the ground without striking an officer.

Officers zeroed in on whoever they felt was throwing stuff and steamrolled through the crowd to get them and walk them through the crowd up to the Whipple complex.

Shortly after, the Sheriff’s Office once again declared the protest an unlawful assembly, this time for the projectiles. State troopers pushed protesters down the sidewalk until suddenly they began running after protesters. Over the LRAD, the Sheriff’s Office announced everybody was under arrest.

Police swarmed the scene, tackling several people to the ground while shouting for others to get on the ground themselves. Everyone arrested was brought into the Whipple compound and later loaded onto a bus, which left the area a little after noon.

Masked Homeland Security agents exited the compound and collected multiple signs left behind by protesters after they were cleared from the area by police. Dressed in jeans with hoodies and plate carriers, they began heading south down Tower Road before stopping mid-way and returning to Whipple.

Overhead the entire time, at least four federal agents at a time stood on Whipple’s roof, taking pictures with cameras on tripods of the crowds below. By noon, as people mostly left the area, they were gone.

Around 9:30 a.m., a short time after the main protest marched, an autonomous action started in the north parking lot when dozens of protesters with shields began to march. Sheriffs immediately threatened the group and began to kettle them. As the group retreated, sheriff’s deputies violently threw a protester to the ground and forcefully bashed their head against the concrete sidewalk. Several arrests were made during this incident.

See UR’s coverage of ICE in Minnesota:

Niko Georgiades contributed to this report.

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