> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://antonellanews.ghost.io/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # ICE: From Administrative Agency to Internal Coercive Force - URL: https://antonellanews.ghost.io/ice-from-administrative-agency-to-internal-coercive-force/ - Published: 2026-01-10T14:57:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-09-28T15:26:15.000Z - Author: Antonella Silipigni ### Minneapolis, Project 2025, and the Paradox of Imported Security Antonella Silipigni Jan 10,2026 ## When Enforcement Becomes Politics For years, **U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)** has been portrayed as an administrative agency: immigration, removals, borders. What emerges in the 2025–2026 period — and what the **Minneapolis** case makes impossible to ignore — is a structural transformation: **ICE as an internal policing force**, capable of overriding local police, imposing securitized narratives, and removing its actions from effective oversight. This is not an accident. It is a **change of function**. --- ## 1️⃣ Minneapolis: a local case revealing a federal pattern On **January 7, 2026**, during a federal operation in Minneapolis, U.S. citizen **Renee Nicole Good** was killed by an ICE agent belonging to a **tactical unit (ERO Special Response Team)**. ### Verifiable facts - **Video footage** of the event exists (bystander recordings and partial material released through government channels). - The **official narrative** speaks of an “attempted vehicular assault” and rapidly adopts the frame of **“domestic terrorism.”** - **Eyewitnesses, independent analyses, and local authorities** dispute this account: the woman appears to have been **attempting to leave the scene**, not posing an imminent threat. ### The institutional node (more serious than the shooting itself) The investigation was **federalized**: the **Federal Bureau of Investigation** took control, limiting access to evidence for Minnesota state authorities. 👉 This step is crucial: we are no longer dealing only with use of force, but with **who controls the evidence**, **who shapes public truth**, and **who answers to whom**. Minneapolis thus becomes a **litmus test** for the new federal posture. --- ## 2️⃣ ICE today: when an administrative agency becomes a coercive force In recent years ICE has progressively expanded: - the use of **armed and tactical units**; - participation in **large-scale domestic operations** (thousands of agents, multi-agency coordination); - a **militarized operational culture**, increasingly indistinguishable from internal security forces. This evolution is not only practical, but **narrative**: - official communication **precedes judgment** (“terrorism”); - independent review comes later — if at all; - local accountability is compressed. ICE no longer merely “enforces the law”: **it produces political order**. --- ## 3️⃣ Project 2025: enforcement as a governing architecture This shift fits into a broader framework: **Project 2025**, the executive reorganization plan promoted by the orbit of the **Heritage Foundation**. Programmatic documents outline clear directions: - centralization of executive power; - expanded use of ICE detention capacity; - reduction of alternatives to detention; - framing immigration and internal order as a **structural security issue**, not an emergency. In this sense, Minneapolis is **not an anomaly**: it is an **operational preview** of a doctrine that turns federal enforcement into a **permanent political instrument**. --- ## 4️⃣ International cooperation: the systemic level (not the individual agent) A sensitive point — often distorted by propaganda — concerns **security cooperation between the United States and Israel**. ### What is documented - **ICE/HSI** operate within a **global network** of offices and international liaison posts. - There are **official channels** for cooperation and exchange on immigration, counter-terrorism, and border control. - **Training programs and seminars** for U.S. law-enforcement personnel in Israel are documented, promoted by security organizations and networks. 👉 Key point: this does **not prove** that the individual agent involved in Minneapolis was trained by the IDF. It **does prove the existence of a transnational security ecosystem**, where doctrines, practices, and language are shared and normalized. Here, analysis must remain **systemic**, not personalized. --- ## 5️⃣ The legal paradox: security imported from a state under accusation This is where the most uncomfortable question emerges. Israel: - is described by major international NGOs as operating a system of **apartheid**; - has political leaders targeted by **International Criminal Court arrest warrants** (2024); - is subject to proceedings and legal opinions before the **International Criminal Court** and the **International Court of Justice**. And yet, it continues to be treated as a partner of securitarian **“best practices.”** This is not an oversight. It is a choice. 👉 **International legality is not the guiding parameter of security policy.** What matters is **control effectiveness**, not compliance with law. Israel is not adopted as an ethical model, but as an **operational laboratory** for advanced coercive governance. --- ## 6️⃣ Minneapolis and the American double standard: when force is “repression” only if used by others The Minneapolis case becomes even more revealing when placed within the **systemic double standard of the United States regarding the use of force against civilians**. For years, Washington: - **publicly condemns** European countries when police use force against protesters (France, Germany, Italy, Greece), speaking of *erosion of the rule of law*; - **regularly accuses** Middle Eastern governments — particularly **Iran** — of violent repression of dissent, calling for sanctions, UN resolutions, and diplomatic isolation; - uses **human rights language** as a geopolitical tool of pressure and delegitimization. Yet, **when lethal force is used on U.S. soil**, during a federal operation against unarmed civilians or protest observers, the grammar changes completely. In Minneapolis: - the use of weapons is **immediately justified**, before any independent forensic review; - the victim is **semantically criminalized** (“domestic terrorism”) without judicial determination; - the investigation is **removed from the local level** and centralized federally, reducing transparency and accountability. 👉 This is not a communication accident. It is a **structural asymmetry**. The United States does **not reject the use of force per se**: it rejects it only when used **by others** and **outside its control**. When force is exercised: - by non-aligned governments → it is *repression*; - by allied governments → it is *public order*; - by the U.S. federal state → it is *self-defense* or *operational necessity*. Minneapolis shows that **the same standards invoked against Iran, or against European states during social protests, are not applied domestically**. The difference is not legal. It is **political and hierarchical**. Those who hold hegemony define: - what counts as legitimate protest; - what constitutes a threat; - when force is abuse and when it is “necessary.” Here, Minneapolis ceases to be national news and becomes a **mirror of the international order**: a system in which human rights are not universal principles, but **selective instruments of power**. --- ## The question that remains The question is not: **“Why Israel?”** The real question is: **why are Western democracies seeking authoritarian models without admitting it?** ICE today is one of the instruments through which this transformation takes shape. Minneapolis is merely the moment when the veil was torn.