Madison McVan

She was terrified and she pretended she wasn't home.

And neighbors started coming out of their houses once they realized ICE was next door, blowing whistles.

Some people stopped and honked horns and eventually the agents left.

So we were planning on publishing this article about the ride along on Monday.

I had a call scheduled with those two observers, Patty and Elle, on Sunday night to just tie up loose ends and do a fact check before publication.

But Patty wasn't getting back to me.

And she has an iPhone and I was texting her and the texts were green.

So I started thinking maybe something was off.

I started looking around on social media, and I saw a video from several hours prior that showed Patty getting her car window smashed in by an ICE agent.

She was pulled out of the car and handcuffed and taken to the Whipple Federal Building at Fort Snelling, which is where ICE is headquartered in the Twin Cities.

She did get released on Sunday night without charges, along with the other observer that had been in the car with her that day.

So I went and met up with her on Monday and talked to her about her experience being held by ICE.

And then that became part of the story, too.

There was an immigration enforcement surge starting in December.

So that was when patrols really started ramping up.

But even before that, people were organized in rapid response networks, starting when Trump took over for his second term.

The idea behind the rapid response networks was that if we see an ICE action taking place, we can notify a bunch of people in the neighborhood and the neighbors can respond to film ICE, to inform people of their rights, and to protest.

But with this big surge in ICE agents arriving, they've kind of changed tactics.

It seems like now the ICE agents are traveling in smaller groups.

They're conducting arrests quickly.