Attorney General Pam Bondi’s letter to Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz — offering to scale back Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations in exchange for the state’s compliance with her demands — is inappropriate and reads as a thinly veiled attempt at extortion.
“Operation Metro Surge,” involving the deployment of some 3,000 ICE agents, has wreaked havoc in the Twin Cities since December, and lawyers for the state have referred to Bondi’s letter as “a shakedown” and “a ransom note.” The missive’s demands are strikingly similar to the tactics used by the Trump administration against universities, law firms and foreign countries.
Noting Walz and other officials’ public statements opposing the surge, Bondi suggests that there is a way to “end the chaos.” But one of her demands is entirely unrelated to immigration enforcement — a request that appears designed to exert additional pressure: “access to voter rolls to confirm that Minnesota’s voter registration practices comply with federal law.”
Since May, the Justice Department has been trying to get its hands on full, unredacted state voter records, including Social Security and driver’s license numbers. At least 24 states, including Minnesota, have refused, and the DOJ has filed lawsuits to obtain them. Courts in at least two states have already ruled against the federal government, finding that the Constitution grants states the authority to oversee elections. And earlier this month, a California court issued a scathing opinion, calling the government’s efforts “unprecedented and illegal.”
While Congress has a role in ensuring fair elections, the California court wrote that before the DOJ may obtain access to voting data, Congress must enact a law that explicitly authorizes it.
Against this backdrop, Bondi has apparently found another way to get what she wants — not through legislation or litigation, but through extortion. She suggests that she can grant Walz’s wish to remove ICE from Minneapolis if he simply gives her access to the voting data the DOJ seeks. “I am confident that these simple steps,” she writes, “will help bring back law and order to Minnesota and improve the lives of Americans.”
Even a federal judge can see the veiled threat for what it is.
During a hearing Monday in a case brought by state officials to order ICE to leave Minnesota, the judge asked aloud, “Is the executive trying to achieve a goal through force that it can’t achieve through the courts?”
It is unclear exactly why the DOJ wants this personal voter information, but in light of President Donald Trump’s “stop the steal” campaign in 2020, valid concerns exist that the data could be used to stoke skepticism about the outcome of future elections or even manipulate the results.
Bondi’s letter, coming just hours after immigration agents shot and killed Veterans Affairs intensive care nurse Alex Pretti, parallels the president’s strong-arm tactics against other rivals since returning to office last year. Trump seems to relish wielding power like a mob boss — first inflicting pain on his targets, then offering relief in exchange for concessions.
In his book “The Art of the Deal,” Trump referred to this technique as “leverage,” which he defines as “having something the other guy wants.”
In the case of universities, he threatened to cancel grant funding unless they changed their hiring, curriculum and DEI policies. With law firms, he terminated government contracts, blocked their access to federal courthouses and revoked security clearances unless they provided millions of dollars’ worth of pro bono work. He has demanded foreign governments agree to “deals” in exchange for tariff relief. Our president acts like the head of a crime family who threatens to burn down a business unless the owner pays protection money.
And now it appears Bondi is playing the same game. After all, it was the Trump administration that created the volatile situation in Minnesota by sending thousands of agents to conduct aggressive law enforcement operations on city streets.
It is difficult to believe that Minnesota — a blue state located on the Canadian border — is a higher priority for immigration enforcement than Texas and Florida, both red states with larger immigrant populations.
Bondi’s offer to “end the chaos” puts pressure on Walz to accept her terms in order to restore peace and public safety for the people he is sworn to protect. Coupled with the demand for voter data, the offer suggests that Bondi, too, has learned the art of the deal. Unable to obtain the voting data through legal means, she is resorting to leverage — “something the other guy wants.”
In this case, the thing Walz wants is to stop the brutality. Bondi is betting it is an offer he can’t refuse.
