In hacker spaces and at their homes, creative protesters are laser-cutting and 3D-printing tools to resist an occupation. As the US government's immigration crackdown expands across the country, anxious residents have mobilized to look out for each other. One way they're doing that is by finding ways to build the tools they need to be resilient against the surge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents empowered to kill with impunity . All over the country, makers are 3D-printing thousands of whistles to help people on the ground alert others to nearby ICE activity. But the whistles are far from the only tools being used to respond to the surge of federal agents.

Petitions demanding people get the chance to be released from ICE custody have overwhelmed courts throughout the US. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operation in Minnesota is pushing the United States court system to its breaking point. Since Operation Metro Surge began in December, federal immigration agents have arrested some 4,000 people, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The result is an avalanche of cases filed in the US district court in Minnesota on behalf of people challenging their imprisonment by federal immigration enforcement agents. According to WIRED's review of court records and official judicial statistics, attorneys filed nearly as many so-called habeas corpus petitions in Minnesota alone as were filed across the US during an entire year.

ICE Agent's'Dragging' Case May Help Expose Evidence in Renee Good Shooting The government has withheld details of the investigation of Renee Good's killing--but an unrelated case involving the ICE agent who shot her could force new revelations. Defense attorneys for a Minnesota man convicted in December of assaulting Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer Jonathan Ross are seeking access to investigative files related to the killing of Renee Nicole Good, after learning Ross was the same officer who shot and killed her during a targeted operation in Minneapolis last month. Attorneys for Roberto Carlos Muñoz-Guatemala asked a federal judge on Friday to order prosecutors to turn over training records as well as investigative files related to Ross, the ICE agent who killed Good on January 7 during Operation Metro Surge and was also injured in a June 2025 incident in which Muñoz-Guatemala dragged him with his car. A separate post-trial motion by the defense, filed in the US District Court in Minnesota, asks the judge to pause deadlines for a new-trial motion until the discovery motion is resolved. Muñoz-Guatemala's attorneys argue that even if the court ultimately decides that any newly discovered evidence doesn't entitle their client to a new trial, he's entitled to explore whether there are mitigating factors that could impact the length of his sentence, such as whether Ross' injuries could have been, to some degree, brought upon him by his own behavior.

The campaign is among the largest anti-ICE protests by workers at a single company since federal agents shot and killed two people in Minneapolis last month. More Than 880 employees and contractors working for Google signed a petition this week calling on the company to disclose and cancel any contracts it may have with US immigration authorities . In the letter unveiled on Friday, the workers said they are "vehemently opposed" to Google's dealings with the Department of Homeland Security, which includes Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP). "We object to the technology we build being used to power state violence around the world," a Google software engineer, who declined to give their name out of fear of retaliation, told reporters on Friday. "I stand to benefit from other people's suffering, which I find abhorrent and I refuse to be a quiet participant in that system," added a second Google staffer, who went by Alex. Google declined to comment on the petition's demands.

Two agents involved in the shooting deaths of US citizens in Minneapolis are reportedly part of highly militarized DHS units whose extreme tactics are generally reserved for war zones. An officer with a Department of Homeland Security Special Response Team stands against a protester in Portland, Oregon. As Minneapolis continues to reel from the fatal shooting of 37-year-old intensive care nurse Alex Pretti by federal agents on the morning of January 24, the international spotlight is firmly fixed on the heavily armed and masked operatives who have spearheaded the Trump administration's violent immigration sweeps. At the heart of the deployment in Minnesota, as well as the chaotic clashes with communities in Southern California and Illinois, are hundreds of agents that operate within Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection: ICE's two Special Response Teams (SRT), CBP's one SRT, and the Border Patrol Tactical Unit (BORTAC). These paramilitary tactical units behave not like local police, but instead like special forces in Iraq, Afghanistan, or other far-flung battlefields from the Forever Wars of the past quarter century.

'Misrepresent reality': AI-altered shooting image surfaces in U.S. Senate Backdropped by posters with images of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, the two U.S. citizens recently shot and killed by federal immigration officers, a resident of Minneapolis mans a corner to keep an eye out for ICE agents near a school where some students were recently arrested in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on Thursday. Washington - An AI-manipulated image depicting the moments before immigration agents shot an American nurse spread across across the internet, eventually making its way onto the hallowed floor of the U.S. Senate. Social media platforms are awash with graphic footage from the moment U.S. agents shot and killed 37-year-old intensive care nurse Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, Minnesota -- a moment that sparked nationwide outrage. One frame from the grainy footage was digitally altered using artificial intelligence, according to AI experts. In a time of both misinformation and too much information, quality journalism is more crucial than ever.

Right-Wing Gun Enthusiasts and Extremists Are Working Overtime to Justify Alex Pretti's Killing Donald Trump has appeared to undermine Second Amendment rights in statements about Alex Pretti's killing. Many in the firearms community are going along with it. In the hours after Border Patrol agents shot and killed Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, President Donald Trump and his administration appeared to directly undermine the rights granted to gun owners in the Second Amendment. Department of Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem inaccurately said Pretti was a " domestic terrorist " who was "brandishing" his legally held gun. FBI director Kash Patel wrongly told Fox News it's illegal to bring a gun to a protest.

A border patrol agent scans the face of a driver in Minneapolis on 13 January 2026. A border patrol agent scans the face of a driver in Minneapolis on 13 January 2026. Immigration enforcement agents across the US are increasingly relying on a new smartphone app with facial recognition technology. The app is named Mobile Fortify. Simply pointing a phone's camera at their intended target and scanning the person's face allows Mobile Fortify to pull data on an individual from multiple federal and state databases, some of which federal courts have deemed too inaccurate for arrest warrants.

"In my opinion ICE are the bad guys. I am not proud that the company I enjoy so much working for is part of this," one worker wrote on Slack. After federal agents shot and killed Minneapolis nurse Alex Pretti on Saturday, Palantir workers pressed for answers from leadership on the company's work with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) --and many questioned whether Palantir should be involved with the agency at all. Leadership defended its work as in part improving "ICE's operational effectiveness." Internal Slack messages reviewed by WIRED reveal growing frustration within Palantir over its relationship with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and in particular, ICE's enforcement and investigations teams.

Within minutes of the shooting, the Trump administration and right-wing influencers began disparaging the man shot by a federal immigration officer on Saturday in Minneapolis. Within minutes of Alex Pretti being shot and killed by a federal immigration officer in Minneapolis on Saturday, the Trump administration, backed by right-wing influencers, launched a smear campaign against the victim, labeling him a "terrorist" and a "lunatic." Pretti, 37, was killed during a confrontation with multiple federal immigration agents. Pretti was an American citizen and a registered nurse who worked in the Department of Veterans Affairs, according to a colleague who spoke to the Guardian . Video from a bystander shows Pretti was attempting to help a woman who had been pepper sprayed by an immigration agent when officers tackled him.