MANKATO — An emergency ordinance passed in Mankato to limit tactics being used by federal immigration agents early this year will likely be allowed to expire at the end of August, based on legal advice following a court victory by the Trump administration.
“I believe our ordinance would be opening us up to some sort of litigation,” City Attorney Pam Whitmore said Tuesday night. “And the Department of Justice is not being shy about filing (lawsuits).”
The Mankato ordinance requiring law enforcement officers — including federal agents — to unmask, identify themselves and use body cameras was originally enacted in February in response to the influx of masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in Minnesota as part of the Trump administration’s Operation Metro Surge. As an emergency ordinance, it could be put in place more quickly than a traditional ordinance — something that overflow crowds of local residents implored their elected officials to do in January and February.
But that emergency process requires the rules to sunset after 60 days unless a super-majority of the council votes to renew the ordinance. That’s happened twice now, but would need to occur again next month to keep the rules in effect.
At a joint meeting of the City Council and the Public Safety Advisory Committee, Whitmore advised city leaders let the ordinance expire this time.
She pointed to cases involving a Philadelphia ordinance, which included provisions requiring ICE agents to unmask and identify themselves, and a Minnesota case where the U.S. Department of Justice attempted to invalidate what it deemed as local “sanctuary policies.”
ICE win, ICE loss
The federal judge in the first case granted a preliminary injunction preventing the enforcement of Philadelphia’s ordinance, agreeing with the DOJ claim that the ordinance violated the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause by interfering with and dictating how federal agents conducted official operations. The ordinance went a bit further than Mankato’s in that federal agents not only had to unmask and identify themselves when asked, they had to wear a nametag and drive only marked vehicles.
“In essence, the Philadelphia ordinance said that ‘if you come here to do your job, you must follow our rules, unmask, and drive marked cars, or we will prosecute you,’ and the court, in that instance, ruled that doing so represented a direct, illegal assault on federal sovereignty,” Whitmore explained in a written memo provided to meeting attendees.
With that legal victory in hand, the Trump administration began attempting to overturn similar rules passed elsewhere.
“Because of this decision, the DOJ is actively leveraging the Philadelphia decision to target similar identity and mask bans across the country, including in ongoing lawsuits in Connecticut, Maryland, New York, and New Jersey,” Whitmore wrote.
The Trump administration was less successful in a case decided last week that involved ordinances and policies in Minneapolis and St. Paul barring local police from cooperating with civil immigration enforcement by federal agents.
“… On July 20, 2026, U.S. District Judge Eric Tostrud of the District of Minnesota issued a decision that limited the broader implications of the Philadelphia case and dealt a setback to the Department of Justice,” Whitmore summarized. “Judge Tostrud concluded that the state and local policies in Minnesota related to immigration enforcement … do not violate the Constitution as written because they regulate the conduct of state and local officials, rather than imposing any restrictions on the federal government’s ability to enforce immigration laws.”
The judge — a Trump appointee — determined that state and local elected officials can restrict employees under their jurisdiction from cooperating with federal agents by withholding police assistance, by not disclosing driver’s license information and by keeping other specified data from the feds.
“The lawyers in that case argued that ‘Minnesota is not impeding immigration law, it is just not assisting,’” Whitmore wrote. “In his order, Judge Tostrud agreed and stated that forcing Minnesota or cities to assist with civil federal immigration policies would violate the anticommandeering doctrine under the 10th Amendment and could also cause budgetary concerns by shifting resources toward enforcing federal law.”
Legal advice
Whitmore’s recommendation to the Mankato City Council was based not only on the two court cases but also on the fact that the local ICE ordinance wasn’t being put to any real use.
“In light of the city’s existing policies and the lack of any complaints, enforcement requests, or other evidence demonstrating a need for the ordinance, I recommend allowing the emergency ordinance to expire and not considering it for permanent adoption,” Whitmore wrote.
Council members, all but one of whom was at the joint meeting, appeared inclined to accept the guidance, as did the members of the Public Safety Advisory Committee. But Committee Co-Chair Chelsea Hintz warned that community members are still seeking avenues for preventing some of the abuses they saw occurring during immigration crackdowns, including detentions of residents in other cities by masked people in unmarked vehicles and with no insignias indicating what agency — if any — they represented.
“People were literally being snatched off the streets by people who are masked,” Hintz said. “It could be anyone.”
If Mankato doesn’t have an ordinance allowing police to verify that the masked people are legitimate law enforcement agents, how can residents be certain they aren’t criminals? she wondered.
“I understand what you’re saying, and it’s a Catch-22,” Whitmore said, adding that even if the ordinance was left in place Mankato police still couldn’t force the masked agents to identify themselves if they refuse to voluntarily comply.
Next steps
As the joint meeting progressed, there was general consensus that the city needs to publicize existing policies that prohibit assistance in immigration enforcement and bar the use of municipal resources by ICE agents. At its Aug. 10 meeting, the council is also expected to consider a resolution asking the Advisory Committee to review those policies and make recommended changes later this fall.
There was some support, including by Hintz and committee member Bryan Schneider, to formalize the policies in a city ordinance. But city staff argued that those sorts of procedural rules are better left in policy manuals than in the City Code.
Whitmore said she will be watching as more courts, likely including the U.S. Supreme Court, try to strike a balance between federal supremacy and states’ rights. If the legal landscape changes in favor of more local control, Mankato could reintroduce more strict standards for law enforcement transparency and accountability. And if new threats emerge, possibly in the lead-up to the Nov. 3 general election, the city could respond quickly with another emergency ordinance, City Manager Susan Arntz said.
“If conditions change or the environment changes or something happens, we know now how to do this work,” Arntz said.