Leaked munitions list for Trump's Minnesota crackdown horrifies DHS official: 'Overkill'
A leaked list of the munitions that President Donald Trump's immigration agents took with them to Minneapolis during Operation Metro Surge appalled one Department of Homeland Security official on Wednesday, according to a report.
Independent journalist Ken Klippenstein reported on a security munitions list for the operation that was leaked to him. Overall, the more than 5,000 agents who surged into Minneapolis last month came stocked with some 35,000 weapons, including more than 1,100 riot control gas grenades, and thousands of less-than-lethal munitions rounds.
Klippenstein shared the list with a homeland security official who described it as "overkill."
“I’ve never seen this amount of s--- being used," the official said.
The munitions list was leaked at a time when Trump's immigration forces are facing significant pushback from Congressional lawmakers and the general public. Over the last several weeks, Trump's forces shot and killed two American citizens in Minneapolis and injured dozens of others.
The killings have sparked protests and ignited calls for multiple Trump administration officials to be fired or to resign.
People who have been released from the custody of Trump's immigration officials have also described horrifying scenes inside the administration's detention centers. One autistic woman with a traumatic brain injury who uses a wheelchair to move around described how she was dragged from her car by her arms, resulting in her not being able to lift her arms properly anymore.
She also spoke about how agents mocked her for asking for a wheelchair when she was in the detention facility and ignored her pleas for medical care.
To Klippenstein, the list showed that Trump's officers appeared to be prepared to "battle" protesters rather than conduct immigration operations.
"The list, produced by Border Patrol’s parent agency Custom and Border Protections, shows that the majority of weapons shipped to Minneapolis (and which arrived two weeks ago) are intended to battle protesters," Klippenstein wrote.