A Minnesota middle school taught eighth-graders that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers were using “tricky & violent tactics” to harass and arrest thousands of “legal immigrants,” according to documents released this week by a conservative education group.
Defending Education published excerpts from a PowerPoint slideshow that showed students at Hermantown Middle School outside Duluth were lectured about ICE during a geography lesson and given a primer on why “people think the Ice [sic] agents have ‘gone too far’.”
The response on the same slide stated: “Some use tricky & violent tactics. 22 people died in ICE custody so far in 2025. Not filing paperwork to track arrests. Wearing masks to hide identities.”
A slide listed ways people think ICE agents have "gone too far," including "tricky & violent tactics," 22 deaths in custody, not filing proper paperwork, wearing masks, and people posing as agents to kidnap/hurt others, New York Post reported.
“ICE has Arrested &/or harassed thousands of LEGAL immigrants and 170 US citizens — including being dragged, tackled, beaten, tased and shot,” another slide read.
The class teacher encouraged students to watch videos of “inhumane” migrant detention centers and other footage of ICE operations in order to receive extra credit.
A concerned parent shared the materials with the conservative organisation, but Hermantown’s principal pushed back in a now-public email, arguing that the lesson plan aligned with Minnesota education standards.
“All of our social studies classes have a current events component to them and this information is part of the MN standards in geography,” wrote the school official, whose name was redacted from the message.
It was unclear whether the PowerPoint also covered the arrests of thousands of convicted criminals who had been illegally residing in Minnesota.
One slide also noted the Trump administration was shelling out “$170 billion taxpayer dollars to hire 20,000+ additional I.C.E. agents to find and deport them.”
“Why don’t undocumented immigrants just apply to come here legally?” another slide asked, before answering, “there aren’t enough ‘slots.’”
“Our staff strive to share both viewpoints on an issue,” Hermantown Community Schools Superintendent Wayne Whitwam told The Post in a statement. “[Defending Education] is showing one side, but for example doesn’t include a pro-ICE video shared by the same teacher.”
“ICE has Arrested &/or harassed thousands of LEGAL immigrants and 170 U.S. citizens – including being dragged, tackled, beaten, tased and shot,” one PowerPoint slide read.
Whitwam declined to share any “pro-ICE” content from the lesson, saying in an email: “I don’t want to feed this story.”
The superintendent did share guidelines from the Minnesota Association of School Administrators, which included admonitions to focus on “education, not advocacy,” “respect all viewpoints,” “support civil discourse,” and “know your role.”
Instructors were also advised not to engage in political debate with students or use the classroom for “personal political messages” or to “display partisan materials.”
“It’s bad enough that this biased lesson is replete with falsehoods — but [for] the school principal to defend such garbage truly adds insult to injury,” said Nicole Neily, the founder and president of Defending Education, in a statement.
“Students are being force-fed ideological propaganda during finite lesson time (when they’re not being encouraged by activist teachers to walk out of their classrooms, that is) and told what to think, rather than how to think. It’s little wonder that families are fleeing the public education system in droves.”
President Trump’s border czar Tom Homan announced the end of a federal surge of thousands of immigration officers to Minnesota earlier this month, after fatal shootings of two anti-ICE demonstrators forced a shake-up.
Operation Metro Surge recorded more than 4,000 arrests and the recovery of 3,364 unaccompanied migrant children, said Homan, who claimed the Biden administration had stopped even “looking for” the lost kids.
Homan highlighted how the arrests included an illegal immigrant convicted of raping a child under the age of 14, as well as other “criminal aliens” convicted of sexual misconduct and violence.
The drawdown announced by Homan followed weeks of clashes between the feds and far-left demonstrators, and rhetorical spats between Democratic officials and the Trump administration, in the Twin Cities over deportations.
The controversy made international headlines Jan. 7 when Renee Good, 37, was shot and killed by an ICE officer as she accelerated her car in his direction after being stopped and asked to exit the vehicle.
Alex Pretti, also 37, was gunned down by Border Patrol and Customs and Border Protection agents Jan. 24 after refusing to clear a roadway and getting into a “struggle” while carrying a loaded pistol.
Both killings were under federal investigation, though Minnesota officials also called for state probes.
Other Department of Homeland Security officers were also probed for misconduct. Two were put on administrative leave in February after giving false statements to a federal court about a migrant-involved shooting incident Jan. 14 in Minneapolis.
Good and Pretti were participants in “ICE Watch” groups that tracked immigration officers to flag when arrests were being made.
ICE Watch proponents maintained they were exercising their right as “legal observers” and emphasised they did not encourage confrontation with law enforcement.
The Trump administration and Republicans criticised such groups’ tactics for disrupting law enforcement and put out statistics showing an alarming rise in anti-ICE violence, assaults on officers and destruction of federal property.
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