‘This isn’t living, right?’: Minnesota immigrants share their stories while in hiding from ICE
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Use the audio player above to listen to a one-hour special program featuring the voices of Minnesotans in hiding.
For more than two months, Minnesotans in immigrant communities have been in hiding – fearing arrest, detention or deportation. At the peak of what the Trump administration called “Operation Metro Surge,” there were 3,000 federal immigration agents in the state.
It led many immigrants to limit trips outside the house, some not leaving at all. They’ve seen ICE agents racially profile or wrongfully detain family and friends.
MPR News collected stories from several people under those circumstances across the state. They recorded voices memos or spoke to a reporter over three days between Jan. 24 and Feb. 4, sharing what their day was like. They answered questions including: did you leave the house today? What did you not get to do today that you normally get to do? How is this impacting your life?
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The result is an intimate portrait of Minnesotans who have been deeply impacted by the surge of federal immigration agents in the state. We are only using first names or first initials due to safety concerns.
Here are their voices.
‘We’re unwanted’
Indira moved to Minnesota in the last five years from Venezuela due to persecution. In Venezuela, Indira was a lawyer. Now she works with children. She also had a second job, doing part-time gig work to pay for her college classes.
But now, she no longer feels safe doing that second job and is taking classes online, because she’s too scared to make the 36-minute commute.
Indira lives with her mother, who is undergoing treatment for breast cancer. Indira only leaves the house to go to work. It’s become a bleak routine for her, during the immigration surge. Her commute to work is 10 minutes, but Indira says it feels like “an eternity” as she watches for cars with out-of-state plates and tinted windows.
After work, Indira shared she used to like to go get coffee, eat ice cream, buy things for the house and go to the mall.
“I haven’t been able to do that lately,” Indira said in Spanish, “I haven’t even been able to go out to enjoy the snow.”
Indira used to frequently visit family members and her boyfriend, but she hasn’t seen them in weeks, because everyone is too afraid to leave their homes.
“The most difficult part of this whole situation; it’s feeling like we’re nothing. It’s feeling like we’re unwanted.”
We asked Indira: for someone who doesn’t know how it feels to be in hiding, what do you wish they knew? Indira shared, “It’s like being on the edge of a cliff and not knowing when you’re going to fall.”
‘I’m watching my life pass me by’
Z, a Somali immigrant, said since December she has been working a nonprofit job from her apartment, which she shares with a beloved cat. Z has lived near her grandparents and sister in Minneapolis for three years.
She has temporary work residency paperwork to work at a Twin Cities nonprofit and even though she rarely leaves her apartment now, she feels lucky to be able to work from home.
Z recounted one day that her cat, Oreo, got sick and needed medical help. She said she was terrified to leave her apartment but didn’t feel like she had a choice and ended up driving to a nearby veterinary clinic.
“The entire time, my heart was pounding out of my chest, I felt like I was going to vomit. I shared my location with a friend and was like, if you don’t hear back from me, my cat is here, come get my cat.”
Typically, Z’s Saturdays consisted of taking care of her aging grandparents. Now, she said she hasn’t been able to see her family in person for months, and even when they talk on the phone, they worry that they’re being monitored by ICE agents.
On the Saturday that Z recounted, she didn’t leave her house once, even though she needed to take out the trash, because she was afraid to open the door to her apartment building. The following evening, she got up in the middle of the night to take her trash out.
“That’s the only time I feel safe taking out the trash. During the day I feel really exposed and unsafe. Like, what if there’s an ICE vehicle across the street? But late at night, I’m like, maybe ICE agents are sleeping too. So that’s when I take out the trash. And that was the only time I left my home that day.”
In another instance, Z’s lawyer sent her a message, warning her that ICE agents were coming to apartments and pulling fire alarms, arresting people who came out of their buildings.
“I’m like, okay, if the fire alarm goes off, unless I see like, actual flames, I’m not going out of my apartment.”
Z said she grew up in a country torn apart by civil war, and that the fear for her life is very familiar to her. She said she never thought she’d have to feel that way again.
