Two Twin Cities women who were detained by federal officials in high-profile cases were arrested Wednesday and are federally charged in separate incidents.

Inver Grove Heights paraprofessional Christina Rank, 25, is charged with allegedly following a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement vehicle and causing a collision in her school’s parking lot. Also charged is a 23-year-old Somali-American woman, Nasra Ahmed, who lives in St. Paul and was born in Minnesota. She was previously detained for two days.

Nasra Ahmed, left, and Christina Rank (Frederick Melo / Pioneer Press and courtesy of the Rank family)

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced the arrests of Rank, Ahmed and 14 others on the social media platform X, calling them “Minnesota rioters” for “allegedly assaulting federal law enforcement — people who have been resisting and impeding our federal law enforcement agents.”

Criminal complaints for Rank and Ahmed allege they “forcibly” opposed, impeded or interfered with a federal officer. They were both charged under seal and their cases are now publicly filed.

Christina Rank

Rank’s mother, Sarah Hunkele, previously told the Pioneer Press that her daughter was arrested in the parking lot of the Concord Education Center on Jan. 12 and spent 12 hours in custody at the ICE detention facility at Fort Snelling before being released pending an investigation.

Rank appeared in court on the felony charge Wednesday afternoon and was released pending a future court hearing. Hunkele said her daughter’s attorney was still in court and unavailable for comment.

“The bigger story is the comments made by the AG along with the release of all the mugshots of those individuals in court today,” Hunkele said in a text message to the Pioneer Press. “Our system is innocent until proven guilty and that was not their message.”

According to the criminal complaint, ICE officers were conducting immigration enforcement and parked at Concord Education Center on Broderick Boulevard. Rank drove up in her car and asked the officers, who were wearing “their issued vest carriers which identified them as law enforcement,” whether they were ICE.

When the officers left the parking lot, Rank tailed immediately behind them in her car. After a short drive, with Rank still behind, the officers attempted to re-enter the parking lot. Rank then drove into an oncoming lane and across the parking lot entrance at the same time the officers were turning into the lot, causing the collision, the complaint alleges.

Hunkele had questioned why the ICE agents were at the school, which offers alternative learning services for nine south metro public school districts. She said her daughter has been a paraprofessional at the school for the past seven years, working one-on-one with students with disabilities.

“She’s young,” Hunkele said. “She’s very passionate about her work. She’s very caring. She would never do anything with ill intent.”

Nasra Ahmed

Ahmed is a U.S. citizen who has no documented criminal history in Minnesota. She spoke out after she was previously detained and said: “I gave them my ID since they asked. I did everything they asked.”

Deportation officers on Jan. 14 “were conducting a targeted operation” and “a knock and talk” and were returning to their vehicles when a woman, later identified as Ahmed, yelled obscenities and threw an egg at one of their legs, a Homeland Security Investigations special agent wrote in an affidavit.

The deportation officers approached to arrest her and she “struggled with officers,” spit in an officer’s face and toward another officer, the affidavit said.

Ahmed or her father couldn’t immediately be reached for comment Wednesday afternoon. A personal recognizance bond was issued for Ahmed’s release Wednesday.

A GoFundMe previously established for Ahmed said she was on her way to pick up medication from the pharmacy when she “was violently detained and arrested by federal immigration officers.”

She “was racially abused and called the N-word by one agent,” the GoFundMe said. “After this exchange, multiple agents detained her using excessive force. They grabbed and pinned her to the ground, which left her with several cuts and bruises, and a suspected concussion. Nasra, who also suffers from seizures and has an autoimmune condition, was particularly vulnerable during this ordeal and her condition’s symptoms were exacerbated during her detainment.”

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By FATIMA HUSSEIN

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration’s high-profile deployment of federal troops to six U.S. cities has cost taxpayers roughly $496 million through the end of December, and continued deployment could cost over $1 billion for the rest of the year, according to new data from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

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President Donald Trump has justified sending National Guard troops into U.S. cities as part of an effort to combat crime and support local law enforcement. Critics of the move argue the deployments undermine state and local authority and exceed the president’s authority under the Constitution.

The CBO published the new data estimating the costs associated with the federal deployments of National Guard and active-duty Marines after a request from Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., who is the ranking member on the Senate Budget Committee.

“The American people deserve to know how many hundreds of millions of their hard-earned dollars have been and are being wasted on Trump’s reckless and haphazard deployment of National Guard troops to Portland and cities across the country,” Merkley said in a statement about the CBO report.

Factored into the estimates are troop deployments to Chicago, Memphis, Portland, as well as Los Angeles in June, when protesters took to the streets in response to a blitz of immigration arrests. The CBO said continued deployments to those cities would cost about $93 million per month.

The estimate excludes the military’s December deployment to New Orleans.

For further possible deployments down the road, the CBO estimates deploying 1,000 National Guard personnel to a U.S. city in 2026 would cost $18 million to $21 million per month, depending on the local cost of living.

National Guard troops are expected to remain deployed in Washington throughout 2026, according to a memo reviewed by The Associated Press earlier this month.

The troop deployments have provoked legal challenges from local leaders, and some have been successful. A California federal judge in January ruled that the Trump administration “willfully” broke federal law by sending National Guard units to the Los Angeles area.

A White House representative did not provide an immediate comment on the estimates.

By JONEL ALECCIA

Two suppliers provided dried milk powder that could be a culprit in the outbreak of botulism tied to ByHeart infant formula that has sickened dozens of babies, The Associated Press has learned.

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Organic whole milk powder that tested positive for the type of bacteria that causes botulism was made from milk provided by Organic West Milk Inc., a California company, and processed at a Dairy Farmers of America plant in Fallon, Nevada, company officials said.

