Minnesota sees escalating protests [Reuters=Yonhap News]

Amid rising conflict over immigration enforcement in Minnesota, U.S. President Donald Trump stated on January 15 (local time) that he could invoke the Insurrection Act as confrontations between protesters and law enforcement intensified.

Trump said on Truth Social that day, "If the corrupt politicians of Minnesota will not allow us to do our job and are not protecting the patriots of ICE who are only doing their job, and if they do not stop the professional agitators and insurrectionists, I will invoke the Insurrection Act, which multiple presidents before me have used, and swiftly end the shame that is happening in that once-great state."

In Minneapolis, Minnesota, protests against the Trump administration's hardline crackdown on undocumented immigrants have been ongoing since January 7, when an ICE agent fatally shot and killed 37-year-old American citizen Renee Nicole Good during a vehicle stop, after she resisted.

The previous day, an immigration enforcement officer also discharged a firearm while attempting to arrest a Venezuelan man suspected of being undocumented in northern Minneapolis. The man who was shot is reportedly not in life-threatening condition.

Both the governor of Minnesota and the mayor of Minneapolis are affiliated with the Democratic Party.

President Trump's remarks on this day are interpreted to mean that he will invoke the Insurrection Act if Democratic officials do not make efforts to de-escalate the escalating protests within their jurisdictions.

The Insurrection Act in the United States grants the President the authority to deploy military forces domestically under specific conditions stipulated in the law, such as insurrection.