“I was hoping I wouldn’t have to experience this again … I feel like I’m watching my life pass me by. Like I’m on house arrest, even though I haven’t committed any crimes.”
‘As if I were in prison’
P immigrated from Mexico to the U.S. more than 25 years ago and raised his children here. His children are adults now and live on their own, but P said he and his wife have barely left their home in weeks.
P said in all his years living in the U.S., he’s never experienced anything like this. Before the ICE surge, P would go about his daily activities, and he said his life was beautiful. Now he barely leaves the house. Driving to and from his job as a cleaner is terrifying and every day he prays before leaving for work.
“I drive to work shaking and looking around for the kinds of cars with tinted windows that we know ICE uses,” P said in Spanish. “It’s a complete change to be locked inside as if I were in prison ... it’s as if ICE were hunting us.”
P also has lupus and has to check in with a doctor once a month. Each time he leaves for his medical appointments, he said he’s “asking God that I arrive safely at the appointment and return home OK.”
In their home, P and his wife keep their doors locked and their curtains closed.
“The way we are living now is just really ugly and sad,” he said.
Since the announcement of federal agents leaving Minnesota, P said he and his wife feel slightly calmer, but they are still in hiding until they see evidence of a true drawdown for themselves.
‘We’re not free’
N is a mother of three in her 40s. Normally she’s active in her community but she hasn’t left the house for nearly a month. Instead, N has been spending her days cooking for her family from the outside world. Once, they made rosettes to thank volunteers who have been helping them.
“We’re strong because we’re united as a family,” she said in Spanish.
N watches through the window as snow falls on her back patio and waits for volunteers to bring her kids to and from school. It’s caused confusion for her son, who asks her why she can’t take him to school.
“I can’t explain many things to him,” she said. “Because I don’t know who he talks to and since he’s very innocent, I don’t want other people to know what’s happening to us, who we are.”
Her son has a learning disability and goes to therapy twice a week. He was nervous when he was picked up by a new volunteer, but N said all the time he has spent with different adults has made him adaptable.
Her daughters, who are older, understand more of what is happening. They worry about their friends who are also afraid to leave their homes. One day, as her daughter was preparing to go to school, N received an alert that ICE agents were nearby, so she had to wait to leave the house.
N and her husband are not working right now, and they worry about how to pay the rent and the phone bill. The family made a plan in case either parent is taken. Much of the impact N, said, is psychological. She and her children have nightmares.
“This isn’t living, right? We’re not free,” she said. “We fled from where we came for the safety of our children. And right now, they’re not safe here.”
N told MPR News she does not trust the federal government’s announcement of a drawdown of ICE agents in Minnesota. She worries that things may get worse before they get better and said that ICE watchers continue to spot federal vehicles and agents in her town almost daily.
‘I feel really helpless’
When L first moved to Northfield 17 years ago, she found it a really peaceful and calm place. She met her husband, who is a citizen, in Northfield, and together they raised their children there. But L is undocumented.
During the surge in Minnesota, she has been so afraid of being detained that she hasn’t left her home for over a month. Normally she would drive her children to school, doctor’s appointments and church, but these days other people have to do that for her.
L keeps a close eye on ICE activity in Northfield. She gets alerts when ICE is nearby and recently installed a doorbell camera. L constantly glances through her windows, looking for strange cars.
L said Jan. 28 was a particularly active day for ICE in Northfield.
“The notifications said today ICE was at some apartments that are really close to where I live, and they were knocking on doors, and I started to panic,” L said in Spanish.
L and her husband have made plans about what they would do in case one L is detained by ICE.
“I try to be strong in front of my children,” said L through tears. “But the truth is, I feel really helpless. Because I can’t, I can’t imagine being without them.”
L said even with the announcement of agents leaving Minnesota, she thinks she’ll feel afraid leaving her house forever.
MPR News reporter Tadeo Ruiz Sandoval helped provide translation assistance for this story.
