Hello Mari, I remember you so well from the happy days of reading War and Peace in 2024. I felt so sad reading this post, but then I have been feeling that way about the situation in the US for quite a while. I am far away in Australia, so I can't do much except offer you, and your country, my heartfelt sympathy and to encourage people like you, and other brave Americans, to continue resisting Trump. Easy to say from here, but I mean it, and I feel that this man and his regime is a potential threat to the whole world.
I lived in New York in the early 1960's for 18 months, and have been back to the US three times since, once for 6 weeks with my mother and then 8-year-daughter, in 1978. So I have many happy memories of your country, and an abiding fondness for it and its people.
It's a dangerous time to be an American citizen, so I hope you and your family can stay safe; I wish for safety for everyone. I send you greetings and my very best wishes.
Thank you for writing this, Mari. Together we are strong. I’ll be calling my reps later today and often to protest. It’s an easy thing to do and the more of us do it, the greater difference it makes.
All well said. Trump 2.0 is officially the worst president of my lifetime. This seals it. I don't wanna hear any "Well, actually" bullshit from the "heterodox" crowd anymore. We truly live in the worst timeline.
Yup. There is no “well actually” here. US citizens who are exercising their Constitutional rights are being unlawfully detained and beaten up. It is totally unacceptable.
In the 1960s, a man stands in the middle of a Moscow train station handing out flyers. Most of the people who accept one take a look at it, nod at the man in fierce agreement, and move on.
After a while, a couple of KGB agents who have noticed this go over to the man, intending to arrest him. They grab the flyers to prove he's guilty of spreading sedition, only to find that they are blank on both sides.
"What is this?" one of the KGB goons asks the man. "Some kind of joke?"
"Well, what is there to say?" the man says, gesturing around him. "It's all just so obvious."
(Intended this as a contribution to the Tidbit thing, but now I've posted it it's striking how much that last line applies to the vindictive thugs at ICE, too.)
It is great you summed it up with so many different things we can see on the news and social media right now.
I am considering going back to Minneapolis next week and protesting. Was in the neighborhood where this happened three weeks ago after visiting Eric and Kathryn. So peaceful there, and I could see the ICE agents at a store and their vehicles, not being given the order yet to create chaos.
It is an uphill battle right now, and I have never liked to use words of war in politics or advocating for change, but those words are all we have for this right now.
Ultimately we need to prepare for decades of consistent change, where it took decades to create this pathway to brutality on the Right. Now here it is in full force and could get worse.
Offsetting what is happening will mean a stronger commitment from more Americans to get involved, be informed, and to vote with knowledge. It also means we need discipline, in part to keep sustaining change over a long period of tiem, and in part to ensure we do not react in a way that harms more people than already have been.
So I hope all those who have been asleep at the wheel will begin to do a lot more so that we do not completely fly off the cliff ... we are driving towards a cliff now, but not there yet.
Yeah, since Trump’s re-election, it has really seemed like we’re on a terrible trajectory that we may not be able to turn around. Bless you for doing what you can to turn the wheel of that careening car.
I hate everything about this, and I'm glad your son was ok. Immigration enforcement being shitty is not new. When federal agents have broad immunity, everyday citizens lose. Trump is uniquely terrible, but he's far from the only one to blame -- this is an ongoing problem made worse by our current political climate. If you're like me and are comforted by being able to do something focused and constructive, I urge you to check out (and/or tell friends & family about) the Institute for Justice. They bring strategic lawsuits to fight for citizens' rights, with a focus on preserving and restoring individual freedom. They've got at least 2 lawsuits that I know of open against ICE tactics: https://ij.org/case/alabama-construction-site-raids/, https://ij.org/case/george-retes-federal-officer-accountability/.
First, let me apologize for writing an article-length reaction to your piece—but I’m doing it all the same! ;-)
Perspective: The Growing Disparity in Policing Standards (2026)
I live in the northwest corner of the seven-county Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area. Two of my kids live nearby, and my eldest daughter lives in downtown Minneapolis. Many aspects of our current situation worry and anger me on a daily basis. I find myself spending too much time "doom-scrolling," getting increasingly frustrated by reports of misconduct by federal law enforcement officers. To me, these do not reflect the desired behaviors of a professional policing body—rather the opposite. I believe this is due, at least in part, to the dangerously low training standards for new ICE ERO officers (though I certainly don't let the administration off the hook for creating and amplifying the situation).
