An American man was dragged out of a restaurant, forcibly arrested, and detained for two hours by masked federal immigration officers, according to reports.
The 20-year-old man, who gave MPR News only his first name, Mubashir, moved to the U.S. from Somalia as a child and later became a naturalized citizen.
Mubashir was outside on his lunch break in Cedar-Riverside in Minneapolis when he was arrested on Tuesday.
While walking out on the street near 4th Street and Cedar Avenue, Mubashir said he noticed two masked men approach him, to avoid them he went into a nearby restaurant.
The two men followed him inside, dragged him outside, and arrested him. Mubashir was also pushed onto his knees in the snow and put into a chokehold, CBS Newsreported.
Mubashir began yelling, “I have my ID,” to the officers; however, the agents did not respond.
When he was put into the car, Mubashir was asked if the agents could take his picture.
“I declined, because how will a picture prove I’m a US citizen?” he said.
“I told him, ‘I have my passport, it’s in my phone. Can I open it and show you?’ He declined. I told him ‘can I give you my name and my date of birth?’ He declined.”
Due to Mubashir’s refusal to have his picture taken, he was in the car for almost an hour. The agents also tried to take his fingerprints; however, their machine was not working.
Mubashir said the officers drove him to the ICE detention facility at Fort Snelling, a 17-minute drive from where he was arrested. He claimed the officers were lost and did not know their surroundings.
“They kept going back on the same highway. I told them, ‘are you guys lost?; they said, ‘this is our first time taking someone in’. They had their maps out and everything and they were trying to intimidate me,” he said.
Once they arrived, the officers kept him outside until he agreed to have his face scanned; however, like the first machine, the second machine was not working, so he was brought inside.
At the facility, a staff member allowed him to turn on his phone to show his ID, which prompted them to release Mubashir as his parents arrived to pick him up.
