​U.S. Citizen detained by ICE speaks out

By Bryce Haugen

Not everyone detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is an undocumented immigrant. After a Jan. 12 scuffle at a local Walmart, Tim Catlett, a resident of St. Cloud, Minn., was held at the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building at Fort Snelling in the Twin Cities, despite his U.S. citizenship. He was held in an area designated for citizens. 

Catlett, the technical director for the Paramount Center for the Arts in St. Cloud, is not new to protesting, having been “on the front lines” of activism in New York City following the murder of George Floyd in 2020. He talked to the High Plains Reader about his experience in ICE custody. This interview was edited for length and clarity.

HPR: What were the circumstances of your arrest?

Tim Catlett: (My wife and I) heard (on a Somali Facebook feed) that at the Walmart here in St. Cloud…we heard that something was happening there. So I pulled into the Walmart, which was right on the way. And sure enough, as soon as we got in there, several horns started honking and someone set off their car alarm and there were people with whistles and yelling and all of the chaos you see on videos pretty routinely these days.

I got out of the car in order to assess what was going on and I got verbally assaulted by someone who kind of looked like an agitator; he wasn’t identified in any way. All he had was wraparound sunglasses and that was the only thing to clue me in that he wasn’t a person to engage with, really. And so then I hollered at him and blew my whistle at him and I followed him, because I thought he was an agitator and I wanted to get a photo of his car.

So then I saw that he didn’t have a license plate on the front of his car and I slammed on the gas real quick and they drove their car into me as I was trying to move out of the way. I got upset and started yelling at them and did a couple other things that made them angry. They all jumped out of the car. And I knew I was going to get arrested, so I ran as fast as I could to get away from the group of people.

They tackled me and variously were rough with me, then picked up and dragged and threw me into their truck. I kind of landed on the floorboard. They slammed the door and caught my foot in the door, then pushed me further in.

Then they proceeded to move to two other locations. At one they arrested me and pulled me into the seat of the truck. And at the other, they read me my rights and put me in belly chains and then they put me back into the truck and then drove to Minneapolis.

HPR: Were you scared?

TC: Oh yeah, I was scared. But of course, I didn’t let them know that, because that’s exactly what they want.

They even tried to freeze me out. They were running the air conditioner full blast on the way down and they kept asking me if I was hot. And that was after they had taken my work shirt and my jacket. So I was in a T-shirt and they were all still in their heavy winter jackets and their winter gear but they were running the air conditioner full blast all the way down to Minneapolis.

They brought me to the Bishop Whipple federal detention facility.

HPR: What was it like there?

TC: Honestly it was pretty ridiculous. Obviously it was not comfortable — you wouldn’t expect it to be comfortable — but it was dirty. There was bits of food all over the cell.

I was in a cell with seven other people, all of whom were U.S. citizens. And I come to find out I was in the U.S.C. zone of the detention facility — standing for U.S. citizen. Like I said, there were eight people in my detention cell and I believe there were three (if not four) other cells that also had a number of U.S. citizens in them.

When we went to the bathroom, we were able to see the nominally non-U.S. citizen zone, where there were probably twice as many people being held.

HPR: What were some of the stories of the people you were being held with?

TC: One of them was a real estate broker and he had been following them, not really causing any disruption or anything. He was just following them and at one point they got upset and arrested him just for following them.

Another one was a plumber who was arrested on a job with his work partner because they had been turned in by somebody. But they were U.S. citizens and ICE just showed up and arrested them.

Two of them were two of the people taken at the Somali mall here in St. Cloud.

This other kid was delivering groceries to one of his community members who couldn’t get out to get groceries. So he was delivering groceries to this person and they told him he looked like someone who committed a crime. But he was a U.S. citizen.

HPR: What are your thoughts on ICE detaining U.S. citizens?

TC: First of all, ICE is not a law enforcement agency. That is categorically the truth, so detaining U.S. citizens is absolutely illegal. Trying to arrest U.S. citizens is absolutely illegal. Trying to charge U.S. citizens is absolutely illegal. It is completely inappropriate for them to be engaging with U.S. citizens in any way.

HPR: What are your thoughts on ICE generally? 

TC: I don’t know if I understand quite what their purpose is. I understand that there might be a legitimate purpose, or there was a legitimate purpose early on. But at this point, I don’t think that ICE is anything more than the Gestapo. That is how they’re behaving. I’ve witnessed it myself, obviously, and also in other ways. I have friends and family who have witnessed and dealt with them in various ways and I just don’t think they’re operating within the bounds of law, at a minimum.

But also they are not operating within the bounds of humanity or morality. So as far as I’m concerned, they should be abolished and disbanded.

HPR: What kind of repercussions do you face based on your detention?

TC: What they said to me — one of the Homeland Security agents said to me — is I was being released pending charges, which is interesting because I never had any charging documents. I was never charged with anything.

They did take my phone. In terms of what might happen to me, I actually don’t know.

My attorney feels very strongly that the sum total of nothing is probably going to happen to me because ICE doesn’t have the legal authority to file charges against me. So who knows? We’ll have to see what happens.

HPR: Is there anything else you’d like to add?

TC: Honestly, I just want people to keep making noise. The noise and the attention — highlighting them with video and letting people know what’s happening — it actually works.

As scared as I was, the ICE agents might actually have been more scared, because they acted that way. It wasn’t until we were actually on the road that they started to chill out and cool down and seem comfortable.

As far as I’m concerned, the more we can keep them uncomfortable and keep them out of our community, the better off everybody’s going to be. This is our country. It belongs to us. And we should fight for it.

Email Bryce Haugen at brycevincenthaugen@gmail.com. To confirm an ICE sighting in North Dakota or Minnesota or share how immigration enforcement efforts have affected you or someone you know, contact Alicia Underlee Nelson at alicia@hpr1.com.