As someone who completed the Minnesota POST (Peace Officer Standards and Training) requirements back in 1990, I view the law enforcement profession through the lens of the "Minnesota Model." Although I never served as a sworn officer, going through that rigorous process gave me a direct, personal appreciation for the academic and tactical hurdles required to earn a Peace Officers license in this state.
Comparing my 1990s experience to the 2026 ICE "Surge" Standards reveals a massive disparity. In Minnesota, the barrier to entry is built on a foundation of higher education and specialized skills; meanwhile, current federal standards for ICE ERO prioritize rapid deployment above all else.
The Training Gap
The 48-Day Federal Agent: To meet 2026 hiring targets, ICE ERO has condensed its training to just 8 weeks (roughly 48 training days). They have even removed the Spanish language requirement, replacing linguistic immersion with translation apps. This "mission-specific" approach is designed to get personnel into the field as fast as possible, but it lacks the broad academic and legal foundation we require in Minnesota.
The Minnesota Standard: To even be eligible for a license in Minnesota, the baseline is a two- or four-year Law Enforcement degree followed by a high-intensity, 10-week skills course. This means a Minnesota candidate has already completed years of college-level law, ethics, and psychology before they ever begin their 40-hour-per-week tactical boot camp.
The FBI "Gold Standard": The FBI remains the benchmark agency, maintaining high barriers that reflect a traditional professional model. They still mandate a four-year degree and professional work experience before a candidate even reaches Quantico. Their 20-week academy is a total-immersion experience that stands in stark contrast to the current 8-week ICE ERO surge.
The Reality of Reciprocity
Here is a telling fact: Under 2026 Minnesota law, a graduate of the ICE ERO 8-week academy cannot become a police officer in Minnesota. They do not meet our standards. Even with federal experience, Minnesota requires a "Reciprocity Exam" and often additional coursework because our state board (POST) recognizes that an 8-week tactical course is not a substitute for a professional education.
Final Thoughts
Some of the misconduct I’ve seen recently is beyond the pale—obviously and fundamentally wrong. I believe this is, in part, a symptom of a significant and dangerous "training gap." While we in Minnesota are accustomed to a model where a badge represents years of higher education and rigorous tactical preparation, we are now seeing federal agents operating in our streets with only eight weeks of total instruction.
In my view, ICE ERO officers are being deployed while untrained to a degree that is patently dangerous. Rather than addressing these systemic failures, ICE appears to be ‘rubber-stamping’ questionable behavior and refusing to even investigate allegations of misconduct. This erosion of professional standards, coupled with a lack of federal accountability, can only result in further tragedies on our streets.
And this is actually the rosy view. If we were to assume that the majority of ICE officers deployed to the Twin Cities are in fact highly trained, it speaks to an even deeper and more fundamental problem: it suggests that the conduct we are seeing isn't at all an accident of poor preparation, but a deliberate feature of their version of law enforcement.
Thank you so much for this informative comment, Gent! Would it be ok with you if I sent it out as a separate post next week? I think it deserves to be read by more people.
I have also heard that the ICE agents have a truly insane arrest quota, which may partly account for their extreme aggression and for their propensity to arrest law-abiding citizens for no reason at all.
Finally, I had my own, very positive, experience with the Minnesota model of policing this last summer. I made a left turn near Maple Grove high school on my way to Target, as I have done so many times before. Suddenly, there was a police car with flashing lights behind me. Uh oh! I pulled over, and the officer came up to my window. He was so friendly! When I gave him my Swiss license, he laughed and asked what could possibly have brought me to Maple Grove. He then told me that the town had just installed a new stop sign, which I had blown right by. He said that the police department had decided to station a car near the sign and to issue warnings instead of tickets to oblivious people like me, figuring that we wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. (He was right!) I came away with such a positive feeling about Maple Grove police. My friend Candy (she was in my year—maybe you knew her?) also has a police-officer dad, and she told me that it was the norm for officers to be trained to approach citizens in this way.
Anyway, in policing as in so many other areas, Minnesota is a model for the rest of the country!
Hello Mari, I remember you so well from the happy days of reading War and Peace in 2024. I felt so sad reading this post, but then I have been feeling that way about the situation in the US for quite a while. I am far away in Australia, so I can't do much except offer you, and your country, my heartfelt sympathy and to encourage people like you, and other brave Americans, to continue resisting Trump. Easy to say from here, but I mean it, and I feel that this man and his regime is a potential threat to the whole world.