The source of the contamination, however, is not yet known. Both companies and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration emphasized that the investigation into the unprecedented outbreak that has sickened 51 babies in 19 states is ongoing.

Bill Van Ryn, an owner of Organic West Milk, said he learned last week that a sample of his company’s milk powder collected by the FDA had tested positive for the germ that causes botulism.

But that doesn’t mean his product is the source of the outbreak, Van Ryn stressed.

“Nothing has been proven about our milk yet,” he said, adding: “Something happened in the process of converting the milk to powder and then in converting it to baby formula.”

Organic West, which supplies milk from 55 farmers, didn’t sell organic whole milk powder to any infant formula maker besides ByHeart, Van Ryn said. The milk company has halted sales of the powder used in any product intended for babies and children until more is known about the source of the outbreak, he added.

Powdered milk is made by pasteurizing liquid milk, concentrating it through evaporation and spraying it into a hot chamber, which causes the water to evaporate and leave behind fine, dry milk particles.

The Dairy Farmers of America is a global dairy cooperative. Its plant in Nevada processes about 1.5 million pounds of raw milk daily into 250,000 pounds of whole milk powder.

The Dairy Farmers of America said in a statement that Organic West was the source of milk for the sample that FDA collected that tested positive for botulism bacteria. The milk was processed into powder that met all required tests, the company said. Organic West subsequently sold the milk powder to ByHeart.

“Manufacturers of end-use consumer products have a responsibility to properly process ingredients to ensure product safety,” the statement read.

FDA officials said on Jan. 23 that a sample of organic whole milk powder collected from a supplier had tested positive for the botulism bacteria, though the agency didn’t identify the supplier. Tests showed that sample was a genetic match to a sample taken from a finished can of ByHeart formula.

The agency also found the bacteria in an unopened can of formula matched a sample from a sick baby — and it also matched contamination detected in samples of milk powder used to make ByHeart formula and collected and tested by the company.

ByHeart officials declined to identify the source of those milk powder samples. The infant formula company has recalled all its products.

Botulism spores are common in the environment and can be found in most foods at very low levels, said Kristin Schill, a botulism expert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Healthy adults consume Clostridium botulinum spores every day without becoming sick. But babies have immature guts that may not be able to prevent the spores from germinating and growing. Once they do, the spores produce a toxin that can cause paralysis and death.

Spores can be found everywhere, including in milk, though typically at low levels, Schill said. Pasteurization doesn’t kill the germs. They can be present in the processing environment, too.

Botulism spores have been found in infant formula in the past, but this is the first large outbreak linked to the product. The risk has been considered so low that testing for botulism in infant formula is not required, though some formula makers voluntarily screen for microbiological signals that could indicate contamination.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

A Minnesota nonprofit and a St. Paul resident filed a class-action lawsuit this week saying she and others are being unlawfully held at the Whipple Federal Building.

The lawsuit challenges U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and federal security officials “for deliberately blocking access to counsel for immigrants detained at the most critical moments of detention,” according to a Wednesday statement. “Many are being transferred out of Minnesota or being pressured to abandon their rights before attorneys have any meaningful opportunity to reach them.”

The suit was filed by the Advocates for Human Rights, which is based in Minneapolis, and a woman identified in the lawsuit by the initials of L.H.M. She has lived in St. Paul since 2019. She is in removal proceedings and has a pending asylum application, according to the lawsuit.

As part of an order of supervision with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, L.H.M. went on Tuesday to the Intensive Supervision Appearance Program offices in Bloomington for a check-in. She was arrested after entering the offices and it’s believed she was detained at the Whipple Building at Fort Snelling.

The woman recently had cranial surgery “and has significant medical needs,” the lawsuit said.

L.H.M.’s family contacted her attorney in her removal and asylum proceedings, who immediately went to the Whipple Building to consult with her and planned to file a habeas petition to have authorities justify her continued confinement.

Officials “refused to allow L.H.M.’s attorney to speak with her,” the lawsuit says.

Federal officials had not filed a response to the lawsuit in federal court as of Wednesday afternoon and a DHS spokesperson did not respond to a message seeking comment.

Whipple Building said to lack beds, ‘adequate toilets’

People who’ve been detained at the Whipple Building “reveal violent arrests, extreme overcrowding, and constant shackling,” according to Wednesday’s statement about the lawsuit. “DHS is further perpetuating these horrific conditions by blocking detainees from accessing legal counsel to seek their freedom.”

Before federal officials started Operation Metro Surge in December, the Whipple Building was used for short-term holding, generally for under 12 hours, according to the lawsuit. It doesn’t have beds, “adequate toilets” or private phones for calls with attorneys, but federal authorities “are now holding some detainees in Whipple for days at a time,” the suit continues.

A 19-year-old reported he was thrown to the ground when he tried to show officers his immigration papers, was not offered an attorney, and was put on a bus and plane and transferred out of the state without being told where he was going.

A refugee living in Minneapolis said he was surrounded by about 20 officers, pulled from his car, mocked by agents and detained in a room that eventually filled with nearly 100 people. He said detainees were forced to sleep standing up near an overflowing toilet.

“He explained that ICE personnel pressured people to sign self-deportation papers and refused to let him speak with a lawyer, even though he believed — correctly — that his refugee status protected him from detention,” the statement said.

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Since at least Jan. 11, federal officials “have not provided detainees at Whipple with constitutionally adequate or statutorily compliant access to counsel,” the lawsuit said. They’ve informed detainees’ attorneys they need to make an appointment to schedule visits, but no one answers phone numbers associated with Whipple or responds to messages sent to their publicly-available email address.

The lawsuit alleges various violations, including of the First Amendment, which “guarantees all persons, including detained immigrants, the right to hire, consult, and communicate with an attorney” and the Fifth Amendment that “guarantees immigration detainees the right to a full and fair hearing in removal cases.”