Operation Metro Surge is a large-scale interior immigration‑enforcement deployment launched by DHS in December 2025 that officials describe as targeting criminal noncitizens in the Twin Cities and across Minnesota; it is led by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and involves multiple DHS law‑enforcement components (ICE/Enforcement and Removal Operations and Homeland Security Investigations) and, according to state filings and media reporting, has included agents from Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and other federal assets and coordination with local law enforcement and, at times, state resources.
Tricia McLaughlin is the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security; she oversees DHS public outreach and serves as the principal advisor to the DHS Secretary on external and internal communications.
No — “criminal illegal alien” is not a specific legal term in federal immigration statutes; it is a descriptive phrase used by DHS to refer to noncitizens who have been arrested, charged, or convicted of criminal offenses while also being unlawfully present or having immigration issues, but U.S. law treats criminal charges and immigration status separately under the Immigration and Nationality Act and criminal statutes.
“Sanctuary” jurisdictions are states, counties, or cities that limit local cooperation with federal immigration enforcement (for example by refusing to honor ICE administrative detainer requests or limiting information sharing); those policies can restrict or delay DHS access to people in local jails unless formal agreements or judicial orders permit federal entry, prompting DHS to seek direct access or other mechanisms to arrest noncitizens before local release.
Federal authority to arrest in local jails comes from a mix of tools: ICE administrative detainers (Form I‑247) requesting that local jails hold people for transfer to ICE; 287(g) memoranda of agreement that deputize local officers to perform certain immigration functions under ICE supervision; and other arrangements (e.g., written MOAs or joint task forces and, where authorized, federal officers acting under federal arrest authority). The scope and legal force of each mechanism differs and is subject to local policies and court rulings.
After DHS (ICE) arrests someone, typical next steps depend on circumstances and may include criminal prosecution in federal or state court (if a crime was committed), placement into ICE custody, initiation of civil immigration removal (deportation) proceedings before an immigration judge, and—if removal is ordered—transfer to U.S. custody for deportation; some cases involve both criminal prosecution and parallel immigration proceedings.
The “Worst of the Worst” (wow.dhs.gov) is a DHS public listing that highlights criminal noncitizens arrested by DHS/ICE operations; the site provides case summaries, names, alleged or convicted crimes, and links to regional listings (for example wow.dhs.gov/Minnesota) intended to publicize enforcement results.