I lived in New York in the early 1960's for 18 months, and have been back to the US three times since, once for 6 weeks with my mother and then 8-year-daughter, in 1978. So I have many happy memories of your country, and an abiding fondness for it and its people.
It's a dangerous time to be an American citizen, so I hope you and your family can stay safe; I wish for safety for everyone. I send you greetings and my very best wishes.
Thank you so much for your kind words and good wishes, Glenys! It really means a lot. Here’s to more slow reads with Simon and happier times!
Thank you for writing this, Mari. Together we are strong. I’ll be calling my reps later today and often to protest. It’s an easy thing to do and the more of us do it, the greater difference it makes.
Thanks for this comment, and for your calls, dear friend!
All well said. Trump 2.0 is officially the worst president of my lifetime. This seals it. I don't wanna hear any "Well, actually" bullshit from the "heterodox" crowd anymore. We truly live in the worst timeline.
Yup. There is no “well actually” here. US citizens who are exercising their Constitutional rights are being unlawfully detained and beaten up. It is totally unacceptable.
In the 1960s, a man stands in the middle of a Moscow train station handing out flyers. Most of the people who accept one take a look at it, nod at the man in fierce agreement, and move on.
After a while, a couple of KGB agents who have noticed this go over to the man, intending to arrest him. They grab the flyers to prove he's guilty of spreading sedition, only to find that they are blank on both sides.
"What is this?" one of the KGB goons asks the man. "Some kind of joke?"
"Well, what is there to say?" the man says, gesturing around him. "It's all just so obvious."
That’s a great joke! My husband lived in Russia in 1986 and 1987, and so he has quite a collection of these jokes. I will have to tell him yours!
(Intended this as a contribution to the Tidbit thing, but now I've posted it it's striking how much that last line applies to the vindictive thugs at ICE, too.)
Agreed.
It is great you summed it up with so many different things we can see on the news and social media right now.
I am considering going back to Minneapolis next week and protesting. Was in the neighborhood where this happened three weeks ago after visiting Eric and Kathryn. So peaceful there, and I could see the ICE agents at a store and their vehicles, not being given the order yet to create chaos.
It is an uphill battle right now, and I have never liked to use words of war in politics or advocating for change, but those words are all we have for this right now.
Ultimately we need to prepare for decades of consistent change, where it took decades to create this pathway to brutality on the Right. Now here it is in full force and could get worse.
Offsetting what is happening will mean a stronger commitment from more Americans to get involved, be informed, and to vote with knowledge. It also means we need discipline, in part to keep sustaining change over a long period of tiem, and in part to ensure we do not react in a way that harms more people than already have been.
So I hope all those who have been asleep at the wheel will begin to do a lot more so that we do not completely fly off the cliff ... we are driving towards a cliff now, but not there yet.
Onwards...
Yeah, since Trump’s re-election, it has really seemed like we’re on a terrible trajectory that we may not be able to turn around. Bless you for doing what you can to turn the wheel of that careening car.
I hate everything about this, and I'm glad your son was ok. Immigration enforcement being shitty is not new. When federal agents have broad immunity, everyday citizens lose. Trump is uniquely terrible, but he's far from the only one to blame -- this is an ongoing problem made worse by our current political climate. If you're like me and are comforted by being able to do something focused and constructive, I urge you to check out (and/or tell friends & family about) the Institute for Justice. They bring strategic lawsuits to fight for citizens' rights, with a focus on preserving and restoring individual freedom. They've got at least 2 lawsuits that I know of open against ICE tactics: https://ij.org/case/alabama-construction-site-raids/, https://ij.org/case/george-retes-federal-officer-accountability/.
Thanks for the link, Lyra. I will check them out. I feel so helpless over here. It would be good to find a way to support concrete, helpful actions.
Thank you, Mari.
First, let me apologize for writing an article-length reaction to your piece—but I’m doing it all the same! ;-)
Perspective: The Growing Disparity in Policing Standards (2026)
I live in the northwest corner of the seven-county Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area. Two of my kids live nearby, and my eldest daughter lives in downtown Minneapolis. Many aspects of our current situation worry and anger me on a daily basis. I find myself spending too much time "doom-scrolling," getting increasingly frustrated by reports of misconduct by federal law enforcement officers. To me, these do not reflect the desired behaviors of a professional policing body—rather the opposite. I believe this is due, at least in part, to the dangerously low training standards for new ICE ERO officers (though I certainly don't let the administration off the hook for creating and amplifying the situation).
