WASHINGTON — Minneapolis/St. Paul Airport police arrested approximately 100 religious leaders Friday morning as faith leaders blocked Terminal 1 departures to demand airlines stop enabling Trump administration mass deportations through Minnesota’s largest airport.
The arrests at 10 a.m. marked the second day of an unprecedented clergy mobilization against Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in Minnesota, where federal agents have deported an estimated 2,000 people through MSP Airport since intensifying enforcement following Donald Trump’s January 20 inauguration.
Friday’s action targeted Delta Air Lines—which operates MSP as a major hub—and Signature Aviation, the private jet logistics company providing operational support for ICE charter deportation flights. Clergy prayed, sang hymns, and shared testimony from airport workers who’ve been detained by ICE while commuting to their jobs before law enforcement moved in.
“Roughly 100 clergy were arrested by members of the airport and Bloomington law enforcement” during what organizers called the “ICE Out of Minnesota: A Day of Truth & Freedom,” according to a statement from faith leaders coordinating the action. The blockade coincided with a statewide economic shutdown in which approximately 600 Minnesota businesses closed their doors in protest of federal immigration enforcement.
The religious leaders are demanding Delta and Signature Aviation publicly call for an immediate end to ICE’s “surge” operations in Minnesota, demand accountability for the ICE agent who fatally shot 37-year-old Renee Good on January 7, affirm Target stores as Fourth Amendment workplaces requiring judicial warrants for immigration enforcement, and call on Congress to defund ICE.
Second Day of Coordinated Faith Action
Friday’s mass arrests followed Thursday’s deployment of 200 clergy from across the United States who fanned out across Minneapolis neighborhoods wearing clerical stoles and blowing whistles to alert communities to ICE presence. That group included Baptist, Lutheran, Catholic, Jewish, and Unitarian Universalist leaders who directly intervened in at least one ICE stop, documenting what they described as attempted unlawful detention.
Episcopal Bishop Mariann Budde—who confronted Trump one year ago in a nationally televised sermon urging “mercy” for immigrants—appeared at Thursday’s Minneapolis press conference. “Join us in sending a message to all our elected officials that no agency should have license to arbitrarily arrest and detain people without due process,” Budde told reporters.
The clergy mobilization represents an extraordinary escalation in religious institutional resistance to Trump administration immigration policy, with faith leaders now employing direct action tactics that risk federal prosecution. Three organizers who disrupted a January 18 worship service at Cities Church in St. Paul—where the pastor doubles as ICE’s acting St. Paul field office director—already face federal conspiracy charges under 18 USC § 241, marking an unprecedented application of civil rights-era statutes against anti-ICE protesters.
Vice President JD Vance visited Minneapolis Wednesday to meet with ICE officials and warned protesters they would face prison time. Attorney General Pam Bondi has publicized protest-related arrests on social media, declaring “WE DO NOT TOLERATE ATTACKS ON PLACES OF WORSHIP.”
Specific charges against the 100 clergy arrested Friday have not been announced. Organizers said media availability with arrested faith leaders would be arranged following their release.
MSP Airport serves tens of millions of travelers annually and has become, according to activists, “the key site in DHS’s operations to abduct and rush out Minnesotans to detention centers.” Many airport workers have been detained by ICE while commuting to or from their jobs at the facility.
