Dramatic video being released Wednesday of a 20-year old Somali-American man who was taken into custody in the Cedar Riverside neighborhood in Minneapolis.
"What you very clearly saw in that video was Mubashir, an American citizen, someone who has been here nearly his entire life, tackled, handcuffed, taken into custody for no reason at all, in clear violation of law and the Constitution of the United States," Minneapolis Mayor Jacob described. "For simply walking down the street and looking like he's Somali. This should make every single person in America, whether you are a Democrat or Republican, livid."
It happened on Tuesday evening during an ICE raid where a number of agents checked ID's of numerous people who all turned out to be U.S. citizens.
The young man, Mubashir, didn't want to give his last name, but stood with Frey and Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara who condemned the operation.
"I felt like I was getting assaulted," says Mubashir. "Like I was getting kidnapped, and that's exactly what it was. And the way they were treating me, it was inhumane. They dragged me across the road, they slammed me to the ground, choked me - that was uncalled for."
Mubashir told reporters he was kept at a facility on Fort Snelling for several hours. He claims he showed his passport several times before ultimately being released, adding they "didn't seem to care."
"Minneapolis is not going to stand by this kind of crap," said Frey.
"Like the mayor, I apologize that this happened to you in my city, with people wearing vests that say police. That's embarrassing," says Chief O'Hara. "But what really gets me is that this is just one story today. And it's a little overwhelming. Just the volume of stories we're trying to sift through, and figure out what's true and what's not, and kind of what may be happening."
Federal agents used pepper spray to push through an angry crowd that blocked their vehicles as they checked identifications in a heavily Somali neighborhood of Minneapolis on Tuesday, amid the Trump administration's ongoing crackdown targeting the community.
"Random efforts in which individuals, who are including American citizens, are being stopped because they appear to be Latino or because they appear to be Somali is wrong," says O'Hara who says the situation is 'not safe.'
City Council Member Jamal Osman, a Somali American who represents the neighborhood, said armed ICE agents went to East African restaurants in the neighborhood Tuesday, closed the doors and demanded people's IDs. They found only U.S. citizens and made no arrests, Osman said.
O'Hara added he was proud of the actions from his department who were dealing with the aftermath, and monitoring the situation in Cedar-Riverside.
"We would just hope that at least from a tactical perspective, things could be well planned beforehand, both for the safety of law enforcement as well as for the safety of people in our community," O'Hara explained. "And that we wouldn't have to deal with so many stories after the fact, of what at the very least are just questionable methods and clearly a use of resources that doesn't appear to be getting a return on investment."
Frey, who has a background as a civil rights attorney, noted that the particular action that led to Mubashir being held are illegal.
"Under any law and under the United States Constitution, you can't tackle somebody because they look Somali without knowing who they are, what their name is, and you can't then detain them for purposes of immigration when they're a complete legal American citizen. When they have tried to provide information showing that they're an American citizen. Where you have declined to receive that information which you saw in this video," Frey explained.