Ryan Ecklund dropped his son off at school in Stillwater, then drove to Woodbury, where he lives, to get groceries. When he arrived in the Cub Foods parking lot in Tamarack Village, he said, he saw what were “clearly ICE vehicles.”
Ryan Ecklund (Courtesy of Ryan Ecklund)
“I didn’t start my day by looking for ICE agents to follow or record or anything like that,” Ecklund said.
Ecklund says he was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Monday after following that vehicle. He said the agents forcefully entered his vehicle, slammed him to the ground and took him to the Whipple Federal Building at Fort Snelling, where he was detained for nine hours in a holding cell.
“I wasn’t causing a scene,” Ecklund said. “I didn’t flash my lights or honk my horn or yell anything out my window. I was simply following that vehicle and recording them.”
ICE has been contacted by the Pioneer Press on this matter. A response has not been received. Ecklund referred to the officers as ICE agents but he said they never identified themselves so he can’t be sure what agency they were with.
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Ecklund said when he arrived at the Cub Foods parking lot, he saw a “police-type vehicle with dark-tinted windows, no license plate on the front, an out-of-state plate on the back and a man in tactical gear and a face covering driving the car.”
He said he decided instead of getting groceries to follow the car and start recording. Ecklund said he followed the driver to a different parking lot in the shopping center, then the driver stepped out and took a photo of him.
“I didn’t know it at the time, but it’s very obvious now that they ran my plate or did some sort of facial identification, because they then proceeded to leave that shopping center and drive into the neighborhood that I live in,” Ecklund said.
Ecklund said the driver returned to the shopping center, and when Ecklund followed, the driver stepped out of the vehicle and gave him a verbal warning.
A still image from video taken by Ryan Ecklund on his phone Jan. 12, 2026. (Courtesy of Ryan Ecklund)
“I said, ‘I don’t need a warning,’” Ecklund said. “’I’m a U.S. citizen who’s allowed to record you. I’m not impeding your movement or your investigation. Have a good day.’”
After close to three minutes, Ecklund said he followed the driver east of the shopping center, and an additional black truck turned off of Radio Drive onto Parkside Drive. The two vehicles parked in front of and behind Ecklund, he said. Five ICE agents walked up to his vehicle and opened the car door, Ecklund said. One climbed in the back seat and put his arm around Ecklund’s neck and headrest so he couldn’t move, he said.
Ecklund said he was then put in handcuffs and taken to the Whipple Federal Building, where he saw protesters demonstrating outside the building. He said he was put in a holding cell from 10:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.
“At no point in time was I told why I was being detained,” Ecklund said. “What was told to me by the DHS officers was that I can be detained without being charged for anything for up to 48 hours.”
10-hour panic attack
Ecklund said he requested a phone call, as he was not offered one when interviewed by the Department of Homeland Security officer. He said he called his wife, Tamara Ecklund.
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“I had a 10-hour-long panic attack,” Tamara Ecklund said. “To say that I was terrified is an understatement.”
While her husband was held at the Whipple Federal Building, Ecklund was on the phone with an attorney and posted videos to Instagram, explaining the situation.
“The biggest piece of advice is, if you have a loved one who’s detained, please, please, please seek legal help, because I really think that was the only reason the needle moved for us at all,” she said.
Tamara Ecklund said the killing of Renee Good has had her thinking about how unlawful and unjust it all felt. She said they talked to their 12- and 10-year-old sons about it “and tried to frame it for them in a way that they could comprehend, which is impossible because I can’t comprehend it.”
“When my older son said, ‘Mom, do you think that ICE will come to Woodbury?’ I said, ‘No, honey, I don’t think they will.’ I was wrong,” she said.
A responsibility
Ecklund said that though he has political opinions and personal values, he does not consider himself a political activist.
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“I simply considered it my right and my responsibility to record them (ICE agents) in the event that they did something illegal to somebody else,” Ecklund said. “If my recording them and my presence stopped them from doing something illegal to somebody, then that was my responsibility as a citizen.”
He said a lot of people in his community are terrified of the uncertainty that ICE brings up, especially for immigrants “who are here legally looking for a better life, who are here to work and work hard and continue to build our communities, because they’re built by immigrants.”
“The biggest emotion that I felt was disbelief,” Ecklund said. “I think it’s important that everybody understands that if you think ICE isn’t in your community, you’re mistaken.”