As someone who completed the Minnesota POST (Peace Officer Standards and Training) requirements back in 1990, I view the law enforcement profession through the lens of the "Minnesota Model." Although I never served as a sworn officer, going through that rigorous process gave me a direct, personal appreciation for the academic and tactical hurdles required to earn a Peace Officers license in this state.
Comparing my 1990s experience to the 2026 ICE "Surge" Standards reveals a massive disparity. In Minnesota, the barrier to entry is built on a foundation of higher education and specialized skills; meanwhile, current federal standards for ICE ERO prioritize rapid deployment above all else.
The Training Gap
The 48-Day Federal Agent: To meet 2026 hiring targets, ICE ERO has condensed its training to just 8 weeks (roughly 48 training days). They have even removed the Spanish language requirement, replacing linguistic immersion with translation apps. This "mission-specific" approach is designed to get personnel into the field as fast as possible, but it lacks the broad academic and legal foundation we require in Minnesota.
The Minnesota Standard: To even be eligible for a license in Minnesota, the baseline is a two- or four-year Law Enforcement degree followed by a high-intensity, 10-week skills course. This means a Minnesota candidate has already completed years of college-level law, ethics, and psychology before they ever begin their 40-hour-per-week tactical boot camp.
The FBI "Gold Standard": The FBI remains the benchmark agency, maintaining high barriers that reflect a traditional professional model. They still mandate a four-year degree and professional work experience before a candidate even reaches Quantico. Their 20-week academy is a total-immersion experience that stands in stark contrast to the current 8-week ICE ERO surge.
The Reality of Reciprocity
Here is a telling fact: Under 2026 Minnesota law, a graduate of the ICE ERO 8-week academy cannot become a police officer in Minnesota. They do not meet our standards. Even with federal experience, Minnesota requires a "Reciprocity Exam" and often additional coursework because our state board (POST) recognizes that an 8-week tactical course is not a substitute for a professional education.
Final Thoughts
Some of the misconduct I’ve seen recently is beyond the pale—obviously and fundamentally wrong. I believe this is, in part, a symptom of a significant and dangerous "training gap." While we in Minnesota are accustomed to a model where a badge represents years of higher education and rigorous tactical preparation, we are now seeing federal agents operating in our streets with only eight weeks of total instruction.
In my view, ICE ERO officers are being deployed while untrained to a degree that is patently dangerous. Rather than addressing these systemic failures, ICE appears to be ‘rubber-stamping’ questionable behavior and refusing to even investigate allegations of misconduct. This erosion of professional standards, coupled with a lack of federal accountability, can only result in further tragedies on our streets.
And this is actually the rosy view. If we were to assume that the majority of ICE officers deployed to the Twin Cities are in fact highly trained, it speaks to an even deeper and more fundamental problem: it suggests that the conduct we are seeing isn't at all an accident of poor preparation, but a deliberate feature of their version of law enforcement.
Thank you so much for this informative comment, Gent! Would it be ok with you if I sent it out as a separate post next week? I think it deserves to be read by more people.
I have also heard that the ICE agents have a truly insane arrest quota, which may partly account for their extreme aggression and for their propensity to arrest law-abiding citizens for no reason at all.
Finally, I had my own, very positive, experience with the Minnesota model of policing this last summer. I made a left turn near Maple Grove high school on my way to Target, as I have done so many times before. Suddenly, there was a police car with flashing lights behind me. Uh oh! I pulled over, and the officer came up to my window. He was so friendly! When I gave him my Swiss license, he laughed and asked what could possibly have brought me to Maple Grove. He then told me that the town had just installed a new stop sign, which I had blown right by. He said that the police department had decided to station a car near the sign and to issue warnings instead of tickets to oblivious people like me, figuring that we wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. (He was right!) I came away with such a positive feeling about Maple Grove police. My friend Candy (she was in my year—maybe you knew her?) also has a police-officer dad, and she told me that it was the norm for officers to be trained to approach citizens in this way.
Anyway, in policing as in so many other areas, Minnesota is a model for the rest of the country!
You flatter me, Mari.
Yes, of course. Feel free to reproduce my post in whole or in part.
Great! Thanks!
Yes. Yes to all of this.
I am so sorry your community is going through this, Patrice, and I pray that you and all my family and friends there will be ok.